IDW has had the Transformers franchise for awhile, but how are things going? Let's take us for a look at the numbers from the beginning. What trends do you see?

Based on information from this source:

http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/1850.html


Here are some numbers to get started:

Then and now:
30 TRANSFORMERS INFILTRATION #1 45,468 (January 2006)
146 TRANSFORMERS DEVASTATION #5 13,185 (February 2008)

The trend:
68 TRANSFORMERS INFILTRATION #4 28,835
138 TRANSFORMERS ESCALATION #1 20,625
148 TRANSFORMERS DEVASTATION #1 15,704

Spotlights
159 TRANSFORMERS SPOTLIGHT HOT ROD 14,133
155 TRANSFORMERS SPOTLIGHT MIRAGE 11,046
152 TRANSFORMERS SPOTLIGHT GRIMLOCK 11,411

Not even the movie brought the numbers:
88 TRANSFORMERS PRIME DIRECTIVE MOVIE PREQUEL #1 23,658
114 TRANSFORMERS PRIME DIRECTIVE MOVIE PREQUEL #2 18,039
114 TRANSFORMERS PRIME DIRECTIVE MOVIE PREQUEL #3 18,000
127 TRANSFORMERS PRIME DIRECTIVE MOVIE PREQUEL #4 17,306

109 TRANSFORMERS MOVIE ADAPTATION #1 (Of 4) 18,071
123 TRANSFORMERS MOVIE ADAPTATION #2 (Of 4) 16,204
121 TRANSFORMERS MOVIE ADAPTATION #3 (Of 4) 16,247
122 TRANSFORMERS MOVIE ADAPTATION #4 (Of 4) 16,210

From what we can see, their numbers are less than 1/3 what they started out to be. What do you guys think? Are Transformers losing some of their momentum? If so, what is the cause?

Part of the reason the story lines are being changed up, according to the Ryall/McCarthy Q and A, (i.e. Shortening Revelation and nixing Escalation, introducing All Hail Megatron) was because Chris decided a change in direction was necessary (Or a good idea) to help strengthen sales. So perhaps the current storyline was not to some peoples' liking? I'd hate to think it was something like "Who's Sixshot, I don't remember him from 1984-85, after which Transformers died". )

I personally loved how the story was going, but at the same time, I'm fine with their changing directions, as long as new stories are always done with care and quality.

In any case, at least this decline of sorts is not accompanied by Dreamwave-style tomfoolery.

Here is an idea.. Get the comic out of comic book stores and into book stores and Target and Grocery stores and crap like that again. That might help boost sells.

Silverclaw: That idea will work only if there are enough other markets willing to carry the book, ie, believing it is a profitable way to use their space. The fact is there are less grocery stores, corner stores, etc willing to carry comics. Expanding beyond the comic book store is a good idea, but in many ways beyond IDW's control as they cannot change other stores' marketing plans--htey have to work with them.

Part of me figures that there's a steady core market for Transformers comics. These are the people who will faithfully buy TF regardless. Then there's a much less dependable "varying market" group who buy what's new, what's hot, what's pretty, etc.

The core numbers must be good enough as IDW was granted the GI Joe license....

I'm surprised that Spotlights are so weak sales wise as I like those stories best. I wonder if the one-off format lends itself to sporadic purchase, while an ongoing storyline requires regular buying or you miss part of the story?

I suppose these numbers also don't count those who prefer to wait for the GN (and those are hte people buying more at bookstores, etc)

I remember hearing that IDW do most of their comic sales business, or at least a hugely disproportionate chunk in the trade / bookstore market, so I wouldn't be too worried about those numbers. Heck, HMV had the movie prequel trades displayed prominanly for a while

Also issue 1s ALWAYS sell a ridiculous number and then plummet, its how the comic industry works.

None of these numbers really scare me, Transformers never was a big comic property in the US but the trends are pretty stable in sales. Except the big drop from your list...

