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Mike Howell
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 10 August 2006
Location: Canada
Posts: 528
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| Posted: 23 March 2010 at 12:35pm | IP Logged | 1
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No need to search out the issue on my account, I can always do my own research if I want. It makes sense the X-Men would be one or two on every chart in the years you mentioned. I guess I'm curious if as the actual sales rose, did the TCR numbers follow suit in the same manner.
If X-men had 7409 compared to Spider-Man's 4235 in the sampling of comic book stores participating in their survey when Spider-Man was selling 100k+ more books a month, to me it would be interesting to see the TCR sample numbers when X-Men was actually selling more in 1981.
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Rick Senger
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 9652
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| Posted: 23 March 2010 at 12:46pm | IP Logged | 2
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Very interesting numbers. It sounds like those who were more than casual readers (those who sought out direct market specialty shops) were big into X-Men. That tallies with my experience back then. The word on X-Men may not have spread nationwide yet, but among rabid comic fans, it was already a must-have. The other thing that surprises me about this list... I own 20 of the top 100! This was right around the peak of my comic purchasing days, but still, that's a lot of issues to buy each month!! (Though I guess it was only about $10 or so out of pocket, more like the cost of 3 comics today?)
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Jason Czeskleba
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 30 April 2004
Posts: 4548
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| Posted: 23 March 2010 at 2:09pm | IP Logged | 3
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Rick, I bought 32 issues out of the top 50 here (and two more out of the second 50), so you have nothing to be ashamed of. This was also around the peak of my comic-buying days.
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Kevin Moorhead
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 12 August 2008
Location: United States
Posts: 1280
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| Posted: 23 March 2010 at 2:41pm | IP Logged | 4
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I'm surprised that they broke it down to the level of Marvel - Parker Brothers.
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Paul Greer
Byrne Robotics Security
Joined: 18 August 2004
Posts: 14189
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| Posted: 23 March 2010 at 3:18pm | IP Logged | 5
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Interesting list. X-Men was a "cult hit" in terms of newsstand sales but was the clear leader in direct market sales. It is also interesting to see that the direct market ordered heavier on titles like Conan, Warlord and the "mature" magazines like Eerie and Heavy Metal. While at the same time they still ordered a fair share of "younger" titles like Harvey and Archie Comics. It also brings back memories seeing Tony Isabella's Cosmic Comics in Cleveland listed as one of the contributors to this list. Every summer my father would take us into downtown Cleveland and we would do some heavy shopping at Cosmic Comics.
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Joe Hollon
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 08 May 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 13679
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| Posted: 23 March 2010 at 3:39pm | IP Logged | 6
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"First issues were speculated on and did sell much better than average in comic shops back then, but the publishers had yet to start cranking out piles of them because the fan market was still just a tiny percentage of the overall market."
***********
Yeah, by comparison, December 2009 (the most recent month I have data on from CBGextra.com) had three "number one" issues (all of which I would consider fake number ones:
Blackest Night The Flash #1
Blackest Night Wonder Woman #1
Blackest Night JSA #1
Stupid.
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Neil Lindholm
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Joined: 12 January 2005
Location: China
Posts: 4941
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| Posted: 23 March 2010 at 5:15pm | IP Logged | 7
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I have a large amount of these issues as well, since i had just started buying comics a few months before this list was released. That was when I was buying everything I could find at the drug store every week to see what was out there.
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Michael Arndt
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 26 April 2004
Posts: 8558
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| Posted: 23 March 2010 at 6:36pm | IP Logged | 8
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Wow. This list brings back some wonderful memories.
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Joe Zhang
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
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| Posted: 23 March 2010 at 6:58pm | IP Logged | 9
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I was really nice when you could choose just about any Marvel comic at random and be entertained.
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Roy Linfred
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| Posted: 26 March 2010 at 10:57am | IP Logged | 10
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QUOTE:
| Begin with the fact that X-MEN during my tenure was never anywhere near the Number One spot, and in fact was so much lower it was always just a few steps ahead of cancelation, and that list kinda falls apart, doesn't it? |
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I was curious about this so I did some research. I tried to find as much sales data as I could on 14 titles from 1978-1985.
The fourteen were.
Amazing Spider-Man
Avengers
Captain America
Conan
Daredevil
Defenders
Fantastic Four
Incredible Hulk
Iron Man
Marvel Team-Up
Spectacular Spider-Man
Star Wars
Thor
Uncanny X-Men
In 1978 X-Men averaged 115,260 copies a month. It was 7th out of 7 titles.
In 1979 X-Men averaged 171,091 copies a month. It was 9th out of 11 titles
In 1980 X-Men averaged 191,927 copies a month. It was 9th out of 12 titles, but only 25,000 copies a month from fifth.
In 1981 X-Men averaged 259,007 copies a month. It was 1st out of 14 titles.
The last three JB issues are counted in this data*, and using mathmatical trending, his last issue was probably outsold by three other Marvel titles.(Amazing, Avengers, and Star Wars).
It was #1 the next four years.
1982 - 313,225 average
1983 - 336,824 average
1984 - 378,135 average
1985 - 449,870 average *I know you left X-Men in calendar year 1980, but some of your work spills into sales year 1981.
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
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| Posted: 26 March 2010 at 11:08am | IP Logged | 11
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1981:Fantastic Four sold 192, 731 per month•• Where did you find that number?
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Brian Joseph Mayer
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 10 December 2009
Location: United States
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| Posted: 26 March 2010 at 11:49am | IP Logged | 12
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Wow, seems unbelievable. Just looking at only the top 20 books, we are talking about an average inventory of 2000 books coming into the shops per month.
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Topic Closed)
