Selling Sunday Returns

Been a while since I've had some numbers to throw at you fans, and honestly won't have a whole picture until the end of the year, but I figured something is better than nothing --especially with the new series all being up to bat.

Shoseki Daily Ranking for 2017.9.15
29. Kyoukai no Rinne #38 - 2017.9.15
42. KOI #1 - 2017.9.15
50. Maiko-san #3 - 2017.9.12
53. Gin no Saji #14 - 2017.8.18
55. Hoankan Evans no Uso #1 - 2017.9.15
58. Mushibugyo #31 - 2017.9.15
59. Aozakura #5 - 2017.9.15
80. Magi #35 - 2017.8.18
93. Major 2nd #10 - 2017.8.18
114. Hadakamera #1 - 2017.9.12
124. Ranma 1/2 #16 - 2017.9.15
140. Youkai Giga #1 - 2017.9.15
144. Re:Creators Naked #1 - 2017.9.15
149. Meitantei Conan #93 - 2017.7.18
199. Obutsu wa Shoudoku desu #2 - 2017.9.12
200. Magi Sinbad no Bouken #15 2017.8.18
268. Dagashi Kashi #8 -2017.8.10
289. Daiku no Hatou #1 - 2017.9.15
298. Tenshou no Quadrable #1 - 2017.9.15
314. Meteor Girl #1 - 2017.9.15
321. Komi-san #5 - 2017.7.18
364. Maiko-san #2 - 2017.7.18
368. Maiko-san #1 - 2017.4.12
375. Be Blues #28 - 2017.8.18
408. Komi-san #4 - 2017.6.16
410. Komi-san #1 - 2016.9.16
417. Daiku no Hatou #2 - 2017.9.15
440. Magi #34 - 2017.6.16

The stats above include all series released under the Shougakukan imprint --and not only those that run in Weekly Shounen Sunday. To make sense of this, we have to take into consideration the release dates (On the side of each series's title and volume #). This list was populated by the sales tracking site "shoseki" for the debut day of the new series, of which lists the top 500 releases over a daily, weekly, and monthly period of time. Obviously the closer a series debuts to the top of this list, the longer it sticks around --and the longer it sticks around the better overall sales are as after 500 they aren't as easy to track.

RINNE takes the top of the Shounen sunday litter --not surprisingly as a series by a veteran. Followed by K.O.I in the 42nd spot and Evans in 55th. The blogposts I've made in the past in regard to these series support this, as they are the new series that are consistently highest in the TOC. Now I do want to make the note here that TOC position does not equal higher sales as the TOC is basically whatever the editor wants to push at the time, rather than strictly what the audience wants to buy. Wakaki also gets a bit of clout since he's a returning author --while Kuriyama isn't, making Evans that much more impressive to debut in the top 100. Meanwhile Aozakura and Mushibugyo make modest debuts in the list at 58 and 59. On first glance it might look like the two Magi volumes are doing quite badly, but take a look at their release dates --One is a month ago, and the other more than three --excellent in this particular situation as they've managed to stick on the charts for so long. Same for Komi-san who's first volume is still tracking despite coming out last year. That means as far as shoseki is concerned, Komi's still selling despite it's first volume being old news, and that is the best case scenario for any manga (especially those without an anime.) However there are dark clouds surrounding this silver lining, so let's take a look at those next.

Hatou, Giga, Metor Girl and Quadrable all debuted well below 100 which is quite bad. As I stated earlier, the closer to that magic #500 one debuts, the worse it's doing saleswise, and if it drops off the chart the sales are basically basement bad. It's even worse for Hatou as with two volumes out, one did significantly worse than the other ---looks like most didn't care enough for the series to buy past volume one despite two being readily availble, and this is coming from a series with a veteran author --same for Quadrable! Giga and MG have the handicap of being by first-time authors which is a struggle in and of itself, but wow. These series are all in trouble if they can't pull themselves out of this pit hole, and while it is theoretically possible, it's exceedingly difficult as new manga comes out nearly weekly from different publishers, so last week's failure is quickly forgotten for the next week's big thing. I'm a pessimist by nature, but I take no pleasure in saying that these series are most likely doomed to continue up til' volume three or four and then be cancelled in disgrace. Granted Quadrable has really changed gears so maybe that'll help, but it's tough going, let me tell you.

*29→*37→*50 Rinne #38
*42→*63→*90 KOI #1
*58→*69→117 Mushibugyo #31
*55→*85→140 Evans #1
*59→*86→166 Aozakura #5
140→288→410 Giga #1
298→444→*** Quadrable #1
314→480→*** Meteor #1
289→***→*** Hatou #1
417→***→*** Hatou #2

And now that a few days have passed, we can see what the tracking was for these series. RINNE steers the course still managing to stay above #50 even four days later, K.O.I remains pretty high up too, but Evans and Mushibugyo both took pretty hard falls, though at the very least they're still way above #500, as is Youkai Giga. I can't really say this means they'll survive in the long run, but they're still in the charts which is a good sign overall. Meanwhile both Hatou's fell off the tracker before a week was out, and Quadrable/Meteor lost one place and then disappeared after that. If a series is barely able to last a week sales wise that's...uniformly terrible, and in general they're only given up to volume two to really improve, which means Hatou might be out(o) faster than we may think.

Maiko-san #3 - 17,800
Rinne #38 - 11,268
KOI #1 - 6,890
Mushibugyo #31 - 6,197
Evans #1 - 5,306
Aozakura #5 - 4,745

These are estimated sales for the volumes. It's hard to tell exactly what sold what, so a friend of mine took an educated guess. Maiko-san is selling more than RINNE at this point, so I think it's future in the magazine is almost assured. K.O.I as well is doing better than RYOKO at it's debut, and almost on par with Keijo!! at it's best, so using that as a metric, it'll be around for a bit. Meanwhile Evans and Aozakura I can see jockeying for a middle spot in the magazine --(for sales, not TOC) which is interesting as one has a four volume lead over the other, but they're both pretty safe --though Aozakura might wanna watch it's back --with Evans outselling it with only a volume out, it's only a matter of time before the Japan defense force has to deal with the lawman from the west. MG/Quadrable/Giga and Hatou on the other hand are ranked too low to estimate, so we're left in the dark as to how many books (might have) moved. Shougakukan has a month delay on their digital volumes, so that may help some of these, but I don't think it'll do too much of a dent so I wouldn't old my breath on that.

I hope this spiel has made a bit of sense on how manga sales are (somewhat) calculated! This goes for Jump as well so you can use this as a yardstick in figuring out where your favorite series stand! If you're interested in seeing the whole list, check this but be forewarned it's all in Japanese. I'll try to do another post detailing where the series stand for the entirety of the year at the end of this year/early next year, but for now this'll do. Thanks for reading!