ICV2 has had the May 2010 sales estimates in full for a few weeks now:
http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/17681.html
Yes, AVENGERS #1 was the top book of the month, with over 163k copies sold. But, SECRET AVENGERS did have a very strong debut; over 106k. And a 2nd print in July will only add to that. Expecting it to outsell Bendis' core title was a stretch, but this is still an excellent debut. It outsold BRIGHTEST DAY #1, after all. It VASTLY outsold NEW AVENGERS FINALE #1.
http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/17679.html
Sales in May 2010 for monthly comics were up 15%, which negates April's drop. Trade sales are still down 13%, and this time it can't be blamed on the slow-down of WATCHMEN purchases. But if you look at raw numbers, it becomes very clear that the Top 5-20 comics are really driving the market, if not the Top 10. In healthy months, you have 5 books that sold at least 100k copies, as this one did. In poor months, you have maybe 1 comic that sold that many. But look at the disparity down the Top 300 list. ASTONISHING X-MEN: XENOGENESIS #1 sold under 55,500 copies and made the Top 25; that would have been impossible in, say, 2008. BOOSTER GOLD #32 actually made the Top 100 list (at #100) with sales of under 20,400 copies. Let me tell you, even in 2009, a book that sold under 21,000 copies would have been unlikely to crack the Top 100. RUNAWAYS for most of the Vaughan/Alphona run used to hover around 22k-24k and in the Top 90-95; these days it might have made the Top 85 with those tallies. IMMORTAL IRON FIST was treated like a sagging title when it's sales dropped to about 27k-35k an issue; with those numbers now it would have probably cracked the Top 55. The point I am trying to make is that both Marvel and DC, but mostly Marvel, via flooding the market and demanding $4 price tags for so many "hot" books that retailers MUST buy are basically eliminating the middle class of comics. They are slowly but surely creating a market where you have comics that sell like gangbusters, and comics that barely make a profit, and few in between; less and less every quarter. They fail to realize that retailers have a thing called a "budget", and if it suddenly costs 50% more to order issues of AVENGERS or DC EVENT MINI #45.A, then they will take the money that they used to use to buy other books and use it for the big books, thus causing a drop in sales for anything that ISN'T a top book. Retailers have also become hesitant with ordering tie-in's (a lot of MESSIAH COMPLEX issues have had to be reprinted due to this), and most franchises that used to support 1-2 spin off's now can barely remain hot with one core title, such as Wolverine or Spider-Man. These simple economic realities that you and I and the hobo on the street corner wetting himself know are akin to having a 12th Level Intellect for the bigwigs at the Big Two. And that's appalling. It is frankly appalling when a common person on the street probably knows more about the economic reality of the comic book market, or at least as much, as someone whose life's profession is to master it and who earns a handsome living doing so. But I suppose that's true of many things. I'd trust the common sense of a random name out of the phone book over an elected career politician any day.
I mean, AVENGERS: THE INITIATIVE #35 actually made the Top 50 with under 39k. Unless you have been following numbers for the last 2-4 years like I have, do you appreciate how startling that is. THE ORDER #1 debuted at 50k in the middle of THE INITIATIVE promotion and it BARELY made the Top 50. Nowdays a 50k launch would land you smack into the Top 30.
My prediction is that the Big Two will act like masters of the universe until the direct market finally reaches some sort of crash or obvious long term decline as has been apparent for years. And everyone will look at the raw data and go, "this has been so obvious to anyone with eyes and a 1st grade education, how did you guys not know it was going to end this way?" And as always, the bigwigs will go, "Duh, 'cause we thought we wuz special?" And then everyone will want to know where it started, how it started, why, when, connect the dots, etc. Like no one can see it coming. In life, sometimes you don't get a sudden, shocking bolt of lightening. You get something that starts small and only becomes a catastrophe after neglect, incompetence, and ignorance that borders on insanity, stupidity, or masochism. And I hate it when I think comics could go that way.
But, by all means May 2010 was a good month. Brubaker cemented his A-List status with that 106k studly launch of SECRET AVENGERS; now let's hope the "drop off" for the 2nd issue isn't too drastic (any drop behind 25% from issue one is cause for concern). THOR continues to sell in the Top 20, which is good because Marvel is about to spam him with about 4 comics a month soon like Deadpool, since a film is up in under a year. The experiment with swapping Logan for Daken and the fall of sales for WOLVERINE: WEAPON X have been so sharp that Wolverine finally may be settling into B-List status and eventually Marvel may figure out that he's long past his prime and give us less of him. Loeb's HULK continues to drop in sales and the gap between it and Pak's INCREDIBLE HULK narrows every month (this month the difference is about 3k). While DEADPOOL is no AVENGERS, considering how much Marvel have spammed him, he's at least remained stable with some 35k-41k sellers for now. AGE OF HEROES #1 debuting at over 33k for what was basically a $4 promotional anthology (with a reprint due) isn't so bad at all. ATLAS #1's debut of over 22,700 copies is above the sales of AVENGERS VS. ATLAS #4, which was 14k, but not so high above that we should be assuming it last 12 issues yet (sadly). Unfortunately, a lot of Marvel titles continue to drop between 5-10% a month, which is bad for long term declines. "Standard decline" that is considered healthy is usually around 1-4% a month for long term, healthy titles in a healthy market. The sheer amount of Marvel titles whose sales have fallen at least 25% within the last 6 months is disturbing, or should be. At least in a world where people had some sense of business.
Now, of course, there are too many great books that sell poorly. ATLAS #1 really should do better. I would have loved it if SECRET AVENGERS #1 was the top dog. Hell, PRINCE OF POWER #1 barely made the Top 100 at 20k, and that's a damn shame. But my point is that if you want great books to at least have respectable numbers, for retailers to order enough of them that readers may get to try them out, then a feast-or-famine, nobles and serfs style of market isn't ideal.
For those of you tired of Spider-Man and Wolverine, though, I honestly think both of their franchises are the weakest they've been in a while. Spider-Man's healthier, as ASM usually sells about 52k-57k per issue three times a month, although it has no ability to sell a spin-off; WEB OF SPIDER-MAN (as well as any Spidey Anthology series attempted in the last few years) is out of the Top 100 in a year. And when WOLVERINE: ORIGINS becomes the flagship title of the Wolverine franchise, you KNOW Logan's lagging. He literally sells far better in Avengers or X-Men titles than he does alone, and that didn't use to be true. Heck, Logan even sells better teamed up with Spider-man in an ASTONISHING mini than alone. Considering Marvel seems to be making honest motions to expand and grow from their Avengers franchise, which leads into others like Thor and Captain America, this may not be a bad thing.
Still, about 5 times the audience for NOVA got to see the character in SECRET AVENGERS, and all he got to do was get brainwashed.
