What is a Back Issue Comic Book?

Comic books usually come out on a monthly basis, and there is one time in the life of comic book when it was considered as a new issue, and that is the month when it was released. The "Back Issue" term refers to those comics that have come before the new issue on stands. As soon as the latest issue arrives, all previous issues are considered as back issues. The market for back issues is considered bigger than for regular ones, because it is logical to determine that most vintage comic books are classified as back issues.

Why Back Issues Matter

If we have in mind that thousands of comic books were released from the beginning of this particular genre, we have to understand that back issues are important in the magazine industry. If magazine stand or comic book shop doesn’t sell the previous issue, they rip everything off and send covers back to the publisher in order to get credit. This enables them to recoup losses on issues that have not been sold and that are why they are called back issues.

In the comic book world, the concept of the back issue became popular and known as Direct Market, because it has been a standard for comic book retailers. Comic book stores cannot return what they don’t sell and therefore that eats their profit. The store must pay for merchandise that hasn't been sold, while old comics can take up a lot of space.

Industries Created From Back Issues

There are many retailers who worked together in order to create a sub-industry that is totally different and that contains comic book back issues for sale. Some of them will board, bag and store these comic books for the future sales, with the possibility to sell them for fans that would like to have them.

However, in some cases, the reality has shown us that back issues can go up in value, which means that retailers can end up in huge profit when compared with invested money.

Lack of order has brought to retailers possibility to have numerous back issues that are unsold. However, most of them find the way to sell them through numerous websites or on yearly sales when numerous comic book fans come in search for them. Other ones turn to online sale sites or eBay in order to sell them there.

Some back issues can stay on shelves for years before they were purchased, and there are some mail services where readers can order them as well. Some comics were released and collected in trade format, everything in order to reduce the number of back issues.

Conclusion:

The great thing about back issues is that you can find them in numerous places and allows you to enter the mood of the certain comic books. If you are a fan, you must have read lots of back issues without knowing what were they called. You can enjoy having them or leave them, but they will still be an indispensable part of the comic direct market that is expanding in the recent years.