Friday, May 6, 2011

Free Comic Book Day Musings


You might have noticed (or perhaps you haven't) that this is the first time in four years that I have not produced a comic for Free Comic Book Day. There are a few reasons behind that, but the main one is that I spent a lot of time, money and effort into the whole ordeal with very little in return. I don't want this to sound all business-like and throw around terms like "return on investment," but in those four years, and literally thousands of comics, I received maybe one order and had maybe 3 or 4 people say that picked up one of the free issues.

Some of the stores I gave copies to had many leftover copies and I suspect that some stores simply threw out the leftover copies. I'd much rather put the money spent on the FCBD issue into making a new full-length issue, since those actually have a decent reception (in terms of sales).

In the meantime, there are still four free comics for you to download if you visit www.candyormedicine.com.

3 comments:

JB Sapienza said...

Candy or Medicine free comic book day #2 was the first comic I was ever published in. so this news saddens me a bit. But I understand where you are coming from.

In the meantime it'd also be awesome if all the candy or mediciners popped over to my name is jonah and download our free comic book day issue as well. at least 4 Candy or Mediciners contributed.

http://www.mynameisjonahfilm.com/Images/FCBD%202011.pdf

Unknown said...

I share JB's sadness over the loss of a fcbd com, but it makes sense. Just found it a little ironic that even though you didn't feel they offered much of a gain, the first copy I saw of the first comicbook to ever publish me and get me wrapped up in all this shiz was the 09 fcbd issue. So I gained. RIP, fcbd com!

Colin Tedford said...

Yeah, though the ostensible point of FCBD is to bring in new readers, I doubt its effectiveness - especially with so many free comics aimed at audiences (like superhero fans) that are probably as big as they're going to get. Whatever, I use free comics for promotion all year - I don't need a special day for it! I mostly give them away personally at conventions, though; the ones I distribute around town etc. are more for fun than because I think it's super useful.