Hi John! 

Do you have any sales figures for "Groo the Wanderer" from Marvel Comics up until its Image Comics run?

I'm trying to find out how many issues of "Groo #1" from Image Comics (Dec. 1994) sold when it made its move from Marvel to Image Comics and how they ended at sales wise with it's last  issue #12. 

"Groo the Wanderer" also had it's last issue #120 (Jan. 1995) with Marvel released around the same time of "Groo #1" from Image and was curious about those sales figures too.

Thanks!

John Jackson Miller wrote     Unusual as one of the few Marvel books not to pick up any bump from the 1990-93 boom. I don't know what that suggests, other than Epic was not getting much attention.

As an avid Groo reader ever since its early Pacific comics days, I believe the main reason for the title to stay low during the 90-93 boom was that it was published twice a month with stand alone stories - meaning people could have taken it once a month without paying attention. Furthermore, the stories at that time were pretty much the same all the time. Evanier had a formula, and he stayed with it till the bitter end. Only after moving to Image did they start doing longer story arcs. Another point to be taken regarding the Image period is that Image did a TPB reprints for all of the Groo mini series, which means the circulation data for that period is influenced by other factors as well.

John Jackson Miller wrote Here are the Statement of Ownership numbers I have in my files: 1986 • 109,675 1987 • 108,158 1988 • 96,205 1989 • 90,830 1990 • 88,883 1991 • 69,525 1992 • 47,165 1993 • 34,277 I would speculate that 1994 does not exist, as it would have been published in an early 1995 issue; someone should look in #120 to be sure. There would be no Statements at Image, since it did not sell by subscription there to my knowledge and would have had a different permit in any event. I haven't run numbers for the whole direct market for that year, but I can say that at Capital, #120 sold 7,625 copies and Image's #1 sold 18,300. But by #11 it was back down to 6,450, the first-issue factor having played out. Looking at the ratios there, you might guess that the overall figure for Image's #1 was around 80,000 -- and then it was down to 28,000 at the end. Unusual as one of the few Marvel books not to pick up any bump from the 1990-93 boom. I don't know what that suggests, other than Epic was not getting much attention.

  Thanks John!!!   I always wondered how well the "Image" Groo issue #1 fared in the Image Comics boom of the time.  I still remember the creator owned books like PITT, Maxx and several others and always wanted to know how well Groo sold as a creator owned book back then.   I think "Bone" was another creator owned book that spent some time at Image but it was later on in the '90s. 

Thanks again for the numbers!