by Brian Hibbs
(#150
– October 2006 – “Quality of Life”)
Kinda
freaky, this is the one-hundred-and-fiftieth Tilting at Windmills
– I wrote 117 of them for Comics Retailer magazine, and this
here is number 33 for Newsarama – I really never thought, all those
years ago, that I’d ever make it this far.
If
this was a comic, this would probably be a special double-sized
issue where there’s some sort of big change in the status quo. If
it were a Marvel comic, we’d go back to our original numbering
this column [or just start dual numbering - ed], probably
followed by yet another relaunch at #1
within a year. (Just how many times has there been a Captain
America #1, anyway?)
But,
nah, I’m not that well-organized or clever.
In
fact, I don’t really have much of a topic in mind this month – there
hasn’t been much big controversial news that needs weighing in on;
and “fat and happy” isn’t really the best state for an opinion column,
anyway, is it?
So,
let’s just bounce through a couple of small things that I would
put in the “quality of life” category – topics that are relatively
minor, but have an annoying impact on the day-to-day running of
a store.
* * *
I’m,
by and large, a supporter of “art for art’s sake”, where we allow
creative minds to do creative things, not worrying about the market
so much. Some of the medium’s greatest successes have come out of
unfettered creativity be let run wild.
On
the other hand, periodical comics are a discrete physical unit designed
to be sold and marketed, and impediments created by the physical
packaging to those sales, aren’t in anyone’s best interest: creator,
retailer or publisher.
While
they’re far from the only publisher/imprint that does it, I think
some of my greatest frustrations come from Vertigo’s cover designs.
Sometimes the logo is at the top of the book, sometimes the bottom,
sometimes up the side. The issue number moves around the cover,
willy nilly, never in the same place twice, or so it seems.
There
are times I have daydreams about going out to New York, and taking
the last decade of Vertigo’s output and dumping it on Karen Berger’s
desk, all mixed up, and completely out of order, and telling her
she’s got to put them in alpha-numeric order. And that she…. hm,
can’t have lunch, maybe?... until she does so. I’m betting dinner is the first meal
that day.
(Note:
I really like Karen, and I really like Vertigo’s output, and I’m
only picking on them because I’m a tremendous jerk)
Comics
aren’t just on the racks the month they come out. I think a lot
of people forget this. Once they come off the racks, they live forever
in the back issue boxes of your local comics shop. Forever,
man. That new issue of Hellblazer
where the issue number is in the bottom right corner? Ten
years from now when I have to file that in the bins (Well, hopefully
not that exact copy, but you know what I mean), that’s going
to slow me down, and piss me off.
Look
at a back issue bin, or a comic long box. They have to be generally
full so the books don’t fall over and damage themselves, right?
When paging through a box of comics, you generally can’t see more
than the top third of the cover – and in a particularly tight box,
it’s probably more like the top sixth. From any kind of an archival
point-of-view, the basic title/price/issue information needs to
all be in that top sixth so you’re not driving people insane down
the decades as they try to file your comics.
Honestly,
I still scream anytime I have to do inventory of that year-to-18
month period (’93 or ’94, I think) when Marvel decided to hide the
issue numbers of their entire line. And I barely handle back issues.
I can’t imagine what a nightmare it has to be for anyone seriously
in that side of the business.
Even
as still a “new” comic, being loosey-goosey
with the design has a negative impact. We rack our Vertigo books
on one of those old-fashioned “waterfall” “Hey Kids, Comics!” wire
racks (you know the kind I’m talking about, right?) – only the top half of the cover is visible. When the book’s
logo isn’t on the top half of the book, the book may as well be
invisible – and our sales patterns reflect that. I’m not a huge
fan of selling 10-15% fewer copies of a title because some designer
decided to try to make a book “stand out” (hah, the irony)
Like
I said, it’s not just Vertigo, it is just that they do it more frequently than most
other publishers. I strongly believe that, barring some sort of
really compelling reason, the title should always be on the
top of a book, oriented to the left hand side of the cover, and
price and issue information should either be in the top left or
top right corners.
Think
of the children!
* * *
Along
the same lines, you know what I really miss? The old school “floating
heads” corner boxes that used to be standard on Marvel and DC comics.
You know the ones? Where you could just scan the racks quickly and
immediately the stuff you followed jumped right at you because you
saw the Spider-Man head or whatever?
