Gladstone's advertising

[DAVID.A.GERSTEIN]

      Dear Folks,

      Matti Maenpaa explained where Gladstone's readership comes 
from, then explained that the strength of that market meant that 
further advertising wasn't needed.  Well, let's start the inevitable 
argument.  ;-)

      You see, KIDS are overlooked when Gladstone's comics aren't 
advertised!  I have talked to dozens of kids who are great Disney 
fans and who, when shown Gladstones from my collection, loved them.  
Many of them started buying them after seeing those I showed them.
But none of them knew that the comics even exist.  Comic shops have 
no advertising for Gladstones anywhere in them.  Neither do any of 
the comic fanzines, dull as they are, which are popular with the 
younger crowd (tripe like "Wizard", I mean).  Those fanzines don't 
have articles about Gladstone 99% of the time.  Is it because ducks 
aren't hip?  Face it.  Marvel BUYS DOZENS of ads in "Wizard."  Hence, 
"Wizard" covers Marvel extensively.  If Gladstone began buying ads in 
that pathetic (but well-read) magazine, Wizard would probably look 
more kindly toward covering their publications.  Did anyone notice 
how the "Diamond Previews" catalogue magazine has devoted less space 
to Gladstones since they stopped buying a one-page ad?  Sad to say, 
money is everything when comic-world power moguls splash praise on a 
concept and series.  (The one exception to all of this, BONE, seems to 
have been praised by the moguls just so that they could make 
themselves look good.  It is one of the best new comics in literally 
decades -- already a classic -- but the media's hype about it seems 
unfortunately transparent to me.)

      When I went into a German comic shop, I saw the German reprints 
of Gladstone albums on a specially-prepared cardboard stand made by 
Ehapa.  The stand had a huge head of Donald at the top.  When I 
bought some random comics, I took them out of the shop in a bag which 
had Ehapa's logo on it and huge illos of CBL Album covers there, too. 
Ehapa makes those bags and sells 'em cheap as dirt (or maybe even 
GIVES them away) to comic shops as part of a promotional scheme.  
THIS is what Gladstone really needs to do.  Sure, they're surviving 
now.  But you never know what you can do until you try.

      So how are Marvel's Disney comics doing?

      David Gerstein
      <9475609 at arran.sms.ed.ac.uk>