Indie books have frequently had a higher price than the "Big 2". Personally, I have very little problem paying $3.99 for an Indie book that sells < 10,000 copies. Those guys are paying a LOT more on expenses than Marvel (more for printing, for instance, plus Diamond gives retailers less discount on those books than they do on Marvel books, PLUS they are carried by WAY less retailers).HipHopHead wrote: The question I have is can Image, Boom, IDW, Oni Press etc. follow the big two and reduce prices?
Here are the units sold via Diamond for August (which should give a decent estimate of relative #s printed):
Publisher "Total Units"
Marvel Comics 2,693,924
DC Comics 1,819,456
Dark Horse 210,140
Image Comics 201,629
IDW Publishing 201,005
Dynamite Entertainment 121,864
Boom! Studios 70,765
Avatar 35,861
Archie Comics 29,005
Bongo Comics 21,646
Zenescope Entertainment 20,475
Aspen 5,969
Moonstone 5,363
Abstract Studios 4,486
ONI Press 4,105
Titan Publishing 3,723
Kenzer and Company 3,605
GG Studios 2,971
VIZ 2,742
So Marvel did 2.7M units to IDW's 200k units, that's a factor of >13-to-1 , as one example. I'm pretty sure IDW pays more per unit to print their books, this is IN ADDITION to the less total $ they make in selling those fewer units.
So, paying an extra $1 to get a book I enjoy from them is worth it to me.
That said, all bets are off for books I don't like. I'm not going to buy an Indie books JUST to support indies, I have to like it too. But, given I try & like it, the extra $1 is not a barrier for me.
YMMV.