Monthly Comics Spending (i.e. Wallet Rapage)

wwtMask

First off, as a bit of background info, I'm a bit OCD about my comics hobby, to the point that I have a multi-tabbed spreadsheet that, among other things, breaks down my monthly estimated expenditures by week. I started this thing as a way to keep track of my spending and to know what I was picking up each week so as not to spend money I don't have. So I was going over this spreadsheet yesterday and realized that I'd spent about $140 on comics for January. This doesn't even count a couple trades I bought, this was just singles. I'd spent about $120 the previous month. Since August, my monthly budget has gone from $25 a month to about $75 a month, and I've been making it worse by impulse buying and going crazy on the dollar back issues. Not only that, I almost feel like a kid in the candy store with all the new and interesting stuff that keeps getting solicited. The only thing keeping me from being broke is that I've been lucky to get overtime at work for a few months, but that's not guaranteed and I really need to reign in the spending.

Anyway, my question to you all is this: how badly are comics raping your wallet? How much do you spend monthly, on average, on singles? On trades? If you've reduced the amount you spend recently, what encouraged you to do so and how did you make the painful decision to drop one or more titles? Please help me feel like I'm not the only one that's spending so much on comics per month. :oops:

Briareos

You're not alone. I can't walk into my local shop without spending a minimum of $30.00, and it's usually more like $50-60. PER WEEK. The most I've spent in one shot recently was $120, but that included bags, boards, boxes, and trades.

And I still don't have books I want, like Invincible Ultimate Collection 1 & 2, Absolute New Frontier, Absolute Watchmen, Absolute DKR, and New X-Men Omnibus.

If I was just buying singles, I'd probably get away with anywhere from $12.00 to $20.00 per week. It's the trades that are killing me.

Marathon

I have to limit myself. Before I even go in I say I won't be getting more than 4-5 issues at any given time. So I maybe olny spend 60-75 a month. If I wanted to and had the funds...oh dear lord it would be bad.

robosagogo

I buy American Virgin and around 3 or 4 trades in an average month.

wwtMask

The problem is that, at least right now, I do have the funds. I just put down $120 on Monday to start up 6 new Marvel subscriptions. And I'm going to feel really stupid if I spend all of my overtime moneys on comics, but with my being somewhat obsessive about not having gaps in my collection, it's completely possible. If it wasn't for my wife constantly keeping on me about saving money and not spending it all on comics...well, let's just say it wouldn't be pretty.

Wildcat

I feel your pain. I started back into comics about six months ago; as someone who now has a fairly decent monthly income I obviously proceeded to go crazy. On average it can be £30 per week, but there are any number of trades that I would like to get also. My largest spend in one week was £120. That's about US£230, by the way.

It's horribly expensive and I know I shouldn't, but at the same time I get too much enjoyment from them to stop. What I do intend though is to give away a lot of them to charity shops, barring the trades or ones I really want to keep.

Charmy

Usually no more than $10-$15 dollars a month. Quite often less.

The trick to spending so little is to not have any money. I need to conserve my wealth to buy Kraft Dinner.

It's kinda pathetic.

Iroh

Like Wildcat, I've probably only been at it 6-7 months. In that time I've spent maybe $150-200 on books, but I only follow Civil War, Annihilation, and about 6-7 regular series. I've wanted to go back and get singles of some things like Planet Hulk and Brubaker's Daredevil run, but unfortunately the two shops in town don't do the discounted backissues very often. The only time I've gotten a deal on anything was 70% off Moon Knight 1-6.

Fortunately though, the primary place I buy books gives me 15% off everything for a $15 membership every year.

My only tips are stick with series only on an arc-to-arc basis, and don't adopt a new run too early. If you buy an issue something you don't truly like a whole lot, you may still be compelled to keep up on it because you like to complete a collection.

Munch

I've been slowly cutting back. At this point I strive to spend no more than $20-ish a week, which is a good 7-8 single issues, and I typically spend more like $12. If I have a small week where only one or two books are coming out, I'll usually pick up a cheap ($12 to $15) trade, and every few months I get the newest Invincible trade. So I would guess that I spend, at most, $100 a month, or $1,200 a year, and that's shooting high. But shit, I spend twenty bucks a week on gas, so why not allocate an equal or lesser amount to my primary hobby? Plus I make up for it by not spending a bunch of money on overpriced coffee, fast food, videogames, consoles, MMOs, alcohol, and other indulgences that people in my age bracket are so fond of.

saint2e

I used to be spending upwards of 100pounds a month, mostly on singles. My comics collection is huge at the moment.

