Skylanders Comic Sells Huge Numbers

IDW Publishing's Skylanders comics have managed pre-sales in the 'high six figures,' according [...]

By Russ Burlingame

IDW Publishing's Skylanders comics have managed pre-sales in the "high six figures," according to ICv2.

Like last year's high-profile My Little Pony release, Skylanders comics will also be available in a number of formats including "micro fun packs" available at non-comics retail cash wraps in places like Toys R Us and GameStop and a hardcover edition which will collect the first three issues of the comic and be available on the same day #1 hits the stands.

"Our Fun Pack product was designed initially to be sold at mass," IDW CEO Ted Adams said.  "We were trying to figure out a way to get comics into the mass market outside of the book section.  If you go to a Target or a Walmart, my belief is that the book store part of those stores is not a great place to sell comics.  They don't fit well in the racks.  It gets buried with all the other content there.  We wanted to create content that could fit in a different part of the store, so that's why it's designed to look like a trading card packet.  It's bigger than a trading card but it's designed to be in the front of the store as opposed to the back of the store where the books are being sold.  And that's worked for us."

Besides My Little Pony, Adams pointed out that they recently released some of the Micro Fun Packs for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, timed to coincide with the release of this month's movie.

Since the sales numbers are split between formats and mostly outside of the direct market, the phenomenal sales for Skylanders will likely go largely unreported because it will take place outside of Diamond's regular channels.

Veteran comics writer Ron Marz, who will write Skylanders, tweeted this about the book's success:

Skylanders #1 is on sale in October.

0comments
Start the Conversation

of