A worker wears a protective mask at a comic book store in Coral Gables, Florida, U.S., on Monday, ... [+]
The COVID-19 pandemic predictably damaged the comics industry in the United States during its peak months, but the segment as a whole held up surprisingly well, and even experienced significant growth in areas like manga and graphic novels for younger readers. Graphic novels outperformed other book categories across trade book retail channels, seeing weekly gains of as much as 30% over 2019. Independent retailers suffered a major hit over the summer but seem to have recovered ground lately thanks to adopting new sales strategies in the face of the pandemic and local restrictions. This is according to market data shared at the annual ICv2 industry conference held online on Thursday (disclosure: I participated in the conference and contribute to ICv2).
ICv2 President Milton Griepp presented his “State of the Industry” whitepaper with data gathered from sources including Diamond Distributors, point-of-sale system ComicHub, NPD BookScan, interviews, public statement and financial reports from publicly traded companies. The organization collaborates with the independent metrics site Comichron to arrive at overall sales estimates.
Griepp said that in the opening months of 2020, the comics market appeared poised to expand on its record-setting $1.21 billion sales level set in 2019, but the arrival of COVID and the local shutdowns sent sales into a downward spiral. That accelerated through the seven week stretch in April and May when Diamond, at that time the comic industry’s only distributor for periodicals, shut down operations to secure the health of its workforce, leaving retailers with no new product to sell.
Based on data from the 100+ retailers (out of about 1500) who use the ComicHub POS system to track sell through to customers, sales in the comics retail channel plunged 29% over the summer, with sales of comic books down 37%, graphic novels down 18%, and manga down 8%. That was enough to drive at least 93 retailers into closure.
The story was markedly different in the bookstore channel, which now accounts for the majority of comic (mostly graphic novel) sales, surpassing comics retailers for the first time last year. Bookstores have a much larger retail footprint, a more robust online presence, and a more broad-based distribution system, and were able to weather the short term disruptions of COVID-19 relatively well. In fact, according to NPD Bookscan, 2020 sales were tracking fairly close to 2019 comparables until a six week period in the depths of the COVID crisis in late spring, but then rebounded stronger than expected through the remainder of the year to date.
Comic sales by channel 2019 shows bookstores have overtaken comic shops as the top seller of graphic ... [+]
Within the overall book market, the graphic novel category outperformed at all levels; even during the worst periods of uncertainty, sales were up significantly, led by the ultra-hot “juvenile fiction” genre. That subsegment now accounts for 37% of all graphic novels sold through bookstores, followed by manga at 31%. Superheroes, the genre previously associated most closely with American comics, represent only 7% of sales, and saw a 10% dropoff year-over-year from 2019, according to NPD’s Bookscan data.
The strength in the comics-for-kids market comes down to the overwhelming popularity of Dav Pilkey’s Dogman series, which accounted for the three top sellers and six of the top eight as tracked by Bookscan. A new title, Dogman: Grime and Punishment, singlehandedly accounted for a massive spike in sales the week it was released.
According to NPD’s Kristen McLean, the pandemic and the suspension of in-person schools for large numbers of kids this year has fueled unprecedented growth in titles with appeal for young readers, middle years and young adults. She said that trends show parents willing to spend large amounts on their kids’ education and entertainment, even ahead of their own spending needs, during emergencies. Publishers and bookstores were clearly the beneficiaries.
Griepp characterizes the events of 2020 as “five years’ worth of change in a year.” He noted the pandemic accelerated dynamics already at work in the industry and forced publishers, distributors and retailers to face weaknesses in their models that the crisis brought to the fore. Of the “big two” corporate comics publishers, DC Comics took the most visible actions, laying off large numbers of its workforce, making changes in leadership, and moving its distribution away from Diamond to two (now one) retailer-backed newcomers. Marvel, which lost its market share lead to DC, had to react to losing the air cover provided by its cinematic arm as release of several major films was delayed.
Griepp observed that the resilience of the independent retail channel, which had been tested before under different sets of economic strains, had pivoted to embrace new survival strategies including product diversification, online sales and new operating models. While it seems unlikely that 2020 will surpass 2019’s banner revenue, the industry does not seem to be headed for the kind of disaster that looked likely at some points over the spring and summer.
The biggest challenge ahead is finding a place in the retail equation for the millions of readers of Dogman who will eventually age out and start looking for other stuff to read. If comics can hold on to those new readers, 2020 will look like just a bump in the road in the rearview mirror.