68 TRANSFORMERS INFILTRATION #4 28,835
138 TRANSFORMERS ESCALATION #1 20,625
148 TRANSFORMERS DEVASTATION #1 15,704

I'd chalk this up to first time comic buyers and Transformer fans that aren't into comics. The Infiltration series was brought to BotCon '05 attendees and I'd imagine it stoked up some sales that wouldn't be return buyers... Of course this trend may indeed be why we have a story line change as the drop off trend continued to the first issue of the third chapter, if you will, hinting at unhappy reader population.

I pick up one or two of each issue, I don't buy all the covers though. I think if they wanted to help sales and reduce costs maybe they should consider just two cover options instead four then shop owners wouldn't be so hesitant to buy a good quantity of the book. Also I think the biggest line to take a hit are the reprint of the Marvel issues. I mean us collectors love 'em but most folks are just confused by 'em.

The data isn't completely accurate though.

Many buyers have switched to trades and or/the hardcover release, which obviously wasn't an option with Infiltration 1.

Many people were curious and picked up an issue anyway, and there were a boatload of variant covers. (at least 6, I think)

Trade sales make up a substantial amount of income.

I know I've started waiting for the TPBs and then buying them online. The comic book stores here sell out before the second day on the shelf, and don't buy the spotlights at all in most cases. Add into the equation that the closest store is 15 miles away and you can see why I am reluctant to go to a store that probably doesn't have the comic I am looking for.

Like others have already mentioned I wonder what the sales numbers are on the trades... I'm still buying but I have been thinking about stopping buying the individual issues and switching to the trades they read so much better all in one sitting.

The dropoff in numbers is certainly a concern, but is also just one piece of the puzzle. It has been stated on IDW boards by Ryall and others that the trend for comics is to slowly trickle down and then something is done to 'shake things up a bit' so that's why we're getting 'All Hail Megatron.' I think though the dropoff seen in the direct market is a combination of:

1. people not buying anymore because they didnt' like; a. The story (too many humans was an often heard complaint), b. the art, or c. the mini-series format...all of which are being changed up in AHM (shift in story, new artist, new writer, 12 issue format)

2. This has already been done. Infiltration and BW: The Gathering were the only 2 series that had four regular covers and multiple variant covers. The standard now seems to be 2 regular covers with 1 or 2 retailer incentive covers. Which is point number 2 for the dropoff in sales. People who bought all 4 covers for Infiltration and then there was only 2 covers for them to buy for remaining series. (Most likely though that's fairly small portion of the dropoff)

3. Another reason for some dropoff was when the price shifted from $2.99 to $3.99. So here is one caveat with reading the numbers from ICV2's sales. Instead of overall numbers, look at revenue generated. An issue that sells 12K at $3.99 is on par with an issue selling 16K at $2.99.

4. People shifting from issues to trades. A lot of people seem to get them from Amazon and those sales would not be reported on ICV2's numbers either.



This is the other caveat with reading the sales reports. They do not include sales outside of the direct market, i.e. major bookstore chains and places like Target, Walmart, and Toys R Us, and it does not include sales made outside of the US. When the movie came out last year not only did the movie prequel and movie adaptation appear in mass numbers in all of these places, but the major bookstore chains also stocked up on trades for Infiltration, Stormbringer, and the first Spotlight. Hence this quote from IDW president, Ted Adams:



So hopefully the shift with AHM, the new animated series, and movie related items will give a boost in the direct market and outside. I believe Ryall when he says things are not "dire" but things could be better too.

Yeh, I've switched to trades now.

Indeed. The number of single issues I've picked up is minute, but I've bought all the trades excepting the Marvel one. The single issues offer nothing to me but ads I don't care about, especially now that the newest issues haven't had any extra content like design sketches and such.

IDW hurts their own single-issue sales by pandering to the trade market (which I absolutely hate... but won't go away any time soon because there's a big cycle between publishers making the trades more attractive, so more people buy trades, so the publishers continue ramping them up, etc). Still, as Moroboshi pointed out, the low sales numbers are the reason for the big shift in the IDW story.

I believe they are.

Traditionally in the comics market though, maxiseries don't do that well at all, so it really threw me that IDW released All Hail Megatron as 12 issues with an untested writer. Still hey, if it works...

