fujishig

I haven't collected monthly comics in a while, but I know the price point has been creeping up. But it's not until I saw this post on twitter that it hit me how the collections are naturally going to get more and more expensive. But this just seems ridiculous:


Here's the Amazon listing:



144 pages for 30 bucks. Geez.

So for those who are still collecting, have you guys cut back or just absorbed the price increases?

B5Erik

95% of what I buy is at least 10 years old (most over 20 years old), so this doesn't affect me - but pricing is a problem.

I do want the new Captain America run from JMS in trades. I hope it isn't $30, too!

Josh-da-man

I ditched the Marvel and DC Universes when they went above $2 an issue.

At this point, I buy very few things. Over the past twenty years, I've only bought things like Hellblazer, Walking Dead, Saga, Grendel, The Boys, Sandman Overture, Miracleman, and select projects from Garth Ennis, Grant Morrison, and Alan Moore.

If you're going to charge me $4+ an issue, it had better be goddamned worth it.

fujishig

I mean I remember 1.99 being expensive to me for a comic. And then this:




with Marvel including digital copies in their comics to try to justify the increases. Now those are gone and comics are like 5 bucks a piece? Geez. Makes Marvel Unlimited and DC Universe Infinite that much better of a deal I guess.

Bronkster

I still vividly remember how upset I was when comics went from 12 cents to 15 cents.

I only collect the new Superman titles now, so my monthly expenses are pretty low, but it does bug me that a single issue is $3.99 or $4.99, depending on which cover you get.

Spiderbite

One of the reasons I quit collecting around 1990 was due to the dozens of different covers, new #1(!) issues coming out every month, crossovers galore, the disappearance of a one issue self-contained story, and of course, the price increases.

When my son was little, I couldn't believe how much it cost to buy him just one comic when he was a kid. It ranged from $2.50 to $3 a book. And that seemed like highway robbery for what you got.

I don't see how collectors do it nowadays with most floppies costing 5 bucks each (!) and then there are literally some having a dozen different cover variations.

I always enjoy looking at inflation rates. I just looked at the standard floppy cover price for each year.

1943, comics cost 10 cents which is $1.79 today.
1953, comics STILL cost 10 cents which is $1.16 today!
1963, comics cost 12 cents which is $1.22 today.
1973, comics cost 20 cents which is $1.40 today.
1983, comics cost 60 cents which is $1.87 today. Massive jump compared to the prior 50 years!
1993, comics cost $1.25 which is $2.68 today.
2003, comics cost $2.25 which is $3.79 today.
2013, comics cost $3.00 which is $4.00 today.
2023, comics cost $5.00!

Me being an all or nothing type collector, I am glad I got out of it in 1990. I would have a warehouse full of comics by now and would likely be broke.

cultshock

I got out about a year after you (around 1991, except for Sandman). Comic prices now are fucking nuts, anything that I'm interested in now I'll just wait for the inevitable trade paperback collection, I haven't bought a floppy in decades.

rocket1312

I haven't bought monthlies since probably 2006. Other than a few omnibi here and there, anything I buy now is digital and on sale. And Amazon nerfing Comixology a few years means I buy almost nothing anymore.

That said...I've gotten hooked on the new Skybound Transformers/GI Joe stuff and my impatience and the instant gratification of digital means that I've bought quite a few issues at 3.99 even though I know if I wait a month they'll be marked down to 1.99. It's fairly outrageous for something that takes 5 minutes to read, but I just sort of accept that I don't have any self control and hold out hope that there will never be more than 3 or 4 series going at a time. Either that or I'll just lose interest and forget about it.

TheBang

No one is forcing you to buy all the cover variants. I certainly stopped doing so a long time ago.

As for affording the cover price, well, I mail order my monthly order from DCBS, so it's about 40% off cover price. The shipping cost eats into the discount a bit, but it's still way below cover price, and the time savings afforded by not having to go to the comic shop each week are well worth it.

fujishig

But that's the point of my thread, the tpbs are super expensive too. Or maybe this is just some experiment by Marvel.