The bad part about all this is I'm moving back to Canada in about 7 months, so I've decided to cut off most of my "subscriptions", and just get the trades when they come out, and ship them to my parent's place in Canada to wait for my return.

Rather than spend oodles of money for shipping my singles back to Canada, I'm gonna probably sell them on Ebay. Just need to get the latest batch bagged and boarded, and then the huge sell off begins.

Side note: Anyone in the UK looking to buy comics off of me?

headn00b

saint2e wrote:

Side note: Anyone in the UK looking to buy comics off of me?

... Maybe.


Yeah ok, probably.

Whippy

I used to spend about a hundred bucks a week on comics. This went on for far longer than I care to admit.

I've bumped it down to about thirty, but it's still pretty ridiculous.

Zeromus

I really only go to the comic book store once every two weeks, and when I do I tend to pick up about 4 singles and maybe 1 trade on average.

Bad Karma

I usually spend about 30-40 bucks a week, unless of course it's a "figure" week for me, then it's around $100.

Sars_Boy

I don't really know.

something ridiculous, I'm sure.

DarkPrimus

Anywhere between $10-$30 on average. Sometimes I get lucky and get under $10 of issues.

Civil War is what's really raping my wallet.

Sentry

shit... if I can spend less then 30 a week, I consider it lucky.

My LCS has a thing where you get a dollar in credit for every dollar you spend, and it adds up as you go. So essentially, every few visits I get either free or half off, depending on when I use the credit.

For Masky specifically, you wouldn't spend as much if you stopped buying that Black Panther crap...

Honestly though, my biggest issue is knowing when it's just time to drop a book...

wwtMask

Sentry wrote:

shit... if I can spend less then 30 a week, I consider it lucky.

My LCS has a thing where you get a dollar in credit for every dollar you spend, and it adds up as you go. So essentially, every few visits I get either free or half off, depending on when I use the credit.

For Masky specifically, you wouldn't spend as much if you stopped buying that Black Panther crap...

Honestly though, my biggest issue is knowing when it's just time to drop a book...

Speaking as Reggie Hudlin's publicist, I have to say stop being a racist comics nerd. You're obviously too uncouth to understand the cultural and social commentary that Mr. Hudlin is putting into his work. For serious, why you gotta hate on a brotha? :P

Speaking as myself, I have to say that BP has been rock solid since the wedding issue and, even if I didn't have a subscription with it through Marvel, I'd still "waste money" on it. It's the book furthest from getting dropped on my list.

What I'm really spending lots on are new books that I keep adding to my pull list. I started with only 6 books and it's now gone up to 25. If not for several that have gotten delayed and a few others that hadn't started yet, I'd be spending even more.

Raziel_pm

I've been buying comics for the last 14 years(All X-titles, Spawn, various LS's, etc) and have 15 "long-boxes" in my collection so far. Maybe this weekend I'll actually count them to put a real number to it.

Anywayz, yeah...I've seen the price of comics go from $1.00 all the way to the current $2.99 a piece.:shock: Fucking inflation makes me wanna cut someone, but fortunately the store I go to does 20% off for everything in your sub and everything new on the rack the week it comes out.

On spending, pretty much ever since Civil War started, my monthly expenditure has been around $80 to $110. It's all due to my store pulling EVERY CW tie-in for me. Thank Primus this damn story is over next month!

Once it's done, I'll be back down to my normal 14 titles a month. That'll bring it back to about $30 or $40 a month.

DarkPrimus

Raziel_pm wrote:

On spending, pretty much ever since Civil War started, my monthly expenditure has been around $80 to $110. It's all due to my store pulling EVERY CW tie-in for me. Thank Primus this damn story is over next month!

You're welcome.

FogDog

I used to spend somewhere around $20-$30 dollars a month, which was fine since i have the money at the time. I was gone all of last summer and my shop continued to hold all my books for me, about three months worth. When i got back i couldnt spend the money on the books, it was too much money at one time. I havnt really been back to the shop and only buy the occasional TPB online now. I feel kinda bad

Skullo

I try to deal almost exclusively in trades to keep my spending down. Over the christmas break, I'd estimate I spent around $200 on trades. As far as singles go, I try to keep it down to two or three monthlies (currently Iron Fist, JSofA, and Dr.Strange: The Oath). I'll pick up other monthlies that may catch my eye occasionally (like specific JSA Classified stories).

