Welcome back to TBU by The Numbers. Here we take a look at the sales numbers for DC Comics, in particular, the books TBU considers Bat-Books from February 2020. All numbers presented in this article are from the February 2020 Comichron page. These numbers only represent comics distributed by Diamond to the United States comic book stores. They do not include sales outside the US, digital, newsstand, or any other distribution method.
DC and TBU Overall Numbers
* Includes ALL DC comic sales, including reorders
** TBU titles are defined by that month’s releases and does NOT include reorders
Units sales are up a small percentage from last year of the top 500 selling books. DC’s unit sales made up almost 1/3 of the sales which is great. Marvel had about 48% of sales. Looking at the money side of things (not pictured) it looks like sales are up 9% from this time last year, which is great for the comic book industry as a whole.
Ongoing TBU Books
All market positions adjusted to include the issues featuring a higher price for cardstock covers
Things are looking a little bleak for most of the Bat-Family books. Catwoman and Harley Quinn are in the danger zone, while Nightwing, Batman Beyond, Batman and the Outsiders, Batgirl, and Red Hood: Outlaw are all well in the cancelation zone. Batman Beyond saw a little boost from its previous book, and on average it’s pretty steady, but overall sales are on a downward spiral.
Even Batman, which is staying in the top ten on a regular basis (once cardstock covers and regular issues are combined) and is selling a respectable 70K+ every two weeks, has seen a drop in sales from Tom King’s average of 100K. Tynion is doing a great job on that book, though, and it should be more popular.
It will be interesting to see how Joker War, the return of Nightwing, and the upcoming 5G event (status quo change?) will shake things up and hopefully increase sales.
Limited Issue TBU Books
All market positions adjusted to include the issues featuring a higher price for cardstock covers
Joker: Killer Smile appears to have more readers hooked than Joker/Harley Criminal Sanity, losing only 9% readership over the latter’s 17%. Harley Quinn & Poison Ivy closed up its run with an average of 51K and losing 69% of its readership over its run.
All the other books are doing decently well, most of them being in the top 100 top-selling books. The exception is Batman vs Ras al Ghul, which has lost 41% of its readership over four issues.
Other TBU Books of Interest
All market positions adjusted to include the issues featuring a higher price for cardstock covers
The Dollar Comics seem to be losing sales quickly, though it is debatable if the problem is the issues being chosen or the interest in the project. The most successful issues have been Dollar Comics Joker #1 with about 24K and Dollar Comics Batman Adventures #12 at 27K. This month’s Dollar Comics Shadow of the Bat #1 is the lowest selling TBU book since I have been keeping track of sales.
