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The Comics Industry you Knew is Over
4 months ago
A couple of eye-opening articles at ScreenRant.com explain, in clear and chilling detail, why you're going to see fewer published comics, and why the ones you do see are about to get more expensive.
Here's the brief version: around the turn of the millenium, Diamond Comic Distributors drove its remaining competitors out of business, thereby gaining a monopoly on the distribution of comic books and graphic novels in the U.S. (As middlemen between publishers and retailers, they were exempt from America's antitrust laws.) Nobody liked Diamond, but everyone needed them; they got the publishers' product to their retail clients, and they offered retailers a wider variety of products, including independently published comics, than they would've had otherwise.
Diamond's twenty-year stranglehold on the comics industry came to an end with the COVID-19 pandemic. With consumers staying at home instead of going out to buy comics, Diamond suspended all distribution activities and -- probably the last straw -- began withholding payments to publishers. That's when DC publisher (now president) Jim Lee did the unthinkable: he cut ties with Diamond and signed new distribution deals with publishing industry giant Penguin Random House (bookstores) and the Merkler family's Lunar Distribution (direct market). Smelling blood in the water, Marvel and Image followed suit, and Diamond, having lost its three biggest clients, staggered on for a few more years before filing for bankruptcy in February 2025. (Diamond's assets were purchased in March by the global distribution company Alliance Entertainment, a former music retailer.)
And with Diamond out of the picture, independent creator/publishers now find it effectively impossible to get their books distributed at all.
And then along came Trump's tariffs. Since all the major comics publishers -- Marvel, DC, Image, BOOM! Studios, Dark Horse, Dynamite Entertainment, IDW Publishing, Mad Cave Studios, and Oni Press -- print their slender, single-issue comics ("floppies") in Canada, and their trade paperback and omnibus collections in China, the prices on these items will soon be going up.
What this means for the future of the comics industry, I dunno. I'd be better off asking those artists who went all in on digital self-publishing years ago, and have managed to make a living at it.
https://screenrant.com/us-tariffs-c.....ays-explainer/
https://screenrant.com/comics-indus.....ruptcy-op-ed/7
Here's the brief version: around the turn of the millenium, Diamond Comic Distributors drove its remaining competitors out of business, thereby gaining a monopoly on the distribution of comic books and graphic novels in the U.S. (As middlemen between publishers and retailers, they were exempt from America's antitrust laws.) Nobody liked Diamond, but everyone needed them; they got the publishers' product to their retail clients, and they offered retailers a wider variety of products, including independently published comics, than they would've had otherwise.
Diamond's twenty-year stranglehold on the comics industry came to an end with the COVID-19 pandemic. With consumers staying at home instead of going out to buy comics, Diamond suspended all distribution activities and -- probably the last straw -- began withholding payments to publishers. That's when DC publisher (now president) Jim Lee did the unthinkable: he cut ties with Diamond and signed new distribution deals with publishing industry giant Penguin Random House (bookstores) and the Merkler family's Lunar Distribution (direct market). Smelling blood in the water, Marvel and Image followed suit, and Diamond, having lost its three biggest clients, staggered on for a few more years before filing for bankruptcy in February 2025. (Diamond's assets were purchased in March by the global distribution company Alliance Entertainment, a former music retailer.)
And with Diamond out of the picture, independent creator/publishers now find it effectively impossible to get their books distributed at all.
And then along came Trump's tariffs. Since all the major comics publishers -- Marvel, DC, Image, BOOM! Studios, Dark Horse, Dynamite Entertainment, IDW Publishing, Mad Cave Studios, and Oni Press -- print their slender, single-issue comics ("floppies") in Canada, and their trade paperback and omnibus collections in China, the prices on these items will soon be going up.
What this means for the future of the comics industry, I dunno. I'd be better off asking those artists who went all in on digital self-publishing years ago, and have managed to make a living at it.
https://screenrant.com/us-tariffs-c.....ays-explainer/
https://screenrant.com/comics-indus.....ruptcy-op-ed/7
Single issues have been becoming too expensive as it was. US$ 5 for something you can read through in a few minutes?
That said, the question how many small publishers survive a little longer will depend on what the new owner is going to do with Diamond Comic Distributors.
I got this message 6 months ago, so Ed is probably dead by now. Wish I knew for sure. I believe Ed underestimated how many people care about him.
Thanks for letting me know. You are right - many people cared about him, even if we never met him in person.