Your "Why-The-Direct-Market-Sucks" Reading Of The Day
The latest installment of Brian Hibbs' "
Tilting
at Windmills" column in up at Newsarama. He examines several
recent topics of note: CrossGen's ongoing, increasing woes; the
move of
Powers and
Kabuki from Image to
Marvel; and Tokyopop's recent exclusive distribution arrangement with
Diamond. It's the last topic that's the most interesting to me,
as it provides concrete examples of how the Direct Market works.
One example in particular seems to shed some light on why indie books
aren't well-represented in many comic shops:
For example, for books that are offered with a “H”
code, your discount is the “Lower of 40% or Standard Discount”. Thus,
if you were a “55% account” (like I am), you’d still only get 40% from
Diamond on Drawn & Quarterly or TwoMorrows. Most publishers are
evenly split between “E” (50%) and “”F” (45%)
Now the thing is, this only applies to orders submitted through
Previews, otherwise Diamond assesses a 3% reorder fee. That means that
every trade paperback I reorder, Diamond gets an extra 3% of the cover
price, if you can believe that.
Interestingly enough, understanding what a huge drag this is upon
growing the backlist, the brokered publishers actually eat this fee
themselves. That is to say, they pay it (or a reasonable facsimile
thereof) to Diamond rather than making the retailer pay for it.
So, in other words, while I can buy a DC and Image TP at 55% and Marvel
one for 54% off, when I buy a Drawn & Quarterly TP from Diamond, I
only get 37% off the cover price (base discount of 40% minus the 3%
reorder fee)
And people wonder why independent books don’t sell better?
Sounds like a factor to me. (There's much more in the piece,
including why the Tokyopop deal might end up being a worse arrangement
for many retailers despite the higher maximum discount through Diamond,
so go read it if you want to understand some of the difficulties comic
retailers face in navigating the labyrinth that is the Direct Market.)
