{"id":516,"date":"2009-02-23T07:00:05","date_gmt":"2009-02-23T12:00:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/?p=516"},"modified":"2009-02-23T00:35:07","modified_gmt":"2009-02-23T05:35:07","slug":"are-you-ready-to-pay-399-per-monthly-comic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/wordpress\/2009\/02\/23\/are-you-ready-to-pay-399-per-monthly-comic\/","title":{"rendered":"Are You Ready to Pay $3.99 Per Monthly Comic?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignright\" title=\"Dark Avengers #2\" src=\"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/images\/dark_avengers.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"275\" height=\"418\" \/>In case you hadn&#8217;t noticed, the price of your monthly comics has been creeping up.\u00a0 For the past few years, monthly comics from Marvel &amp; DC have cost $2.99 each.\u00a0 Rumors have been floating around about a price increase on the horizon.\u00a0 Well, Marvel is starting to move up.\u00a0 For example, both <em>New Avengers<\/em> and <em>Dark Avengers<\/em> are already priced at $3.99 with no additional pages added.\u00a0 Most of Marvel&#8217;s new limited series are also priced at $3.99.\u00a0 Both companies have been using the $3.99 price for a while on extra-sized comics (usually with an additional 8-pages), but the 22-page comics had remained $2.99 until now.\u00a0 It&#8217;s worth noting that only Marvel has announced the price increase on 22-page comics at this time.\u00a0 But don&#8217;t be fooled, both companies tend to match prices. I&#8217;m sure it&#8217;s just a matter of time until DC catches up.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Just a couple quick thoughts about this price increase:<\/p>\n<ul style=\"text-align: justify;\">\n<li>I realize that paper prices are increasing.\u00a0 I deal with the increasing expense of paper every day in my job.\u00a0 However, did Marvel really need to raise the price a whole dollar?\u00a0 Couldn&#8217;t they have just gone to $3.25 or even $3.50?\u00a0 $3.99 is a lot to pay for 22 pages of story &#8211; that&#8217;s 18 cents per page.\u00a0 It&#8217;s quite possible Marvel has exceeded the threshold people are willing to pay for a monthly comic.<\/li>\n<li>Marvel is being inconsistent about the price increase.\u00a0 Some 22-page comics remain $2.99, while others have been moved up to $3.99.\u00a0 The only 22-page monthly comics at $3.99 so far are: <em>Dark Avengers<\/em>, <em>New Avengers<\/em>, <em>Spider-Woman<\/em>, <em>Hulk<\/em>, and <em>Punisher<\/em> (Max series). Why the difference in pricing?\u00a0 Why is one comic more expensive than another?\u00a0 Are they charging more for Bendis comics because they can get away with it?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Just a quick history lesson on price increases.\u00a0 Here are the past few price increases, showing how much of an increase and when they happened.\u00a0 I used Uncanny X-Men cover dates for this example:<\/p>\n<ul style=\"text-align: justify;\">\n<li>June 2000 went from $1.99 to $2.25<\/li>\n<li>August 2005 went from $2.25 to $2.50<\/li>\n<li>June 2006 went from $2.50 to $2.99<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Some people have suggested that the &#8220;Big Two&#8221; should just drop the monthly comics and move to a trade paperback-only industry.\u00a0 While that&#8217;s an interesting thought, neither of the &#8220;Big Two&#8221; is currently structured in such a way to support change like this.\u00a0 From what I&#8217;ve heard, the monthly comics are paying the bills, while the trade industry is where the profit is.\u00a0 As it stands right now, they can&#8217;t afford to pay their bills without the monthlies.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">While only a handful of regular-sized comics are $3.99, it&#8217;s likely that Marvel &amp; DC will begin to price all their regular-sized comics at that price.\u00a0 So you gotta ask yourself, is $3.99 too much to pay for monthly 22-page comic?\u00a0 I&#8217;m starting to think it might be.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\n<div class=\"sharedaddy sd-sharing-enabled\"><div class=\"robots-nocontent sd-block sd-social sd-social-icon-text sd-sharing\"><h3 class=\"sd-title\">Tell the world about ONCE UPON A GEEK:<\/h3><div class=\"sd-content\"><ul><li class=\"share-twitter\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"sharing-twitter-516\" class=\"share-twitter sd-button share-icon\" 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your monthly comics has been creeping up.