Just as a general comment on bookstore sales; IDW uses Diamond as a book distributor, but it's a separate division to comics stores sales and nowt to do with reported figures.


Broad generalisation, but fiction that engages fans most tends to be of less general interest, unfortunately -- though the bigger issue is that you'll get stores that'll order issues of a miniseries but won't touch one-shots or will order low and not reorder if the stock sells out by the weekend.

I'm assuming that IDW knows what it's doing. It deals with licensed fiction for properties that have millions of viewers, seems solvent and to be growing at a measured pace, has a good continuing relationship with Hasbro, and yet very few of its titles have notable sales as singles. They seem to have a business model that suits them, and to treat books as personal interests rather than just cash cows.

What I'd like to see now is tighter editing and more Nick Roche. We're definitely getting the latter, and I'll keep an open mind on AHM. Furman has tended to write best around another writer.

I can say that, from my experience, IDW seems to have really taken their editorial responsibilities up a notch. For The Ark I, our deadline got moved forward so we had to rush some elements. This resulted in some sloppy mistakes. For The Ark II, we stuck to the original deadline, then had about a week of back and forth between myself, my editor (Justin Eisinger, great guy) and my proofreader. We caught a bunch of small mistakes and corrected them all. Overall I think it will result in a much more polished book.

-Jim S

Woohoo Ark II!

Has a release date been announced for it?

July 2008, probably towards the end of the month: http://forum.idwpublishing.com/viewtopic.php?t=3780

Jim S

Mmm, and I think on the whole people will be understanding of schedules changing if when stuff turns up it's spot on -- the combination whammy of the BW sourcebooks was they got delayed, rushed, and were a high price point.

Hopefully the lead time built in before the Revelations spotlights will have paid off too.

We keep a tally of ICV2-based revenue figures at tfarchive.com.

Here's the trend based on ICV2:

Summary:
Total TF Revenue December 2006: $209,000.
Total TF Revenue November 2006: $208,000
Total TF Revenue October 2006: $189,533
Total TF Revenue January 2007 $161,380
Total TF Revenue for February 2007 $121,024
Total TF Revenue for March 2007 $329,932
Total TF Revenue for April 2007 $198,345
Total TF Revenue for May 2007 $238,936.79
Total TF Revenue for June 2007 $535,169.76
Total TF Revenue for July 2007 $262,600.59 (estimate)
Total TF Revenue for August 2007 $127,860.12 (estimate)
Total TF Revenue for September 2007 $118,460.58 (estimate)
Total TF Revenue for October 2007 $424,635.39 (estimate)
Total TF Revenue for November 2007 $125,453.58
Total TF Revenue for December 2007 $102,105.78
total TF Revenue for January 2008 $247,827.98
total TF Revenue for February 2008 $250,586.39
Total TF Revenue for March 2008 $62,690.88
Total TF Revenue for April 2008 $107,759.55


If you look at the trend, sales have remained pretty steady, save for the last couple months. Why worse the past few months? Because you can't generate revenue if you don't get the product out!

Anybody know how to do a bargraph or linegraph for the above figures?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/29897249@N00/...353416/sizes/o/

What I meant was can someone besides me make a line chart graphing out the sales.

I don't like this thread on bit! The last time we had one of these threads we lost our comics. I don't want to be a sad panda again

I think a lot of people already pointed one of the main causes out, many people (myself included) buy the paperbacks. For me its a lot easier/cheaper to get on amazon and get them, than it is to travel for over an hour for an off chance that a comic book store has what I'm looking for.

I'll chime in, I've only bought the trade paperbacks of the IDW series. I don't read comics, and there aren't any comic shops in my area. I got into the IDW stuff because in the pre-movie push, Infiltration, Stormbringer, Spotlight Volume 1, and then Escalation were available in actual regular bookstores all over, I picked them up, and got hooked.

Honestly, I like the TPB's better because they're built to last, and tell complete stories. Comic books are fragile things, and they're incomplete tales.

