As ideas continue to percolate behind the scenes here, I wanted to share with you a page from Comics Retailer Magazine #36 (March 1995).

This page of retailer opinions from the 90s is partially responsible for inspiring The Indirect Market. As I poured over this page, I was struck with how timeless these concerns were.

“A glut of poor products in an overcrowded market.”

“Attracting regular readers instead of ‘fair weather’ speculators.”

“Comic-book glut. Discount stores. Wal-Mart exclusives.”

“There are too many titles at high cover prices. Customers only have so much to spend, so they don’t buy as much as they used to.”

“Big money in comics more concerned with moving product than telling good stories with good art.”

“Lack of quality storylines to attract comic readers, not investors.”

“Will the current economic problems in the US once again affect our industry in 1995?”

These concerns loop around, time and time again. They eb and flow and pertain to different parts of the industry at different times, but they are always there. Always here.

They are the result of the current system, where "art" inevitably gives way to "content". Companies will find something that works and then push that button until the blood is gone. The art of it all dilutes and becomes "product".

We do this again and again and again.

But what if we didn't?

What if the industry picked up stakes and tried to do something else?

In almost every era, you can find folks doing the hard work to do move in a better direction. You're seeing it now when companies build small lines with focused purpose, and collected editions priced for discovery. You're seeing retailers across the board point to initiatives like that as a reason why new readers are flowing into stores.

A lot of hard work by many hands may have brought the comic industry to this point, but history shows us we need to break out of these old patterns and become something else.

Let's work together and see what we can build.