Forum - View topicManga Answerman - Do Comic Book Stores Still Hesitate To Stock Manga?
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Kicksville
 Posts: 1175 |
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All this really reinforces for me that the direct market comic store system as it exists now is ludicrous.
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Sakagami Tomoyo
 Posts: 940 Location: Melbourne, VIC, Australia |
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You underestimate just how much it would increase the cost of the book if a retailer was to order a book from another retailer with fast shipping, and overestimate just how much consumers are willing to pay for the questionable convenience of not ordering it from Amazon themselves. At work, I have literally been asked by customers to order something for them from this that or the other retail website because for whatever reason they don't want to order online themselves. Every single time I've turned them away, because it simply will not work out to anyone's benefit. Now I'll certainly agree that the amount of time it takes to get something from Diamond is greater than it should be. But honestly, even ordering from a more efficient distributor, things are ultimately still going to work out best consolidating the week's orders into a single big shipment. Separate shipping costs and other logistical issues surrounding many smaller shipments (labour involved in unpacking and processing deliveries, sorting and paying invoices, etc etc) greatly increase the amount of time and money it all takes, not to mention introducing unnecessary complexity which increases the odds of mistakes happening. Being able to order something from a brick and mortar store from a standing start and receiving it in a couple of days is a dream. If you want it that quickly, you can order online from a store such as Amazon that have massive warehouses of their own so have basically everything on hand. If for whatever reason you don't want to order online, it's going to take a little longer. Nargun gives some numbers on costs, and while I could round up some real-world numbers, I don't want to and in any case the numbers will be for Australia, which won't be as relevant for the more America-centric general discussion here. But in general principle he's right. |
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shabu shabu
Posts: 79 Location: Tokyo |
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In Japan, amecomi are only sold in specialty stores. It seems that the same is true in America as well.
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sputn1k
Posts: 52 |
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One problem for small stores is also that manga publishers generally sort the retailers they work with into tiers based on how many books they stock and sell from them. Stores that order larger amounts and return less receive preferential treatment by the publisher when it comes to reimbursement for returned stock or restocking again.
This means that in order to make selling manga viable, you have to fully commit to it. Just "dabbling" in selling manga is not going to cut it. |
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AkumaChef
Posts: 821 |
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I can see that the labor cost would increase, but why not pass that on to the customer? You can tell the customer: I can get it from our normal distro for standard price but it will take 2 weeks. If you want it faster I can have it here tomorrow but that's going to cost an extra $X. It would take you less than a minute to order up from amazon. I have never worked in the comic business but I have worked in other retail businesses and I have, personally, ordered products from my competitors or at retail pricing from amazon because it's good customer service. Yes, it does take longer than the usual monthly order from diamond but it's not enough to cause issues as far as I can see. I've never seen a comic book store so busy that the staff didn't have time to place a 30 second online order. If they can chat with me for hours about the latest tabletop game they certainly have time to order a manga over the computer. It takes just a few seconds with a smartphone or PC. |
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AkumaChef
Posts: 821 |
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I don't think either of those things are true. Regarding the cost of ordering with "fast shipping": With an Amazon prime account, shipping costs essentially nothing and it takes a couple seconds to place the order. I have done this in my business for years, though for different things than comic books. Regarding how much customers are willing to pay for "questionable convenience": I agree that it doesn't make sense from my perspective. I wouldn't ask a store to order from Amazon for me. But clearly people are willing to pay for a service. Nearly everything we see at retail can be bought cheaper online but a lot of people prefer not to for some reason. And you even go into this yourself in your next statement. How can you say that people don't want this service and then go on to give an example how how people do indeed want it, and have asked you for it directly?
Why wouldn't it work out to everyone's benefit? You take less than a minute to order the thing the customer wants. You pass on that cost, with an upcharge, to your customer. Your shop makes money. Customer is happy.
