Marvel did not cause this recession. Neither did Apple, Microsoft, Coca-Cola, Hasbro, or any other company out there making products and trying to make a profit. The banking system, along with idiot home-buyers did.
Marvel is not a non-profit getting a tax exemption. If they were, I would 100% agree with you. If they took bailout money (remember that banking industry), I would 100% agree with you. But they aren't. They are a publicly traded company whose shareholders actually want them to make as much ROI as humanly possible.
To say that profit-producing companies like Marvel (or DC, or Image) who actually produce something should boulder the burden of the recession, while execs at places like Goldman Sachs, take public money, post a profit, and return to business as usual (bonuses) is unfair, to say the least.
And to suggest that they should hold back on increasing revenues as some kind of charity gesture, would be no different than my boss suggesting to me that I not take my raise this year, because the economy is bad. And that's my fault how?
Now, again, I'm not saying this is a wise move, for the same reasons you cite. And I could probably name a few more that make this a risky business decision. But I absolutely support them in making pricing choices. And if fans don't like it, well, I'm taking a trip to Russia in a few weeks. I'll come back and report on the thriving comics business in a place that did believe that price controls were the way to go.
See, here I thought there is a middle ground between socialism and Scrooge style, "one coal ember for heat a month is more than enough for the peons" capitalism. Since when did I say Marvel caused the recession?
Although Marvel has had a few cynical cash grabs now and again that have put retailers in the middle. The commercial success of CAPTAIN AMERICA #600, for instance, is debatable. Some shops made a killing. Others have $4 books in the dozens they can't move or return. But I guess since we're all capitalists, the struggles of retailers in this market, a shrinking market, are worthless to consider.
The price hikes don't only effect customers; they effect retailers, too. They buy comics from Diamond at about 50% cover price; when said cover price jumps IN ONE LEAP some 50%, that increases retailer's costs. Retailers, unlike the government and to a greater degree than mega corporations that toss around figures like "a half billion" like water, have a thing called a "budget". If it costs more to buy, say, 30 copies of NEW AVENGERS, that means something has to be cut, and the margin for error is less. The result? Most new launches are DOA because shops can't gamble on them while shelling out more for the books that do move like HULK or NEW AVENGERS that would move regardless of price. The result, if you look at sales charts since the price hikes, is that the Top 100 has become more, shall we say, "capitalist"; the gap between top sellers and books nearing cancellation numbers is widening. Books that sell under 40,000 copies make the Top 50 now. That was impossible in 2007. Basically what has happened is the price gouges, ironically on the titles with no sales trouble rather than failing books to recoup profits that were lost by dimming sales, is that the big books have become larger cash hogs, eating more slop than the smaller pigs.
My point is that while Marvel didn't cause the recession, they still are a cog floating in it's waters. Now may not be the best time to so blatently test the patience of fans, many of whom may have lost wages, work hours, or jobs. Notice that DC also has done price hikes, but immediately launched a campaign of, "we'll add back up strips so you get value for your extra buck on those $4.99 titles" and the outcry has been far less. Marvel never once thought of doing that until DC beat them to it, and that is telling. The notion of giving fans value for their money, instead of taking them for as much as the threshold will allow, was almost akin to a chimp discovering their own reflection; took too long by rational human standards. Comic book licenses are big; comic book selling itself is a cottage, fragile industry, and I don't see toying with it's diminishing and aging fans as being in long term interest. I'm 27, and I'm at the high end of average for a comic fan's age. But then again, bankers never thought their system would collapse, either. I'm sure the boys at 90's Marvel never thought relying on trading cards for 48% of sales profits would ever crumble, either. The Obama Spidey issue sold over a half million copies for novelty range. Nice cash grab. But how many fans did it create for ASM without that gimmick? Zero. Not a solitary ONE person. The fact that Marvel and DC have long ago lost the struggle for new fans to manga is a quiet scandal. The fact that Marvel and DC's only strategy of getting new fans is to hope their old ones procreate and pass down the hobby to a new generation is so obvious, it wouldn't be unreasonable if one of those two companies started funding a "geek to geek" style dating service. It is their ONLY hope of getting anyone too young to drink into a comic shop for anything other than manga or Yu Gi Oh cards.
Had Marvel spent a year slowly building price ranges, the outcry would have been less. Instead, they played a game of, "Let's see how much the suckers will pay" and then don't flat out admit it when asked. The Joe Q EIC tenure has seen the rise of Marvel as a more profitable company, and many good creative decisions. It's the PR department that still needs work. Hiring a coach to give lessons on how not to seem condescending or arrogant in an interview would probably be worth the price of a workshop or two. I mean, it's not like they can't afford it.
Again, I would love to see Joe Q, on the street, trying to convince anyone under 18 to pay him $4 for a comic book without outright lying (such as saying it will be "worth something someday"). It'd be a YouTube classic.
Again, if a comic is more than 22 pages, I usually will justify the $3.99 price and often do in reviews. It's the books that don't that sometimes earn some ire. Is it really worth paying more for THOR because it's over 600 issues now? Really?
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