Simon Jones just posted a thoughtful analysis of DC’s decision to shutter CMX. In addition to rounding up responses from all corners of the Internet, he raises two points which I think bear repeating. First, the Tenjo Tenge controversy is being overstated as a possible cause of CMX’s poor sales. Other publishers — Dark Horse, Del Rey, Viz — have, at various points in their history, angered fans by putting panties on naked girls or censoring images, but all have recovered from the inevitable backlash. The fans still sulking about Tenjo Tenge strike me as the kind of readers who were never likely to buy the American edition — or Two Flowers for the Dragon, for that matter.
Second, the demise of CMX suggests the market can’t support small-to-midsize generalists. Though most bloggers have been citing the strength of CMX’s shojo catalog, a quick glance at their website reveals that CMX was, in fact, casting a much wider net with its offerings, which ran the gamut from G-rated shonen to R-rated splatter-horror. Without a Naruto-sized hit, however, CMX had no steady revenue stream to offset poor-to-middling performers. Jones anticipates that the market of the future may be divided between the big guys, who succeed on the strength of a few mega-sellers, and the boutiques, who cater to a particular segment of the fandom. His analysis is worth quoting at length:
I’m concerned with the viability of the mainstream manga model itself. Without a doubt, the $10 trade paperback as popularized by Tokyopop and Viz, and adopted by almost every other manga publisher, is most responsible for the rise of the manga category in bookstores. The low price point moved manga from boutique publishing towards mainstream publishing, like movies, music, and manga in Japan, which works on the following principle… there are always far more movies, music, and books that are unprofitable, but profits from the a handful of big winners subsidize the legion of piddling losers… This system of relying on a few properties may not work for mid-list publishers like CMX, Go Comi, Infinity Studios, Aurora, et al… they don’t have one mega-hit, a Naruto or a Love Hina, to sustain them, especially when the economy and devaluation of media by piracy… have all but broken traditional PED models.
To put it simply… is the $10 manga under-priced? This might seem an absurd question when everyone is clamoring for even cheaper digital comics, but unless one is able to compete with the likes of Viz on major licenses, it seems to me the only other option is to operate as a specialty publisher… where a greater emphasis is placed on books that are self-sustaining.
On a personal note, I wanted to add my voice to the chorus of folks praising the hard work of Asako Suzuki and Jim Chadwick. They did a terrific job under difficult circumstances, taking licensing risks with Astral Project, From Eroica With Love, Moon Child, Presents, and Swan, while working hard to serve an important but neglected demographic: pre-teen girls. Tangognat summarizes the importance of the CMX collection to her library’s patrons:
CMX’s shoujo line always seemed like it was carefully curated… As a librarian, I knew that I could always turn to CMX if someone was asking me for a good manga for 9-12 year olds, because so many of their shoujo titles were simple and sweet, without any objectionable elements that parents might be wary of.
DC, I hope you’re listening. If you’re serious about developing a female readership, maybe you should think about finding new roles for Asako and Jim at your company, as they have a talent for identifying and bringing great, girl-positive comics to market.
Since manga here costs about twice as much as it does in Japan, I’m gonna go ahead and say it’s not under-priced.
Obviously it doesn’t sell here like it does there, but doubling the price should support that to an extent.
I’m also inclined to agree with a lot of bloggers that something more than simple economics is going on with CMX. I have no doubt it’s part of the problem, but I think there’s something more going on related to the new management.
I wouldn’t be surprised if the new management at DC looked at CMX’s middling performance and decided to pull the plug on it.
As for cost, Jones’ main point is that $10 might work for Viz and Tokyopop, both of which have titles that sell tens of thousands of copies, but smaller companies have a much harder time making a go of it at the price point. CMX didn’t have a single book on the 2009 Bookscan Graphic Novel List, which means that they had few, if any, titles selling 4,000 copies per volume. Those kind of numbers suggest that CMX wasn’t making money on the titles it licensed. (The break-even point for most books in the US is somewhere between 5,000 – 10,000 copies, depending on development, printing, and marketing costs.) With no Naruto-sized hit or steady back catalog sellers (e.g. Death Note), they didn’t have a revenue stream that would help them weather the downturn in the market. I think, too, the discrepancy between US and Japanese sales is telling: the best-selling volume of Naruto sold around 61,000 copies in 2009, a far cry from the best-performing volumes on the Japanese market, which might sell upwards of 200,000 copies (or, in the case of One Piece, 1,000,000 copies for a single volume).
From the consumer perspective, pricing and value are greatly subjective, of course, but I think if you wanted to directly evaluate the pricing of manga in US versus the Japanese market, there are some additional details to consider…
1. The size difference (and the economies of scale involved) between the two markets cannot be overstated. I believe manga is 40% of total units and 25% of total revenue of the entire Japanese print industry.
If a $10 manga isn’t selling at least somewhere around 4~5000 copies each volume, it’s probably losing money. To be an ongoing business concern, it should be moving 5 digits. A lot of books are having trouble meeting just the break-even point.
2. Japanese publisher wholesale discounts are 10~20% less than what US retailers expect.
3. Secondary licensing opportunities are generally not available to US publishers.
Thanks for that extra information, Simon–I appreciate someone bringing some real numbers to the discussion, much as it pains me to say good-bye to great series like From Eroica With Love, Swan, and Fire Investigator Nanase.