Buffy Season Eight: Killing Me with the Variant Comic Book Covers

OK, I have no idea how it is if you buy your comic books from a bricks and mortar comic store. I could never keep track of or deal with that, so I buy my comics online from Things from Another World.

Now, every issue of Buffy Season Eight has a regular cover and then every four books are printed with a variant cover.

So. If you want to guarantee that you receive the variant cover, you have to order four copies of every book. This is absurd, and luckily, I prefer the regular artwork anyway. It's absolutely stunning.

But. If you want to guarantee that you receive the regular cover, you have to order two copies. Otherwise, you risk receiving the variant cover on your one issue, thereby not having a complete and beautiful set of the regular covers.

At first, I would just order my one and cross my fingers. But then, if the variant cover arrived, I had to reorder - and then I still had to reorder two to make sure I got what I wanted. So now I order two copies.

Except somehow I accidentally ordered three of an upcoming issue, and it seems too late to cancel one, at least, not without calling about it. Who wants to bet I don't even get the variant on that one?

Oh, and the one time I really, really liked the variant? Of course, didn't get it. I might have ordered four to get this one, but I didn't see it in time:

What's beyond annoying is that now what I have is:

• One complete set of the normal covers.
• Many, many doubles of the normal covers, but not another complete set.
• An incomplete set of the alternative covers.

That last one would have me stark raving mad if I stopped to think about it.

It's not the cost; comics books are under $3. But the annoyance, and hello, the paper involved in these equations??? The fact that people are ordering four copies every issue to get those variant covers just seems like such a paper suck.

I guess what most annoys me, though, is that I have to order extra copies just to ensure that I receive a complete set of the normal covers. I don't want any of these extra copies! The whole system is the suck.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm off to read Wolves at the Gate Part 3 (#14) before I go to bed. Gee, which of my matching copies should I crack?

(I am happy about my free Hellboy I got for Free Comic Book Day.)

Comments

[Andrew McIntire]

Dear Ms. Rizzo,

Thank you for choosing Things From Another World. We appreciate your business and strive to provide you with the service you deserve. I have read your blog regarding your dissatisfaction with the variant cover situation, and I am sorry to hear of your displeasure. I wanted to take a moment to clarify this policy.

We at TFAW take pre-orders and subscriptions from our customers for all titles well in advance of their release dates. For Buffy alone we have a very high volume of subscriptions and pre-orders. When we receive these copies from the publisher, they come packed together in a specific sequence, 3 normal covers then 1 variant, and repeat. We unfortunately have no way of requesting a box of exclusively variant or regular covers. There are some titles that do ship variants separately from regular covers - Buffy does not.

We actually have tried in the past to allow our customers to specify regular or variant covers for the Buffy comic. Unfortunately this caused several problems. Namely, due to the way the title is packed (3 regular, 1 variant) we ended up with a great number of boxes that had been pillaged for their variant cover issues, and several extra copies of the regular cover. Because we had removed the variant covers, we could not return the boxes to the publisher. And because we had based our order quantity on our subscriptions, pre-orders, and a reasonable amount to cover our post-release customers - we ended up with hundreds of excess copies.

As you can imagine the cost associated with this was considerable. It also caused displeasure on the part of the publisher, as they did not want the regular and variant covers solicited separately. As a rule, most retailers when faced with this situation price the variant cover 2 to 3 times greater than the MSRP to cover the cost of the three extra (regular cover) copies they must purchase. We don’t do that. In fact we take 20% off the MSRP for pre-orders. This way, whether you are lucky enough to get a variant (which I know you do not particularly like, but which many of our customers love) or whether you receive a regular cover – you get it at one fair price. We would not be able to maintain this pricing structure were we to embrace the ‘order 4 to get 1’ practice used by many other retailers.

There are some titles which solicit variant covers separately from the regular covers, and some which do not. Buffy just happens to be one of the latter. For customers, such as yourself, who do favor one over the other, we've attempted to enable you to be able to guarantee you receive the one you want as easily as we can, without gouging everyone’s prices, by letting you know that you have a 1 in 4 chance of getting a variant and that to absolutely, positively guarantee you get a regular cover, you must buy two copies. It is not a perfect solution, but given the limitations imposed on us by the publisher, it is the most accurate way we can convey this information to our customers.

We certainly do not stipulate that you must order two copies to receive a regular cover to exploit or inconvenience our customers, and I apologize if you have been left with this impression, and for your displeasure as a whole.

Thank you again for choosing Things From Another World as your Buffy source. We are grateful for your business and hope that, despite your dissatisfaction with the variant policy, you will continue to allow us to be of service. If there is any further way I can be of service please don’t hesitate to contact me.

Best Regards,

Andrew McIntire
Things From Another World

[Liz]

Hi Andrew,

Hey, I hear you. I didn't really mean to be coming down on Things From Another World - I'm glad I can order my comics online!

This post was more about, as someone relatively new to comics, the fact that the publisher sets this whole situation up like this really bites. And uses a lot of paper. And leaves me with a lot of extra comic books. It's frustrating, but if I couldn't order online, I'd never be able to keep up and make sure I didn't miss any.

[Shrew]

Hi Liz, this is totally off-topic, but I thought these dragonfly correspondence cards might be your thing:

http://www.metmuseum.org/store/st_family_viewer.asp/familyID/%7B50C21952-AC6D-48C5-8F15-7262C3E3654D%7D/FromPage//callFromRelViewer/y/callFromFamViewer/y/SpecialPermFlag//catID/%7B3A37CF94-1465-11D5-93F0-00902786BF44%7D/FromSearch/

That's all!

[Liz]

Oh, I know, Shrew. I *totally* love those cards!