PhantomStranger

I threw up my hands when monthly issues hit $2, one of the big reasons why I stopped collecting individual issues for many years. I never had a problem with the cost of trades and hardcovers until very recently when the value per page of content started hitting a sour note for me. The inflation of the past two years on comics has made me far more selective.

I'll pick individual issues here and there but those are primarily impulse buys when a cover catches my eye. $5.99 for a single comic book is almost never worth it. And yes, I have gone out of my way for a few cool variants like the rare Artgerm DC variant or such.

Josh-da-man

To be brutally honest, there's no way hell I'm ever going to spend one or two hundred bucks a week on a bunch of capeshit.

Jesus... even if I wanted to read that stuff I'd just pirate it. But I wouldn't waste time and energy reading that shit even if it was free.

Trevor

I still buy some capecrap, ocd and been my habit for 50 years now, but most of my reading has progressed to Fantagraaphics and Drawn&Quarterly and similar fare.

I started at 20 cents an issue, and when the minimum wage hour of $1.60 could buy me 8 comics. Now it’s two books if you stick to the 3.99 ones. Even if the minimum wage was properly adjusted for inflation to $12, that’s still only 4 books compared to 8.

PhantomStranger

The decompressed storytelling also makes it a pain since there are issues where very little actually happens. I feel burnt when most of the issue is filled up with spreads told with sparse dialogue.

B5Erik

I looked it up, and the trade with the first 6 issues of JMS' run on Captain America is $19.99.

I'm definitely getting that.

VHS?

Ive been bitching about this for 2yrs. I saw it coming first from DC and now even several indi titles are following.
I used to be able to get a good amount of books, weekly, at $40 but no more. So I have had to pick what books I really intend on reading. I cant be a cover whore any more either.
The bad part is, books are the same page count (any others are just ads) and what really gets me is when the paper quality is shit (Marvel) but the price is still $4.99

PhantomStranger

I hear quality control on new Marvel trades and hardcovers is...very questionable. I don't regularly pick up Marvel stuff anymore so I wouldn't know but that seems to be the popular consensus.

fujishig

Maybe they are testing premium pricing the trades to get people to stop waiting for the trade? If so that seems shortsighted at best. It goes back to the whole thing where only collectors and people already into comics will ever be collecting (superhero) comics, because the value proposition just isn't there, which is just really sad. I'm sure most of us got our start in comics because of either cheap spinner racks or cheap digests at the grocery check out.

Trevor

I’m still using DCBS, getting 30-50% off everything, can’t imagine buying as much as I do otherwise. Still frequent the local shops to support them a bit, mainly the dollar bins, and sorta work at one part-time for a few freebies each time I help.

ntnon

I know exactly what you mean, but at the same time...!

fujishig

I know what he means though. I used to be able to afford a pull list with enough comics every week that I could stack them in order of what I was least to most excited about reading and read them in that order. Shoot, I still do that with Shonen Jump weekly releases, since it's just 2.99 a month. When I had to resort to DCBS monthly shipments, I'd prioritize it every month and slowly read through them.

Trevor

Speaking of reading, it’d be cool if everyone posted more of what they’re reading, like maybe the “best thing I’ve read this week’ thread. I’m a couple weeks behind on that, need to get posting….

VHS?

I'm about to give Sam & Twitch a go. I read all Spawn titles so they are definite buys.
I also picked up Feral as I really enjoyed Stray Dogs.

majorjoe23

I just finished Peacermaker Tries Hard, and really enjoyed it. It's got a tone similar to the HBO Max series.

VHS?

OK Sam and Twitch was pretty good start. Nothing big but it's got me interested and I didn't count pages.If I'm reading and I stop to count pages, it usually means I might be dropping the title.

Feral .... man. I'm not looking for Stray Dogs again. I know this but Feral was just hard to read. It seemed like repetitive talk and confused story telling. I couldn't finish it. I'll give it another go but I became very uninterested about 3/4 and even that was too far.
This sucks because Stray Dogs was so good. Such good story telling. I hope Feral gets better. Maybe it's just a slow start.