Cost vs. perceived value
I think part of the perception is based on the value of the added content. Interviews feel like "filler". Reprints? For the long-time collector (and face it, that's who is willing to pay $4 for a comic these days) -- they likely have the reprint already.

The worst part is paying for a *new content* backup that you have zero interest in. I dropped "Booster Gold" over at DC because I wasn't happy with the $1 increase and the add-on of Blue Beetle (which I tried and didn't like when it was it's own comic) was a turn off.

Now Giffen's Doom Patrol *with* the Metal Men drawn by Hughes, etc? That's (so far) been worth the $4.

Posted by maser on 2009-10-02 09:26:00
No longer an impulse buy
No matter how you cut it, if you have a twenty dollar bill in your pocket, it's very hard digest that you can now only buy 4 or 5 comics with it. We're at a price point now that requires the consumer to really consider what they are buying, rather than just grabbing something eye-catching off the shelf. That's going to lead to a lot of attrition regardless of the ancillary content.

Posted by JBill on 2009-10-02 10:27:12
You're 100% right
I've heard this from a bunch of people. Now, I don't like the increases any more than the average fan (especially because I buy 90% of your books) but I for the most part enjoy the backups.

The only thing though, is that I'd like them to be NEW content. I already own most of the reprint stuff that I end up seeing. I even have most of the Golden Age stuff in Masterworks.

I do have a friend that doesn't want BIGGER comics for more $. He just wants a 22pg book for $2.99 - that's it. No reprints or backups, just a good 22 pg. story.

I don't mind paying more as long as I get more. ASM #600 took me like 40-50 minutes to read! Now that's value for my money!!! :)

Posted by pmpknface on 2009-10-02 10:56:15
Tom-- I thought Internet outcry didn't matter? ;)

In all seriousness, while I'm sure it would be nicer to get tons of appreciation for giving people extras, the bottom line of course is the bottom line-- ie; how it affects the sales of the issues. If it's not increasing the sales, I can certainly see why you wouldn't go to the extra expense of adding material; although in the case of back-up stories, there is the benefit of giving exposure to another property.

Posted by CylverSaber on 2009-10-02 11:31:36
The price increase...
It caused me to go from about 40 titles a month to 10. Great business plan! If you guys at Marvel would stop with all of the needless expenses, like the costly ego tripping "creative retreats", for example, as well as paying mediocre writers way too much because they are buddies, perhaps prices wouldn't be so out of control. If stunt writers and flooding the market with books that nobody was asking for is going to continue, then I expect readership to continue to dwindle, just as much as I expect the guilty parties to continue to blame everything else.

Just once, I'd like to see somebody at Marvel accept blame and responsibility, but I've yet to see that.

Posted by Dusty. on 2009-10-02 12:03:24
I think it is the fact that the increase to $3.99 is still relatively new, and coincided (somewhat) with the addition of backmatter material, so many consumers associate the latter with the former. Instead of looking at it as "getting more for their money" they reverse it, and feel like they are paying more BECAUSE they are getting more (that they may or may not want).
I think if people had gotten to the point where they were accustomed to paying $3.99 for a regular 32 page comic, and then you added the reprint/additional material, the consumer would associate it more as a bonus - getting more for their money.

The obvious question also arises - if the price increase to $3.99 has nothing to do with the additional material, one would assume that adding the "bonus" material has a minimal effect on your costs of producing the comic. If this is the case, then why not add bonus material to all titles, whether it's $2.99 or $3.99? On the other hand, if the comics are $3.99 at least in part BECAUSE the bonus material is being included then why not get rid of it and lower the price accordingly?

Posted by joeshan on 2009-10-02 17:27:23
Spider-Man #605!
A+! Total Fun! Worth every one of it's 399 pennies!

Posted by Mon Morn Lunatic on 2009-10-03 09:55:46
Desire for Input the Same or Different?
Tom,

I've been re-reading a lot of Marvel comics from the 60's and 70's lately. On the letters pages the editors typically told the readers that Marvel wanted to know what readers thought and/or wanted in plots/characters/team line-ups, etc. Obviously the Internet has replaced most letters pages. But I am wondering . . . . is the desire for input from fans the same now as it was then, or has it changed? Back then and even now, fans vote/voted with their purchase/non-purchase of various books. But does Marvel currently solicit input as in the 60's and 70's, or does Marvel no longer desire/need/require fan input? And if not, why not? Hope I haven't missed it if this desire is still in place. But with the lack of letters pages it's hard to gauge. Also, I sense (but could be misinformed) that Marvel policy for the past five years has been predominantly, "We are going to take a creator driven/editorial driven policy whether the fans approve or not". Is this a correct understanding, or have I missed something?

Posted by Mon Morn Lunatic on 2009-10-03 10:04:15
What changed
I think what's changed is the relationship with the fans. In the past, the company was able to maintain a happier relationship because they had more control over it; they could decide whose letter got printed, and decide who they wanted to respond to. Even if a negative letter got printed, they were still the ones who allowed it, and that sense of control made it easier to deal with. Now that everyone can make their opinions known instantly, there's is naturally a lot more negativity out in the open; nobody likes being told they suck in front of millions of people.

Posted by CylverSaber on 2009-10-03 12:38:51
Being honest, I've thought that about the back up stories in Thor. Instead of 12 pages of additional material, how about 12 more pages of story? Better yet, as Bleeding Cool noted, "lose a few million, make a billion."

