May 2014 Sales Discussion

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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by leonmallett »

iwantvaliant wrote::popcorn:
:D
VEI - I look forward to you one day publishing MORE than 9-10 books per month

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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by Keith »

iwantvaliant wrote::popcorn:
Dang... thats what I was looking for!

:popcorn: :popcorn: :popcorn:
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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by FormerReader »

Knob Row wrote:VEI is absolutely not making money if they average less than 10,000 copies
I think VEI was aware it would take time to grow their readership and have a long term plan. These numbers are comparble to other smaller publishers.

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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by ilzuccone »

Knob Row wrote:http://www.comichron.com/monthlycomicss ... 14-04.html

April 2014 Valiant sales info
RANK TITLE ISSUE SALES
73 Rai #1 29,137
194 Unity #6 9,351
205 XO #24 8,595
211 Harbinger #22 8,213
216 A&A #19 7,969
219 Q&W #9 7,896

VEI 4/12 to 4/14 = 24 months
VH2 2/97 - end 10/98 = 21 months

VEI is absolutely not making money if they average less than 10,000 copies and 25,000 copies for a #1 reboot. And 10,000 copies is less than late VH 1 or VH2 print runs.

A comic book costs $4.00. $2.00 to the retailer, how much for printing and distributing??? $1.50? This leaves 50 cents to VEI per copy X 10,000 copies = $5,000 from book sales.

You cannot make a comic book for $5,000. The penciller alone should get $5,000 just for pencil art! Think about it- $5,000 per issue, 12 issues = $60,000 a year income which is what run of the mill artists make. Penciling is time consuming and doing a series is a full time job. So unless they're paying in Yen, I have no idea how they're getting the overhead to producing a book that's going to return $5,000.

Another thing I recently realized- VEI pretended they were making a Harbinger movie just to see if Jim Shooter or anyone else would claim ownership. With no one claiming it, they then started making the comics. You folks were all lied to and led on.

I had a bad feeling when I heard there was going to be a relaunch in 2012 by VEI because I was afraid they wouldn't have enough glue to hold together a universe without the three central GK characters including Solar, who created all VALIANT universes.

I sure hope this post stays here and does not fall into a black hole, call me the harbinger of doom.
Come on just do some research on pay rates and percentages before you start adding up numbers and calling it impossible.

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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by kjjohanson »

Knob Row wrote:http://www.comichron.com/monthlycomicss ... 14-04.html

April 2014 Valiant sales info
RANK TITLE ISSUE SALES
73 Rai #1 29,137
194 Unity #6 9,351
205 XO #24 8,595
211 Harbinger #22 8,213
216 A&A #19 7,969
219 Q&W #9 7,896

VEI 4/12 to 4/14 = 24 months
VH2 2/97 - end 10/98 = 21 months

VEI is absolutely not making money if they average less than 10,000 copies and 25,000 copies for a #1 reboot. And 10,000 copies is less than late VH 1 or VH2 print runs.

A comic book costs $4.00. $2.00 to the retailer, how much for printing and distributing??? $1.50? This leaves 50 cents to VEI per copy X 10,000 copies = $5,000 from book sales.

You cannot make a comic book for $5,000. The penciller alone should get $5,000 just for pencil art! Think about it- $5,000 per issue, 12 issues = $60,000 a year income which is what run of the mill artists make. Penciling is time consuming and doing a series is a full time job. So unless they're paying in Yen, I have no idea how they're getting the overhead to producing a book that's going to return $5,000.

Another thing I recently realized- VEI pretended they were making a Harbinger movie just to see if Jim Shooter or anyone else would claim ownership. With no one claiming it, they then started making the comics. You folks were all lied to and led on.

I had a bad feeling when I heard there was going to be a relaunch in 2012 by VEI because I was afraid they wouldn't have enough glue to hold together a universe without the three central GK characters including Solar, who created all VALIANT universes.

I sure hope this post stays here and does not fall into a black hole, call me the harbinger of doom.
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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by leonmallett »

Also, those costs put forth by Knob Row don't factor in digital sales (unknown) or tpb/collected edition sales which will top up the income.
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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by kjjohanson »

leonmallett wrote:Also, those costs put forth by Knob Row don't factor in digital sales (unknown) or tpb/collected edition sales which will top up the income.
Also doesn't figure in that an artist makes a decent amount of income by reselling the original art.
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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by bygranddesign »

Not an expert on Artist salaries but just doing a little research .. its more like 20-30K on average for most artists.

And more times than not, they get paid on a per page basis. 100 bucks per page. So if Pere Perez pencils a year worth of A&A - he probably gets $100 per page - 22 pages per issue + 12 total issues = 26,400 in yearly pay.

But like KJ said - an artist will also makes money on commissions, selling his art work and other projects that he probably works on.