\u00a0 For the past few years, monthly comics from Marvel &amp;<\/p>\n<div class=\"sharedaddy sd-sharing-enabled\"><div class=\"robots-nocontent sd-block sd-social sd-social-icon-text sd-sharing\"><h3 class=\"sd-title\">Tell the world about ONCE UPON A GEEK:<\/h3><div class=\"sd-content\"><ul><li class=\"share-twitter\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"sharing-twitter-516\" class=\"share-twitter sd-button share-icon\" href=\"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/wordpress\/2009\/02\/23\/are-you-ready-to-pay-399-per-monthly-comic\/?share=twitter\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Twitter\"><span>Twitter<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-facebook\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"sharing-facebook-516\" class=\"share-facebook sd-button share-icon\" href=\"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/wordpress\/2009\/02\/23\/are-you-ready-to-pay-399-per-monthly-comic\/?share=facebook\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to 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Here is a relevant quote from the press release: \"As Co-Publishers, we listened to our fans and to our partners in the retail community who told us that\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;comic books&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4025,"url":"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/wordpress\/2010\/08\/18\/marvel-comics-the-avengers-trailer-from-1952\/","url_meta":{"origin":516,"position":1},"title":"Marvel Comics&#8217; The Avengers trailer from 1952","date":"August 18, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"I figure most people saw this last week as it made it's rounds on the interwebs.\u00a0 In case you missed it, here is the trailer to Marvel Comics' feature film The Avengers made in 1952! If you can\u2019t see the embedded video above, please click here. My thanks to Ed\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;comic books&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"Marvel Comics' The Avengers made in 1952 (pre-make)","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/onceuponageek.com\/images\/avengers_premake.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":993,"url":"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/wordpress\/2009\/05\/19\/marveldc-jlaavengers-artwork-by-george-perez\/","url_meta":{"origin":516,"position":2},"title":"Marvel\/DC JLA\/Avengers Artwork by George Perez","date":"May 19, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Hey gang!\u00a0 The internet at my house has been out since a bad storm on Sunday.\u00a0 No internet = no posts.\u00a0 Sorry for the interruption in service.\u00a0 I'm doing this during my lunch hour at work. To tide you over until things return to normal, enjoy this George Perez drawing\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;art&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"Marvel\/DC JLA\/Avengers Crossover by George Perez","src":"https:\/\/i2.wp.com\/onceuponageek.com\/images\/marveldc.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":4381,"url":"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/wordpress\/2010\/10\/15\/bronze-age-marvel-madness\/","url_meta":{"origin":516,"position":3},"title":"Bronze Age Marvel Madness","date":"October 15, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"I can't explain it, but I've been infected with Bronze Age Marvel Madness! I'm loving old Marvel comics from the Bronze Age!\u00a0 This is surprising because I'm predominantly a post-Crisis DC guy (or Tween-Crisis DC guy to be exact).\u00a0 The Bronze Age is often defined as mainstream comics published from\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;comic books&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"Bronze Age Marvel Comics","src":"https:\/\/i2.wp.com\/onceuponageek.com\/images\/bronze_age.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2597,"url":"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/wordpress\/2010\/01\/06\/will-the-sentry-die-during-siege\/","url_meta":{"origin":516,"position":4},"title":"Will the Sentry die during the Siege crossover from Marvel Comics?","date":"January 6, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Dark Avengers #14 is scheduled to ship on February 17, 2010.\u00a0 The cover here suggests the character known as the Sentry may perish. Here is the promotional blurb from Marvel Comics about this issue: The secrets of the Sentry are revealed but is it too late?\u00a0 Is this a hero\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;comic books&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i2.wp.com\/onceuponageek.com\/images\/darkavengers14.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1498,"url":"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/wordpress\/2009\/08\/03\/spent-time-reading-comics-this-past-weekend\/","url_meta":{"origin":516,"position":5},"title":"Spent Time Reading Comics This Past Weekend","date":"August 3, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Instead of blogging about comics, this weekend I actually read some!\u00a0 I've literally got stacks and stacks of comics I'm behind on reading.\u00a0 All together I flew through 44 comics this weekend.\u00a0 I really enjoyed immersing myself in the comic book world. Here are the titles I read and some\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;comic books&quot;","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/516"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=516"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/516\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":519,"href":"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/516\/revisions\/519"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=516"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=516"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=516"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}