I’ve
been thinking this especially because of the explosion of titles
from Marvel and DC. Most stores really have a finite amount of rack
space, and rack slots don’t expand just because a publisher expands
their production. For stores that just dead-drop books in straight
alphabetical this is less of a problem, but I have my racks as “boutiques”
– I have a “crime” shelf, a “horror” shelf, author foci like “Alan
Moore” and “Bendis!” and “Garth Ennis”,
and so on. There is a fixed and rigid amount of space for the, say,
“DC Superhero comics” boutique (Barring a rotational end-cap display
like we’re doing now for 52) – and, in order to give more
linear rack space to “DC Superhero comics”, I’d have to remove
the “crime” section (for example).
Well,
I’m not at all willing to do that, mostly because I think it’s really
important for stores to showcase the wide variety of genres and
creators available. So the other option is just to cram more titles
tighter into the same space. Which leads us to
an ugly and poor-selling scenario where you can only see the leftmost
quarter or so of their titles. In other words, all you really
see is the issue number, and the first letter or two of the title
– not really enough to sell the book, or even to necessarily spot
it on the racks.
I
strongly believe, at least for the straight-forward superhero books,
that there needs to be some kind of iconic “anchor”, be it floating
heads, or character symbol, or whatever, in the top left corner
of every title. It doesn’t have to be a rigid box, but us left-to-right,
top-to-down reading humans are much better served when the top left
corner of your periodical is where you first grab the consumer’s
eye.
* * *
I
just don’t understand publishers who send out dust-jacketed hardcover
without shrink-wrap.
I
mean, I literally don’t fathom this behavior. What’s the
possible upside? Saving some pennies on the cost, maybe?
The
problem is, there are just way way too many
ways to damage a dust jacket. I’ve snagged them trying to unpack
a shipment; we’ve had them come damaged because the packers in the
warehouse snagged them getting them into the box; we’ve had them
damaged because the box shifted during shipped; we’ve had them damaged
on the rack by inattentive customers. You rip that dust jacket,
and that $30-50 book is worth maybe $5, max.
Even
worse are the die cut dust jackets, like the Pantheon hardcover
of Epileptic, where at least half of our copies received
had to be discounted to sell because the jacket ripped.
It’s
just tiresome and unnecessary – shrink-wrap your production run,
and let the retailers unwrap copies as needed. We always have “display”
copies of books available, but I’d really rather not have multiple
copies damaged in transit/on the racks for something so easily prevented.
This
is a real Penny-wise/Pound-foolish kind of deal.
* * *
Price
is not a design element.
Well,
it can be, but it always (always!) has to be clear
and visible at an instant’s glance.
Pretty
much every retailer in the world will hate you if you hide the price
of your book (or don’t put one on it at all, the most frequent rookie
mistake for, say, mini-comics). We’ll hate you nearly as badly if
you try to be all cutsie and spell it
out like “Eight dollars and ninety five cents”, especially when
it’s just another element in the overall design.
Why?
Oh, pal, you work a New Comics Day at the register when the customers
are stacked twelve deep, all clamoring to buy their three-inch stack
of quality comical books, and you’ll know why. Anything
that slows up the ring-out process is something to be avoided at
all costs.
* * *
I
think I’ve made the point that there are too many TPs
these days, but it suddenly struck me (“Wait, what do you mean ‘slow
of mind’?”) that Marvel and DC are each putting out two volumes
of their big-thick-and-cheap black & white reprint series (Essential
and Showcase) each month. That’s 48 a year.
Let’s
assume they’re, on average 2 inches wide in the spine. That means,
over the course of a single year, I’m going to need eight
additional linear feet of shelving just for the b&w
reprints, if I want to stock them all.
Where
the hell am I going to get eight more feet of rack from?
* * *
You
can say what you want about the Marvel/Guiding
Light crossover, but I have to say it is refreshing to see a
big comics publisher reaching directly out to (what one would imagine
are) wholly and completely new customers, even if it is in
service of something fundamentally goofy.
What
do you think would happen if we had six initiatives a year similar
to this from each and every publisher?
* * *
Annnnnd… that’s about what I have this month.
Yeah,
I think I could have done better for an “anniversary” column, too!
Well,
next month: a bold new era begins!
(maybe)
**************************
Brian
Hibbs has owned and operated Comix
Experience in San Francisco since 1989. Feel free to e-mail
him with any comments. You can purchase a collection of the
first one hundred Tilting at Windmills (originally serialized in Comics
Retailer magazine) from IDW
Publishing. An index of Tilting at Windmills on Newsarama
can be found right here.
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