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It strikes me that comic fans in the UK get a raw deal.

Back in the 1980s the UK had Neptune,Titan and Diamond distributing comics and Comag and others offering US comics to news agents.

Now we just have Diamond.  Despite everything you read in Previews you will be very lucky if you are a comic store customer and want to order an Independent title -and get it!  I’ve seen the UK store order catalogue Diamond sends to shops and it is very limited.

A UK chain store,such as Forbidden Planet [based on my experiences with the Bristol store] will sooner give you one ridiculous excuse after another as to why they cannot order a title rather than try -mainly because they know they can’t get them.

So do these big stores turn around to Diamond and say:”Look,provide us with the titles we need for our customers or we’ll get them elsewhere”?  Like hell.  Diamond might ‘delay’ a delivery or two.  In fact,it seems that these big stores will take what Diamond recommends because they are only interested in the idea of selling -and,funnily,over and over these shops have ended up with unsold piles of the “hot” title.

A distributor needs two things:[1] a product and,[2] a customer to sell to.  Independent publishers get terms that are difficult for most to achieve and if they don’t hit Diamond’s minimum order for the distributor to make more profit than the publisher can,the title is dropped.  Search the internet and you’ll find many such stories from publishers.

For Diamond cramming everything they can into Previews makes it look like the distributor to go to. But I have been shown faxes and even emails to store owners in the UK stating that certain Independent titles are not available in the UK -sometimes the line “because of costs” is used!

Diamond control what shops get and that is what makes them money.

Do store owners unite and say “Look;our customers want these titles so we want to get them”? No. Each year Diamond holds its very secretive “dealers/trade only” day before the Comic Expo. Can the comic press get into this ‘innocent’ event? NO! But customer friendly store owners offer info on what is pushed and how they are advised against Independents which will push their costs higher and therefore the cost to the retailer -hence why Independent comics can cost anywhere from £2.95-£3.45 depending on where you buy them.

Although I’ve had a standing order for Marvel,DC and Independent titles at my local Forbidden Planet for many years I have,since May this year,lost issue after issue and my Image comic titles are almost non-existent.  EVERY week since May I have been told I only have “one or two items” on my order. I have renewed my Standing Order almost every week -every week- since May.  Customer service in the store has also nose-dived. But with one comic store in a big city like Bristol they can do what they want.

I could do what other former regulars have done and that is set up a standing order at a store in another city and go there once a month or go mail order.  But as I’ve been a loyal FP customer since their first store opened -what,thirty years ago?- I expect store loyalty back.  No chance.

There are small Independent comic stores around the UK but they are rare.

And the claim that no one distributes the titles a lot of us ask for is proven false when you look at the huge catalogue of Turnaround Books -including the,uh,’unobtainable’ Dr Master Books.

The industry in the UK needs a new boost but while stores pander to simply Marvel and DC titles it’ll never happen.

And ‘UK’ companies seem to have lost direction. I can see Beano and The Dandy vanishing into only Annuals in a few short years.

Egmont publishes,in Scandinavia and elsewhere,books featuring old UK strips from Fleetway as well as D.C. Thomson -Jet Ace Logan,The Black Sapper and even Charlie’s War which sell very well but ask them why they don’t reprint in the UK:”No market”.  No ******** market??  Cinebook and Classical Comics seem to prove that there is a market.

I’ll give you a “for instance” here as to how UK companies have lost direction and,perhaps,even the knowledge of how to publish new comics.

“Mr J” at D.C.Thomson had a chat with me about the old adventure characters it owned and a document I presented to them.  I put two samplers together and sent them as promised in June.  Nothing. Sent an email gently reminding Mr J in August.  Nothing.

Like-wise,I chatted to Egmont back in April and again in May and forwarded a couple of dummy titles featuring various strips. Nothing.  An email sent.  Nothing.  Three weeks later another email. Nothing.  But about two weeks ago I got an email stating my submission had been received but would take “around six to seven months” before it might be looked at.

In case you thought that was a typo:6-7 months.

In that time a comic packager would say “ta-ta” and offer the package elsewhere and were Egmont later to be interested they could not bleat out “but you offered it to us first [7 months ago]!”

Back in the good old days a managing editor would go through submissions and sort them into “No”,”Maybe -go through again later” and “Possibility -file”.  And then the “Maybes” were gone through and a strong runner chosen.  And so the process begins. Six to seven months -forget it.  I was lucky enough to see certain titles chosen and how the process worked back in the 1980s after my character and title buying spree left me wondering how to proceed next! 

Look at Panini UK and its reprints of US comics.  Quality from cover to cover but nothing really standing out as “British” and for British kids.

Do D.C.Thomson bosses or bosses at Egmont actually look at the UK market or is it now simply a 9-5 job,pick up the pay cheque and hope the job lasts til retirement?

And let me point out that this situation re. distributors and UK companies is not just confined to comics.  The UK could have a good comic industry but it needs the business men with money and editorial staff with -forgive my language- balls big enough to do the job.

Hmm. Have I made enough enemies now?

Well,that’s my rant for the month.

nighty-night,kids.