(Diamond Order Code: JUL161105)
Read CEREBUS IN HELL? daily at CerebusDownloads.com
DAVE SIM:
Very good news! The purchase order for CEREBUS IN HELL? #0 came in this morning and it's for 8,021 copies. Which is roughly two and a half times what the last issue of glamourpuss shipped.
As you can see from Travis Pelkie's query below, the comic-book field runs on an incredibly tight schedule: we have the orders as of today and the book is scheduled to be in stores September 25. If you read the fine print in your Marvel and DC comics you'll notice that they now run the print date of their books in the indicia -- and it's usually a week before it arrived in the comic stores. Basically "keep up or quit".
This was a particular problem in our case because we had NO IDEA what the orders were going to be even as a ballpark -- if they would even be high enough to issue a purchase order -- so it's only as of today that we can get Marquis working on a quote. Hopefully CIH?#0 can get booked at or close to the day GOING HOME ships (9/25) and they can print it shortly after that. I've proofread the pages for the last time, Sandeep is e-mailing them to Sean for him to go over and then they go to Marquis to "join the line-up".
The best news is that this means the CEREBUS IN HELL? mini-series is now a "go" (which was in doubt until we had the #0 numbers). We're betting that the order drop-off from #1 to #4 on the mini-series can be kept to a minimal amount but still anticipating a substantial drop between #1 and #2 as an industry standard.
And we'll be able to go ahead with the pre-press MUCH faster with the mini-series than with #0, I think. And (a big plus for us) the mini-series is DONE and has been since before we launched the online strip. We want to get all the way through the mini-series (April of next year, God willing) before we decide what we're going to do next with CEREBUS IN HELL? For the time being? Just keep producing the daily online strip while we mull it over.
Thanks to everyone who ordered at their LCS! It won't be in stores by 9/25 but we will keep you posted every step of the way.
And now here's Margaret with the latest NOTEBOOKS entry!
Take it away, Margaret!
2 comments:
Woo hoo! Good news about the book AND name-checked! I feel special!
Looking forward to the book and the mini. Hope the #1 "tricks" enough people into ordering #1 in similar quantities to #0!
That's definitely one of the things that we'll be watching for. And I'd guess we won't be alone. What DOES happen to your sales figures when you start with #0 and then put out #1? If sales go up, expect a lot more titles to issue a #0 before they issue their #1.
Got the quote from Marquis for printing the book and it's definitely livable. Also got quotes for 6,000, 4,000, 3,000 on the assumption that the orders will be cut -- dramatically -- on the mini-series. Depending on HOW dramatically, this might be the last mini-series and we'll just do "one-shot" CEREBUS IN HELL? comic books for the time being. There's quite a "hockey stick curve" on the cost per unit as the print run goes down (naturally enough).
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