How Local Comic Shops Are Coping During The Crisis, Part Four

      GROUNDBREAKING COMICS, based in White Marsh, Maryland faces a different challenge for coping during the coronavirus crisis compared to standard comic shops. Owner Dustin Hovatter stated that 90% of his business derives from convention sales. Groundbreaking Comics does not have a physical store location, but brings its’ version of a “comic shop” to various conventions, large and small, up and down the East Coast and sometimes to points further West. “In some ways that’s wonderful,” Dustin explained, “in some ways it’s challenging.”

   Dustin is a bit luckier than the standard comic shops for several reasons: 1) He doesn’t have a physical location/shop and monthly rent and utility bills that will keep coming in during the shut-down; 2) He was able to pay his remaining two invoices related to Groundbreaking Comics; and 3) He has a full-time job that provides a steady income working for a business deemed essential by the state of Maryland. 

   Groundbreaking Comics sells books both old and new (specializing in variant covers), and is a customer of Diamond Distribution, who Dustin feels “probably saved the industry by suspending operations in March.”

He also obtains a little revenue from sales on Facebook (as Groundbreaking Comics) and eBay, which has picked up over the last several weeks. He anticipates Diamond resuming business perhaps as early as the targeted May 20 date with new books from all publishers back to regular release sometime in June. 

   I asked Dustin to rate the general feel of his business future on a scale of 1-10. (A rating of 10 means he isn’t concerned at all, and not bothered by the shutdown. A rating of 1 means his business is hurt enough by the crisis that he may have to shut down permanently.) "I'm probably out of business until fall at the earliest, so I'd have to go with a rating of  6." Dustin still remains optimistic about the future even though comic conventions will be the very last thing to return once businesses open up again.

     As the San Diego Comic Convention just announced it will not hold that gala event in 2020, Dustin says “there’s a lot of speculation out there in comics circles now as to who will do the conventions first. I’m hurt by the shut-down, but Groundbreaking Comics will be there when things re-open. Although, in our case, rather than 2-4 weeks from now it will probably be 2-4 months or even next year.”

     Aside from his own business, Dustin is more concerned for the plight of local comic shops in lieu of the recent decision by DC Comics to abandon Diamond for now  and go to two alternate distributors for their books, with five books coming out as early as this week (April 28). 

 “DC Comics lost a lot of goodwill the last three weeks, and has no respect for the problem, he said. Dustin feels the decision came from higher up in the DC corporate chain (parent Warner Brothers). “They want content coming out the door now, and aren’t willing to wait for things to resume.”

   “The comics industry operates on razor thin margins, especially at the local shop level,” he explained. “Having to get books from more than one distributor adds extra layers of invoicing and shipping costs. That especially kills margins when shops are only able to afford 1-2 issues of a title. Now spread the extra distribution costs in, and shipping costs on top of shipping costs begins to add up.”

  Also, the parent companies of DC’s new distributors are in the comics selling business (Midtown Comics and Discount Comic Book Services). They were probably selected by DC because they already have large established mail order businesses, and will just have to ramp up. “Those parent companies are competitors. Why should we support the enemy and allow them to make money off of comic shops, when they can then use the extra profits to ramp up the advertising for their mail order business?”

   “Why ask comic shops to cough up the money for new books now, when most of them are shut down and can’t effectively sell these books to their customers?” asked Dustin. As some states relax the rules of stay-at-home during the crisis, some comic shops will be able to re-open the doors to walk-in business. “That creates a have-and-have-not situation. Shops may lose some customers to other shops because of the fear of missing out (FOMO) regarding the new DC books.  Customers may travel from a quarantined area into a non-quarantined area to get comics. (This could easily happen in Pennsylvania, which is considering slowly re-opening one area at a time, depending on the presence of the virus in each community.)

UPDATE: After the re-opening, DC Comics will continue to be distributed through Diamond as well as the two new sources. There will be a few weeks before Diamond reopens when the other two distributors will be the only source for new DC books. After Diamond resumes operations, they will then have all the releases the other two carried as well.