No way Valiant is paying an artist 60K salary a year ... Marvel and DC might pay 40K salary for a big artist.
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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by Keith »

I wonder if there is a Prophet of Doom over on some Zenescope fansite... all their comics are under 6,000 for April. Clearly it's curtains for them! CURTAINS!! :bugeyed:
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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by Keith »

Maybe not the best way to look at the numbers, but here are average number of issues sold for April 2014:

Valiant: 93,488 / 9 titles = 10,387

Let's look at the competition (based on the top 400 titles ranking):

Avatar: 78,316 / 10 titles = 7,831
IDW: 294,376 / 39 titles = 7,548
Dyna: 206,205 / 29 titles = 7,110
Boom: 135,636 / 21 titles = 6,165
Zene: 58,417 / 12 titles = 4,868

Did this just for curiosity sake.
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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by ilzuccone »

bygranddesign wrote:Not an expert on Artist salaries but just doing a little research .. its more like 20-30K on average for most artists.

And more times than not, they get paid on a per page basis. 100 bucks per page. So if Pere Perez pencils a year worth of A&A - he probably gets $100 per page - 22 pages per issue + 12 total issues = 26,400 in yearly pay.

But like KJ said - an artist will also makes money on commissions, selling his art work and other projects that he probably works on.

No way Valiant is paying an artist 60K salary a year ... Marvel and DC might pay 40K salary for a big artist.
yeah these rates are closer to reality. maybe a bit more. I was told an entry level colorist is at 100 or 150. color is below pencils in rate.

also lets be honest valiant has been saving some money on artists the last year. there has been a slump in the level of talent compared to 2012.


also. END OF LINE! if valiant does dry up and disappear it will most likely be because a film doesn't turn a big enough profit. this happens all the time.

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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by ilzuccone »

Keith wrote:Maybe not the best way to look at the numbers, but here are average number of issues sold for April 2014:

Valiant: 93,488 / 9 titles = 10,387

Let's look at the competition (based on the top 400 titles ranking):

Avatar: 78,316 / 10 titles = 7,831
IDW: 294,376 / 39 titles = 7,548
Dyna: 206,205 / 29 titles = 7,110
Boom: 135,636 / 21 titles = 6,165
Zene: 58,417 / 12 titles = 4,868

Did this just for curiosity sake.
do you work in public relations? that's a great spin on the situation!

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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by jedimarley »

Let's be honest. VEI will fail long before that if Peter Cuneo pulls his $30 million in funding.
He is a recognized leader in business turnarounds.  He has completed seven turnarounds of distressed branded businesses in the global media.
Three years into the relaunch and numbers are trending down.
Pete strikes me as a bottom line type of guy.
If Armor Hunters is a flop I see him pulling out and cutting his losses.

Without that working capital...

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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by FormerReader »

jedimarley wrote:Let's be honest. VEI will fail long before that if Peter Cuneo pulls his $30 million in funding.
He is a recognized leader in business turnarounds.  He has completed seven turnarounds of distressed branded businesses in the global media.
Three years into the relaunch and numbers are trending down.
Pete strikes me as a bottom line type of guy.
If Armor Hunters is a flop I see him pulling out and cutting his losses.

Without that working capital...
I'm all for being honest if the company is folding, but we're not there. Let's not pretend we are. I'm pretty sure he didn't become successful because he gave up due to adversity. No one thought it would be easy. He is not going anywhere anytime soon. He would not have invested his money if he didn't think he would see a return on it.

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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by ilzuccone »

jedimarley wrote:Let's be honest. VEI will fail long before that if Peter Cuneo pulls his $30 million in funding.
He is a recognized leader in business turnarounds.  He has completed seven turnarounds of distressed branded businesses in the global media.
Three years into the relaunch and numbers are trending down.
Pete strikes me as a bottom line type of guy.
If Armor Hunters is a flop I see him pulling out and cutting his losses.

Without that working capital...

interesting. I don't know anything about this guy. but armchair speculation tells me peter cuneo is looking to get film money. Nobody invests in comics. comics are dead. so this supports my earlier idea of waiting to see how they do in hollywood before we start talking about the end of the line.

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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by kjjohanson »

jedimarley wrote:Let's be honest. VEI will fail long before that if Peter Cuneo pulls his $30 million in funding.
Where do you get that figure from? I can't imagine that the overhead for VEi was anywhere near that much.

Or is that just an estimate of what his fortune is?
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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by ilzuccone »

kjjohanson wrote:
jedimarley wrote:Let's be honest. VEI will fail long before that if Peter Cuneo pulls his $30 million in funding.
Where do you get that figure from? I can't imagine that the overhead for VEi was anywhere near that much.

Or is that just an estimate of what his fortune is?
Good question!