Now I buy mine online, as they're not in stores anymore. If I have one tip for them, it's to release the TPB's in a better sequence, as some stuff in Devastation near the end confused me, and while trying to avoid spoilers, I figured out that it was because it referenced Spotlights that haven't been collected into a TBP yet.

last time we had a thread like this, it lasted for, what, half a year before it kicked in?


and honestly, considering the quality of IDW's editing, I wouldn't mind if there was another company switch again. There might be a one year break, but if the next company hurries, they could have a bunch of #1's hit the market right in time for the Transformers sequel.

bad news is? I imagine the next company in line is Dynamite.
good news? That would mean Army of Darkness vs The Transformers!

I haven't read the Cyclonus and Wheelie Spotlights yet but it really seems like Transformers comic have been put on the bench for months now. Since Devastation ended its been very quiet. Spotlight Mirage was unimpressive, out of known continuity, had very little story and even less insight into Mirage's personality other than a "What if?" Grimlock's was better but i don't think it quite captured what made the first Spotlights so memorable. Reign of Starscream #1 was pretty forgettable. I haven't been drawn into the movie universe at all and this isn't going to change things. I didn't get the Focus on Decepticons because I didn't want to ruin the All Hail Megatron story for myself.

I really hope Wheelie, Revelations and Megatron turn things around.

I hope IDW keep Transformers for the foreseeable as now they have the GI Joe license and i do like me a bit of crossover action!

Does anybody know how other comic book titles are doing? It would be nice to see how the TF brand stands up against others.

I suspect that graph is somewhat misleading, because sales, on a month-to-month basis, aren't going to be constant across the whole year, and we don't have enough data to make a meaningful trend line out of it.

It looks like revenue is up on a year-over-year basis, but, again, the data's not quite deep enough to be really convincing.

The Devastation tpb sold around 1700 copies in May.

That's pretty decent, and is something that isn't factored in on the monthly charts.

I'd expect the number to be strong in non-Diamond outlets too. TF is still riding the movie-high, as evidenced by the strong sales of ROS #1.

Personally, I've been enjoying the IDW run for the most part. However, because I was such a huge fan of the Marvel and Dreamwave runs, I was initiallly annoyed at yet another G1 continuity since I really enjoyed the Dreamwave stuff and grew up on the Marvel version. Oh if only Devil's Due had gotten the licence and continued the old Marvel run like they did magnificently with GI Joe. They also do the best TF/Joe crossovers.

I've also started going with the trades because I find the distribution of IDW comics lacking. I had a much easier time picking up Dreamwave. Plus the nearest comic shop is an hour and a half from me and is very sporadic in getting in TF stuff. Missed out on a few months of TF comics last year, or so I thought, until one day, all the stuff I thought I missed suddenly appeared, months later than what should have been.

Plus a new bookshop in my local town seems to be very good at getting the IDW trades. Was amazed to find Megatron Origin, Spotlight book 2 and the full Escalation in the last few weeks. especially considering outside of a handful of specialist shops, Ireland has a non existant comic book market.

For what it's worth, a buddy of mine finally quit buying Transformer comics about 6 months ago. Why? He got sick of the "miniseries" bulljive. That, plus the random spotlights, he (and me too, for that matter) had a hard time keeping it all viewed as a cohesive story and universe.

Yeah, I really wish they would cut the miniseries crap and just make it ongoing. The way things are now, we get stuff in big chunks, with a whole lotta nothing in between. I tend to get very interested near the tail end of a miniseries (i.e., really exctied for Devastation #4, 5, 6...) but during the lulls, I couldnt' care less. Spotlight Wheelie and Cyclonus were good but I wasn't really into them because the whole storyline has languished. Hopefully with AHM going 12 issues, that'll give them enough time to work the new direction out and we won't get such a huge break again.

You're in for a treat when you do.

Miniseries are practical -- it's difficult to get stores to stock most non-Marvel, non-DC titles as ongoings. Though I don't think a twelve-issue limited series is very practical... getting into the second half it might be trickier for readers to get copies unless there's a very stable or upwards sales pattern for the first half.

Maybe a lot of non-online readers are more enthusiastic about AHM #1 than most responses seen so far...