I thought some people here might be interested in seeing these statistics. The bar graphs were created by Kate Willaert, from data jointly compiled by John Jackson Miller of Comichron, in collaboration with Milton Griepp of ICv2. I've no idea of where they got access to statistics such as total book market sales, digital sales, and newsstand/subscription sales, but I have faith that these are reasonably close estimates that represent the most accurate snapsnot of the total market as anyone's likely to get. The graphics ought to be self-explanatory.

Oh, and as for how this all relates to the sales of Archie Comics, it's helpful to remember that ACP's sales have traditionally been strongest in the Newsstand & Subscription Channel (not sure if direct mail-order sales are included in "subscriptions", as that's something that ACP has leaned heavily on in the past to shore up a shrinking newsstand marketplace).

No doubt in the past 6 years both digital and trade collection sales have helped somewhat to make up for the newsstand market that ACP was traditionally dependent on for its bread & butter sales, but book channel sales still lag behind those of comic book shops, a market where ACP is at its weakest, and digital sales appear to have leveled off within the last 3-4 years. The biggest growth of the total marketplace over the past 6 years has been in the graphic novel/trade collection format (up nearly $200M from 2011 to 2016), while both digital and newsstand sales have remained largely the same over a period from 2013-2016.

It's interesting to see these figures, and I also wonder where the figures came from and exactly who was reporting their sales that would combine into the totals presented.  We know the monthly Diamond figures only reflect orders for a given period, so of course that's always been somewhat incomplete.


I'm not sure what my takeaway of all this is, but the snapshot appears to show digital sales have levelled (or declined) despite the increase in ownership of devices people could use to access digital content during the 2011-16 years.  I also suspect the increase in overall dollars by 2016 is more a reflection of higher per unit price than any sort of bump in readership.


Makes good food for thought regardless.

Quote from: steveinthecity on September 10, 2017, 12:55:49 PM
I also suspect the increase in overall dollars by 2016 is more a reflection of higher per unit price than any sort of bump in readership.

Possibly a little, but it doesn't seem to me that there's been an overall increase in cover prices big enough to account for the rise in the last 5 years. I suspect a lot of it might come from a new awareness and interest by people (mainly in trade collections) due to the huge jump in media adaptations over that time removing some of the stigma of "nerdiness" of reading comics. Some of that might be younger consumers who feel like comics are now okay or cool to read, and some of it might be older lapsed readers returning.

I never thought of what you thought before. I feel very good.