It's no dream. The brick-and-mortar store can order overnight online, just like a person can. I can see that there is a little extra time involved with unpacking boxes and accounting perhaps, but I'm going to be bluntly honest here: Every comic book store I've stepped into, and it's been many over 3 decades, has been full of staff sitting around and either doing nothing, or doing obvious leisure activities, like gaming or chatting with fans about comics. Of course there's nothing wrong with building a rapport with your customers, but let's not pretend that the staff is too busy to open boxes or type numbers into an accounting software package. Maybe Australian comic shops are different, but that's been my experience with the American ones for thirty years. |
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AkumaChef
Posts: 821 |
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In America we do have specialized stores which sell mainly American comics. They usually sell related merchandise like sports cards and collectibles, role-playing games and supplies, miniatures, and trading card game things too (Pokemon, Yu-Gi-Oh, Magic the Gathering, etc.) Many, carry Anime and Manga related stuff too: garage kits, gundam models, etc. You can buy American comics at places where magazines are sold, but the selection has been dwindling for years and is getting even worse now that many stores are getting rid of, or at least reducing in size, their magazine sections. Many years ago there were no comic book stores and people bought comics at newsstands. Now that is changing, and comic books are becoming more of a specialty niche with their own stores. |
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Redbeard 101
Oscar the Grouch
Forums Superstar  Posts: 16935 |
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I know for a fact that RightStuf will undersell a comic store 95% of the time with a lower price. Especially if you buy $50 or more for the free basic shipping. I have to admit I often buy my manga from them5-6 volumes at a time in clumps to take advantage of that. I think I might change that and buy my favorite ongoing series from the local comic store. I am lucky as my store (shout out to Third Eye Comics) has a rather nice section. It's also not hidden but rather on the same wall next to the TPB section. They also don't simply just carry super popular or old titles. Given that I feel like I should support them a bit more with the manga so they keep in stock. |
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AkumaChef
Posts: 821 |
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If you have a good local shop which carries what you want I absolutely would support them. Sadly, in my area the comic shops have a terrible selection, though I must admit I rarely check so maybe things have improved? |
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Sakagami Tomoyo
Posts: 940 Location: Melbourne, VIC, Australia |
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Customers generally aren't very keen on the idea of costs being passed on to them. Granted the numbers won't be as big in the US as here in Australia, but still.
Perhaps my experience is with an unusually busy comic book shop, then. Probably it not being just a comic book shop is a factor there. In any case, there are logistical issues for a shop ordering from an online retailer beyond "just click 'buy'". It needs to be paid for before the online retailer will send it out; is the customer going to want to hang around while the employee sorts out with accounts/the boss to pay for it? The business isn't going to just give all its employees access to a credit card the business pays for. Is the employee expected to pay for the order out of their own pocket? What happens when the customer decides after the order is placed and shipped out that no, they don't actually want it after all?
But Amazon Prime isn't free, is it? Ultimately shipping is being paid for, it's just that it's done with the membership fee, not a specific charge on each order. And this assumes you're doing it often enough for it to be worth the ongoing cost of the Amazon Prime account.
I never said people don't want it, just that they're not willing to pay what it would cost. Again, I'm used to the costs as they apply to Australia, not the US, so maybe the extra expense won't be as offputting for US customers. |
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AkumaChef
Posts: 821 |
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You stated that people asked you to order products for you from other retail sites. Surely those people must expect that you would be paid for that service? And people, especially millennials, seem quite open to paying extra for various services such as food delivery. Every time one of my customers has asked me if I could get something I don't normally carry I tell them: "yes, I can, but I have to order from a different source and it will cost a little more. is that OK?" 99% of the time they say yes.
I just pick up my smartphone and click "buy now" on Amazon. That's the exact process I follow. My business Amazon account draws payment directly from my business bank account. The summary statement I get from Amazon every month goes to my accountant for tax purposes. When the item comes in I call the customer and let the know. If the customer never shows to collect the merchandise I return it to amazon unopened for a full refund. Amazon even provides prepaid shipping labels for returns. The effort is very nearly zero. This works for other employees as well. If someone is worried about potential cases for fraud, any credit card company or bank will issue new cards attached to a main account. Those cards can have arbitrary limits applied to them to prevent a criminal employee from ripping you off. If, for some reason you have an employee you trust with customers but not with money you could set them up with such a card--that's standard practice for situations where employees need to spend money, but you don't want them having full access to a business bank account. For example, delivery drivers need to buy gas for their trucks/vans, contractors might need to buy supplies, etc. Banks have solved that problem for business decades ago: employees get issued cards or accounts with limits. None of those things are problems.
