January 2011 Sales Estimates

[runawayboulder]

http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/19327.html

The list came out almost a week ago, I just finally saw it today. FF's big death issue #587, topped the charts as the only title cracking 100K. Everything else was still down. The 2 issues of Brightest Day came in at 2 and 3 and were the only books that cracked 70K. Everything else was no higher than 65K.

Spawn's 200th issue made an appearance at #4.

Avengers sold about 3K less but ranked 4 spots higher, New Avengers remained at #8 (selling 6K less), Secret Avengers is hanging around the top 20 still, selling 3K less and Avengers Academy dropped 3K in sales.

X-Men had a sales boost as it put vampires in it's rear view mirror, going from #19 to #6 on the list and gaining 9K in sales. UXM sold a few hundred less copies than December, Legacy had a small boost in sales but dropped lower in the charts (most likely due to the anniversary issues of Spawn and Iron Man).

ASM #651 and #652 came in at 10 and 14 selling just as much as ASM #650, which came in at 13 the previous month.

 

[Ipodman]

I didn't realise X-Men was so popular... I assumed it to be under at least Batman and Spider-man...

 

[Tron Bonne]

Spawn's 200th issue made an appearance at #4.

As if we didn't have enough signs that the industry's sentence is up

 

[TheCorpulent1]

I'd be upset that Thor is only in the 20s, except now that Fraction's making it really terrible, the 20s are actually too good for it.

 

[Tron Bonne]

I'm just worried that Spawn was able to crap its way to the top 5. I know it's a big numbered anniversary issue and all, but come on....Spawn.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

Chalk it up to the lack of events right now. Or the comic audience's overall suckage for not continuing to buy comics in decent numbers when there aren't events going on.

 

[Tron Bonne]

I chalk it up to the end of comics as we know it

 

[kguillou]

I'm incredibly surprised that X-men is still selling so much, i pretty much thought that franchise's popularity was dead.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

Alas, poor print industry...

 

[Max J Power]

Will the Fantastic Four death issue be a jump-on point for a lot of people, or will it the franchise be back in the 40s or 50s in a few months? I think probably the latter.

 

[kguillou]

Well Marvel's got a few gimmicks in play to keep FF selling high. FF#1 will probably be a big seller, then theres probably gonna be a 50th Anniversary issue coming this Fall, and THEN we've got the big #600 coming early next year. Not to mention Spidey's on the team now, so with those in play FF will probably be a big seller at least for a little while.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

The relaunch as Future Foundation might generate more interest than usual, but I wouldn't count on seeing it stay over 100k. This was a one-time thing because of how big a deal Marvel made over the death of a major character.

 

[Phaedrus45]

Did DC's $2.99 books make any impact this month? I wonder if sales increased at all for these titles.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

DC's series don't seem to be doing any better by quantity than Marvel's on that list.

A surprising thing I just noticed: Invincible Iron Man sold pretty terribly for a centennial issue.

 

[Kirk Langstrom]

You're telling me that Batman, one of the most recognizable comic icons in the world, only has 61,785 readers?

That's...scary.

Those figures are only for comic shops, right? Doesn't include bookstores and grocery stores, etc.,?

 

[TheCorpulent1]

Direct market only, I believe. Although I don't know of many grocery stores that are selling anything besides Archie comics anymore. Bookstores are another story.

 

[Drz]

I'm just worried that Spawn was able to crap its way to the top 5. I know it's a big numbered anniversary issue and all, but come on....Spawn.

It had like a gazillion variants from Jim Lee and others.

 

[runawayboulder]

I didn't realise X-Men was so popular... I assumed it to be under at least Batman and Spider-man...

X-Men books have been hanging around the top 20 for sometime now in some shape or form.

 

[JTStarkiller]

I hate that Snyder's Detective run is so low. That's a shame.

 

[Themanofbat]

Tis a sad day indeed when a Top 20 book barely sells above 40k...

 

[Phaedrus45]

I'm not surprised F4 would be near the top, since probably a few people are like me, and had to buy a second issue because of the dang bagging.

 

[TheCorpulent1]

Oh, right, there are a lot of collector nutjobs out there who buy 2 copies of things...

 

[runawayboulder]

LOL, another child of the 90's. Phaed probably still wears flannel shirts and acid-washed jeans!

 

[Tron Bonne]

It had like a gazillion variants from Jim Lee and others.

It shouldn't matter

 

[nikbackm]

It shouldn't matter

But it does. X-Men #7 also had some six variant covers or so, that's why it got about 10,000 extra sales. Otherwise it would have been some thousand below Uncanny like the previous issues were.

Presumably it works so that a shop has to buy more of the regular issues in order to get the variants, how many depends on the incentive ratio. They then sell the variants expensively to the customers that are willing to pay for them.