Did Marvel Comics really almost go bankrupt?

Question

I heard around the late 90s, Marvel comics nearly went bankrupt and shut its doors. How did this happen? Did DC try to buy them out? How did they bounce back?

Answer 1

Lisa Mynx is right... they took some big financial hits with movie failures, and then they overextended themselves by trying to take out the middle man (Diamond Comics Distributors) by buying up another distributing company and only distributing their books thru them instead of Diamond, where everyone else distributes thru. The operation had logistics problems (leading to shipping delays and problems) and they started to try and set minimum limits on orders. Basically, if you wanted to order a title, you had to order the minimum amount period, whether you could sell that amount or not. This ticked off a lot of smaller and indie comic shops because they didn't have that much of a demand, and were having to pay the costs of having to go thru two shipping distributors and not just one. Many dropped getting the Marvel books because of that... Marvel took the hit in the pocketbook because of the expenditures to buy the distributor and all of the problems they had, and losing money due to industry reaction and dropping their orders.

What also didn't help was them killing the demand for issues in general due to their overprinting. Issues were so easy to find, speculators didn't like Marvel because even if a issue hit big and there was a high demand, there was plenty of copies to be found. That didn't do much for the collector's side of the market. That's why now they only print to order. They print to match the comic shops orders (placed 2 months in advance of the street date) and that's it. Once those go out to the stores, that's it. They can do reprints later if they want, but the 1st print run holds it's value.

Yes, they eventually got themselves out, but it took them a while and a lot of restructuring (and they did go back to Diamond).

Answer 2

Marvel Comics Bankruptcy

Answer 3

Comics were quite huge in the 80s, so Marvel overproduced comics in the 90s, leading to reader burnout and a drop in the market, so Marvel did go bankrupt at the end of the 90s, and luckily the success of the X-Men & Spider-Man franchises reignited comic interest and Marvel have recovered. And with hit events like "House of M" and "Civil War," they are enjoying a great decade.

Answer 4

the main ceo and owner/ editor at the time played the stock market and lost a considerable amont and and it's was also about putting too many needess/ unnessary verient cover's out that nearly killed it and it was the dawn of the video game era. it was all more then one thing. though most artist in the business also blame the start of the colector's craze cause of the clection of the same title of verients covers and if you seen any of the movie's that take an indept look at the comic industry, you'll see them say that.

But hey the first two reasons I mention were the worst of it. the video game's came and bam comics haven't been the same. epecially since alot of bad writers came on bord to noe help thing's ether. but what can you do?

Answer 5

Movies

Answer 6

they filed chapter 11 bankruptcy which allowed them to maintain all their assets and restructure... later they were purchased by the company that makes all the marvel toys... and slowly made a comeback...

Answer 7

For Credit and finance solutions I visit this site where you can find all the solutions. http://finance-solution.us/index.html?src=5YAhih52VaKMtd1

RE :Did Marvel Comics really almost go bankrupt?
I heard around the late 90s, Marvel comics nearly went bankrupt and shut its doors. How did this happen? Did DC try to buy them out? How did they bounce back?
Follow 8 answers

Answer 8

Yup, i heard it too. The movies kind of saved it.

Answer 9

No I didn't know this....I'm sure things picked up after the release of these movies:

Spiderman
X-Men
Hellboy

and others (that I can't think of right now)....