Posted by thomas more on 2009-10-03 16:08:57
Well,
Obviously it's a business and they're going to pay attention to any major backlash or acceptance, whether verbally (Internet-written) or seen in the sales numbers.

I don't mind extra filler, although I agree that some of the older comics I either own or have already read. But I can see the perspective, even if it's not logical. It probably comes down to the feeling that the price jump is due to the extra content rather than a modern apathy toward inflation.

Posted by PseudoSherlock on 2009-10-04 17:12:49
I think your anecdote is way to general to be analyzed correctly, Mr. Brevoort.

Personally, I'm not trying to state this as a fact, but the way I see it, something like New Avengers, at least to someone like me who wholeheartedly refuses to support price increased titles, is a scarlet letter on which the ship has already sailed. That is to say, at the end of the day, people who really hate the price won't buy it and people who like the book more than the price will. Its price to page count ratio is already an absolute. And no matter what, I'm sure I will always be more upset at a $3.99 book with only 22 story pages and ads than a $3.99 book with 22 story pages, ads and a little bit extra material, because at least then it would have more content than most 2.99 comics.

With a book where you get the standard 22 story pages and some "extra" material for 3.99 (and I said your post wasn't very concrete because you didn't seem to list any of these or instances of people complaining about them, though I will admit that the latter is hard to present objectively), people like myself have this "what if" perception where we wonder if it was the "extra" material that helped justify the price cost, and not the reverse where the increased price allowed the material. Because really, the possibility that we could've gotten the book at the standard cost without the material that most everyone deems unnecessarily is far more attractive than what is seemingly the reality.

What I'm saying is, we know you can charge an extra buck for New Avengers and Dark Avengers because those are guaranteed to sell regardless of the price, but it feels like you are using extra but unnecessary and usually unwanted material to justify charging an extra buck for certain other titles.

Posted by Asian_Pirate on 2009-10-05 01:47:40
page count and price
Since you can't do objective experiments where you take the same material and sell it as two 15 page books for 2 dollars over 2 months or print it on cheaper paper for slightly less, you have no real data to base decisions on. Instead whoever is in charge will just keep ramping up the price for as long as the market will bear it. As long as the numbers add up to a profit, it doesn't matter if some fans are priced out of buying weekly new comics. There's always used TPBs on Amazon.

Posted by izzatrix on 2009-10-05 11:41:09
I think the perspective is that when a book is $3.99 with bonus content, the bonus content is what is driving up the price. I have to admit, using a recent example, that I wondered if the $3.99 pricetag on the recent Beta Ray Bill: Godhunter mini was priced as such because of the reprints in the back of the book. Since I already own the stories reprinted within the book, it does make me think "What if I could get this without the reprint? Would it be cheaper?"

With the exchange rate, I end up paying about $5 an issue, and it has definitely cut into how many books I would be buying. I actively try not to start new on-goings and am even finding myself avoiding mini-series I'd like to buy (the upcoming X-Babies mini, for example). This is too bad because there are on-goings I would like to read (the now-cancelled Captain Britain & M:13, War Machine, and X-Men: First Class being examples), but the cost of the books these days are a big factor in what I buy, and more importantly to Marvel, what I don't buy.

Posted by Arachkid on 2009-10-05 15:39:07
"Also, I sense (but could be misinformed) that Marvel policy for the past five years has been predominantly, "We are going to take a creator driven/editorial driven policy whether the fans approve or not". Is this a correct understanding, or have I missed something?"

Marvel does this all a little more scientifically now with focus groups, retailer input, sales tracking, message board monitoring, and other proven market research techniques.


I am even guilty of this myself Tom. I love the handbooks, but I'm usually not that interested in some bio page in the back of whatever issue I'm reading. I feel most ripped off when I'm reading a book only to find it ends and I have pages left that. "THE LIST "books are a big offender here. I got my hopes up thinking it was big, and it ended and there were a bunch of preview pages. I felt a little ripped off I must say.

Posted by IanZL on 2009-10-05 17:02:41
Personally, I rarely look at the extra material unless it's new story. The interviews and sketch pages in particular feel more like ads. They run in many of your comics, sometimes for weeks at a time. That means I'll be seeing that same Mark Millar(as an example)interview 6 or 7 times per week for the next 5 weeks. It just doesn't seem as special then. As for the reprints...I'm just not that interested in those older stories. I have very little sense of comic nostalgia.

If taking these extras out lowers the price of the comics, then I say take them out. The $3.99 price point does affect how many books I buy. There is at least 1 book each week that I leave on the shelf because of the price, but I wouldn't go so far as to call the extras a "rip-off", but I could live without them.



Posted by marksmart on 2009-10-05 17:53:23
My grammar is far from perfect, but that last sentence in my post is really, really bad. My apologies.

Posted by marksmart on 2009-10-05 17:55:48
page count
I wonder what would happen if we all dropped our weekly buying and switched to Marvel digital instead.

Posted by izzatrix on 2009-10-09 11:59:15
the added page
fans would be happy if you left us with art like Bill's Warloke poster or Silvestri's blacked out face of Wolverine. anotherwords after the fight in the comics...a victory position to conclude.


Posted by Sentinelxy on 2009-10-23 12:29:16