Perception is not the reality.

Because we're in a relatively small comic market, we've had to be somewhat presumptuous in how we handle sign-ups for comics. More often than not, we will assume that certain subscribers will like certain titles and automatically sign them up for it.  Especially for DC and Marvel.

We try not to overdo it.  We try to make sure that the titles are compatible.

The thing you have to understand is, we buy comics non-returnable.  Hundreds of titles that we are more or less guessing on every month.

If it was games or toys or books or even graphic novels, either we have it or we don't.  We can buy what we need when we need it.  But being periodicals, we have to keep buying comic titles, whether we need them or not, whether they sell well or not.  Because, we just don't know.

But we've learned that if we wait for people to actually tell us they want a title, it is usually too late to do anything about it.  Or...they never ask.

So that is the system we've had for years, now.  Making the decision for the reader, very often.

And it seems to work.  There is a constant turnover in books and the interest in books, and this seems to help keep things level.  Most everyone seems all right with us doing that.  (They have the option of not taking a title they didn't specifically ask for -- but I'd say they take them about 90% of the time.)

Coming up in April and May, and continuing after, both DC and Marvel are throwing their universes into complete change-over mode.  So for about 3 months, we won't have any idea based on previous selling history, how these completely new titles will do.

If we were doing it the way most comic shops do it -- that is, waiting for people to sign up -- this would be a huge problem.  But because we're going to more or less make the decision for the customer, we may not get hurt too badly.  We hope.

So, for instance, there is a title called Shadow of the Bat.  If we just assume all Batman subscribers will want that (after we explain the regular Batman won't be coming) we can hope that 80 or 90% of the customers will accept that explanation and buy the comic.  We hope.

Something I've learned over the years -- customers will complain about constant turnover, but they will often respond.  Whereas, if the market remains stable (as they say they want) they will slowly drift away.  In other words, the comic publishers are simply responding to what the customers actually do, versus what customers think they're going to do.

This is true more often than not.  The perception is not the reality.  You have to deal with the reality, not the perception.