I don't spend that much, but then again I just hate spending money in general.

Wildcat

saint2e wrote:

Side note: Anyone in the UK looking to buy comics off of me?

Quite possibly.

Bogart

In singles I'm spending between £10 and £20 a week. On top of that I'm collecting anything Ultimate and a couple of other series in trades, so those get slapped into the budget on a regular basis. Sooooo, say somewhere between £70 and £100 a month. And then double that to get the dollar worth. Oy.

lostwords

When I first started getting into comics, around soph year of high school, I would spend about $50-$70 a week on comics, since I had a crappy part-time job and all.

Now that I'm an adult, I spend about that much every two weeks, even though I have a bigger entertainment budget.

I cut down on lot of things down the road, and stopped buying books that I would buy just because I've been buying them for as long as I've been collecting. no more mindlessly buying issues of ocmics that I know will turn it around in a few months time, slogging through bad storylines and bad writing.

Romero Zombie

Really depends on the week…I don't usually buy trades unless it's a slow week. I try to stay within $20 a week…I think the most I spent is $50 one week on single issues. I'm running out of room for my longboxes…my closet has…6 stacked up right now.

guyjo

I spend over 100 dollars a month on comics easily.

SatanIsMyMotor

I made an off-hand comment to my lcs that I would eventually like to pick up Absolute Kingdom Come and Absolute New Frontier. Just in a casual conversation.
I come in last week and he says "You're going to cry. I got both of your absolutes in."
I only picked up one but I'll grab the other this week...

Rabid_Llama

I spent over a hundered dollars on graphic novels this week. It really hurt.

I bought:
300 (painfully short)
Infinite Crisis
Crisis on Infinite Earths
Identity Crisis

Romero Zombie

Yeah - my comic habit keeps me from being able to go out to the shooting range to once every couple of months

DJ Eebs

I spend around eighty bucks a month now that I think about it.

I don't like to think about it.

Bad Karma

Geebs wrote:

I spend around eighty bucks a month now that I think about it.

I don't like to think about it.

You should be spending more.

DJ Eebs

Bad Karma wrote:

Geebs wrote:

I spend around eighty bucks a month now that I think about it.

I don't like to think about it.

You should be spending more.

The first step would be making more.

And I honestly can't think of anything I'm mad at myself for missing out on. Other than stuff like Y and Fables, and I've decided to just pick up the trades on that/those.

Garlic Bread

There are some books I see as "trade books" and "monthly books"

Fables is a trade book
Jack of Fables is a monthly
Y is a monthly
Invincible changes like every month

DJ Eebs

Yeah, I tried to pick up Fables for a few months and it didn't read nearly as well. But in terms of Y, I'm like five trades behind, if I'm even that close.

Jack of Fables though, I should be able to catch up on pretty easily. And I'm taking the wait-for-the-trade thing one step further with Invincible and I'm waiting for the big three-trades-in-one-gigantic-hardcover-route.

Garlic Bread

Well the first Jack trade just came out or is about to come out

Sars_Boy

Keith wrote:

Well the first Jack trade just came out or is about to come out

end of the month

but DMZ comes out this week!

DJ Eebs

I've seen it listed, but I kind of like to have the singles instead of the trades, even though I haven't managed to get longboxes for them yet.

I really, really should.

Iroh

Sars_Boy wrote:

Keith wrote:

Well the first Jack trade just came out or is about to come out

end of the month

but DMZ comes out this week!

DMZ is fantastic. I can't believe how little it gets mentioned around here. At first I thought it would be a big Bush-hater circle jerk, but it turned out to be something totally different. And the art is beyond great; in fact, it's probably my favorite thing about the book.

Every arc is pretty much a self contained story too, so nobody has any excuse for not jumping in with both feet.

ben0207

I don't have an LCS for literally miles, so I just buy trades and HCs off Amazon, but even then I can still send an easy £60 in a single sitting, and thats generally every couple of weeks.

Vaguely related then, I suppose: is there a better place than Amazon UK for buying comics? They're alright, but they can take absolutely months to get somethings in.

Wildcat

You could try Forbidden Planet, I guess. I just ordered the Absolutes of New Frontier and Kingdom Come from them, so I'll be able to judge how good the service is.