Prime costs me $70 a year. Amortized over the number of orders I place a year it costs me just a few cents per package. You're right that it costs something, but given business volume it's negligible. I charge the customer $1 for shipping anyway which more than makes up my costs, and honestly the customers love it because nobody expects to be charged such a low shipping fee. Last year my $75 prime fee paid for 302 packages shipped.
Gotcha, I see where you're coming from here. My experience is that people are willing to pay, especially younger people. They're already used to paying $$$ to have their every whim delivered to their door so they have no qualms about paying a little extra for this service. You can always offer: worst case scenario the customer declines.
That's absolutely possible. It wasn't the case 20 years ago, but currently it seems that many if not most people here are perfectly happy to overpay for convenience in nearly every aspect of their lives. |
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I_Drive_DSM
 Posts: 217 |
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I very briefly read over some of the discussion and will add my .02 cents.
Back in the mid 90s the place where I actually got my manga WAS comic book stores. In my major city that is in a fairly rural part of America we only have (they're still around actually) two major comic book stores, both owned by the same individual. Other stores have come and gone but the sheer amount of cubic feet of the stores allowed him to retain a MASSIVE back stock of back issues which built his business. His loyal customer base that come for both new releases and to fill gaps with their collections is fairly large which has enabled him to stay in business as long as he has. It's literally a haven for anyone that's trying to find any sort of older comic. During that time in the mid 90s most all manga sans like a VERY few examples from say VIZ or Dark Horse were printed in American comic format. If you're unfamiliar with that seemingly dark age of manga in the US basically manga was printed in the standard comic book format as you know it, flipped (of course), and sold at roughly ~20 or so pages. It was not the greatest of times because at roughly $2.50-$3 an issue it would take you roughly 8 to 10 issues of a particular series to equal the same amount of material that is now sold for $10-$13 (and we haven't even adjusted the prior prices for inflation). Manga is SOOOOOOOoooooooo cheap in the US compared to what it used to be, even with TokyoPop and it's constant $10 selections gone and manga seeing a gradual price increase. It's still DIRT cheap. At that time unless I had a circular from say VIZ or you knew who to go through online to actually try & order manga (in 1995/96 it was VERY few pickings online) you had to hope somebody had it local. And for the most part it worked because manga in the format of a comic book displayed alongside American comics just like any other comic would. This guy in particular in his two stores often did carry manga, and I'd say every two weeks I'd make a trek to each store and buy every single issue of whatever manga he had. It got to the point where he was not only pointing me to back issues of things that I may have otherwise not known about that was translated to English (He introduced me to what I'm certain are some very obscure Studio Proteus manga releases like Lost Continent and Rebel Sword, for example) but would set things aside knowing I would come. Eventually I was just pulled away from having to deal with this sort of thing when manga starting hitting big into book stores 2001/02. Ultimately - and I don't think it's exaggerated enough how important this became - when places like Borders started carrying entire dedicated manga sections it made it very difficult for comic book stores to compete with manga whatsoever. A person going to buy manga knew exactly what they were looking for; they wanted this particular art and sets of genres. They wouldn't be swayed by an American comic release because they weren't looking for it and it happened to look good. They were going for manga because they wanted manga. And it's not like this ideology hadn't been building up for a while. If you were a fan of anything manga or anime in the 90s you were probably already going to the "anime" section at your local Suncoast or Best Buy or wherever else had that single big shelf full of anime VHS. Manga simply followed suit, and as a fan you expected it. It worked well, all things considered. I did actually go into one of the guy's store last year; it's the first time I had been in there for well over near fifteen years now. I noticed he did have a VERY small manga section, some modern releases but also a few very random old-stock items from TokyoPop and a comic-style Dark Horse release of Outlanders which for sure was going back into the 90s. |
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Alan45
 Village Elder Posts: 9840 Location: Virginia |
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I_Drive_DSM wrote:
Dark Horse brought out Outlanders in comic book form between December 1988 and March 1992 with a special in March 1993 and an epilogue in March 1994. It was later brought out in Trade Paperback format with the final volume (8) issued in August 2000. My experience is similar to yours. Book stores carrying manga killed sales of it in the local comic shops. |
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