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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by rjrjr »

Knob Row wrote:http://www.comichron.com/monthlycomicss ... 14-04.html

April 2014 Valiant sales info
RANK TITLE ISSUE SALES
73 Rai #1 29,137
194 Unity #6 9,351
205 XO #24 8,595
211 Harbinger #22 8,213
216 A&A #19 7,969
219 Q&W #9 7,896
220 Shadowman End Times #1 7,777
224 Bloodshot & Hard Corps #21 7,630
245 Eternal Warrior #8 6,920

I had to check to confirm that these are last months numbers (which is why the chart shows April 2014, duh). Obviously, Rai 1 helped the numbers for Valiant. Rai 1 sold almost as many copies than the bottom 4 titles combined! All this tells me is VEI is very smart to start renumbering their titles with new number 1s and the May numbers should be interesting.

I was surprised at how quickly Unity fell below the 10,000 mark. Outside of that, I don't see anything abnormal with last months numbers.
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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by bygranddesign »

Keith wrote:Maybe not the best way to look at the numbers, but here are average number of issues sold for April 2014:

Valiant: 93,488 / 9 titles = 10,387

Let's look at the competition (based on the top 400 titles ranking):

Avatar: 78,316 / 10 titles = 7,831
IDW: 294,376 / 39 titles = 7,548
Dyna: 206,205 / 29 titles = 7,110
Boom: 135,636 / 21 titles = 6,165
Zene: 58,417 / 12 titles = 4,868

Did this just for curiosity sake.
And even if you took out Rai #1 from the equation .. the sales per average of the other 8 titles(8,043) is still greater than all those other companies.
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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by bygranddesign »

We haven't even gotten to the May sales numbers yet - which is the purpose of this thread

The April sales numbers were already discussed in this thread: viewtopic.php?f=1&t=43337&start=50" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

For all the folks that think the end is near, In that thread I post a list of well known comics / critically acclaimed comics .. that are below EW (our worst selling title that month).
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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by kjjohanson »

Knob Row wrote:http://www.comichron.com/monthlycomicss ... 14-04.html

April 2014 Valiant sales info
RANK TITLE ISSUE SALES
73 Rai #1 29,137
194 Unity #6 9,351
205 XO #24 8,595
211 Harbinger #22 8,213
216 A&A #19 7,969
219 Q&W #9 7,896

VEI 4/12 to 4/14 = 24 months
VH2 2/97 - end 10/98 = 21 months

VEI is absolutely not making money if they average less than 10,000 copies and 25,000 copies for a #1 reboot. And 10,000 copies is less than late VH 1 or VH2 print runs.

A comic book costs $4.00. $2.00 to the retailer, how much for printing and distributing??? $1.50? This leaves 50 cents to VEI per copy X 10,000 copies = $5,000 from book sales.

You cannot make a comic book for $5,000. The penciller alone should get $5,000 just for pencil art! Think about it- $5,000 per issue, 12 issues = $60,000 a year income which is what run of the mill artists make. Penciling is time consuming and doing a series is a full time job. So unless they're paying in Yen, I have no idea how they're getting the overhead to producing a book that's going to return $5,000.

Another thing I recently realized- VEI pretended they were making a Harbinger movie just to see if Jim Shooter or anyone else would claim ownership. With no one claiming it, they then started making the comics. You folks were all lied to and led on.

I had a bad feeling when I heard there was going to be a relaunch in 2012 by VEI because I was afraid they wouldn't have enough glue to hold together a universe without the three central GK characters including Solar, who created all VALIANT universes.

I sure hope this post stays here and does not fall into a black hole, call me the harbinger of doom.
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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by Bone-A-Fach-ee »

Man, you guys are worse than the right wing conservative media. None of these claims have any basis. You're spreading nonsense.
Forget about this being a comic company. As a BUSINESS, you have to have a layout for anywhere from 3-5 years. They have income coming in, and more on the way. They are successful. If they weren't making money, if no one was buying the books, that'd be a different story. But they are a TOP 10 PUBLISHER. They have merchandise, and as someone else pointed out, TPB's, Hardcovers, digital sales, etc.
If they weren't making money, they wouldn't be spending thousands of dollars on exhibiting at conventions, and giving away books to everyone who attends a panel, or does something nice for them.
And who is the one who said Peter Cuneo gave Valiant $30million? Where did you get that information from?

Seriously, just enjoy reading the books if you do. If you don't, then I don't know why you're on these boards.
:rant:

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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by FormerReader »

Bone-A-Fach-ee wrote:
Seriously, just enjoy reading the books if you do. If you don't, then I don't know why you're on these boards.
:rant:
:high-five:

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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by dino »

This thread is amazing! :lol:

Completely devoid of accurate facts but amazing nonetheless :high-five:

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Re: May 2014 Sales Discussion

Post by ilzuccone »

sales threads are the best. :P


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