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Action Comics Sales Figures

Circulation as Reported in Publishers' Statements of Ownership

Filed with the United States Postal Service

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While Action Comics ran Statements of Ownership well before 1960, but the first one for which circulation figures were requires appeared in Action #273 (Feb 1961).



Right away, it could be seen that despite clearly being a Superman title, Action lagged sales of the main Superman series, selling 458,000 copies per issue versus Superman's 810,000 in 1960. (See its postal record here.) Action was monthly at the time, while Superman was published nine times a year; name recognition certainly also factored in.



But the pattern would continue, with Action always trailing a bit behind its sister title throughout the 1960s and 1970s, seeing its peak in 1965. The exception was in 1987, when John Byrne was working both on Action and a newly renumbered Superman title; the regular Superman series, which had been redubbed Adventures of Superman, trailed Action slightly that one year.



With #601, however, the title went to a weekly anthology, and sales fell. The experiment lasted less than a year. Sales were down to 70,316 copies monthly at the end of the 1980s, after which postal data is not available.



The title reached new heights in the 1990s boom, the pinnacle being in April 1993 when Action #687 topped a million copies as it helped bring Superman back from a temporary case of death.



In April 2018, Action became the first American title since Dell's Four Color to reach 1,000 issues with Action #1000. Four Color wasn't strictly a serial title, of course, but then Action's direct path has its own blemish, in the series' renumbering during the New 52 period of 2011-16.



Some direct-market only information is available in the monthly reports.





—John Jackson Miller



1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 Issue Statement appearing in: #273 February #286 March #297 February #309 February #327 August Date of filing: 10/1/60 10/1/61 10/1/62 10/1/63 10/1/64 Issues published during year: 12 12 12 12 12 Annual subscription price: $1.50 $1.75 $1.75 $1.40 $1.40 Cover price during year: $0.10 $0.12 $0.12 $0.12 $0.12 Total Copies PRINTED (avg): 716,000 Sales through DEALERS (avg): 513,000 Sales by SUBSCRIPTION (avg): 5,026 Total PAID circulation (avg): 458,000 485,000 435,000 no data published 518,026 Samples by MAIL (avg): 387 Samples OUTSIDE mail (avg): 0 Total FREE circulation (avg): 387 TOTAL DISTRIBUTION: 518,413 Copies not distributed (office): Copies not distributed (RETURNS): 197,587 Reported % Paid/Requested: % of RUN RETURNED: 27.6% Copies existent: 518,413 SELL-THROUGH at RETAIL: 72.4% 1965 1966 1967 1968 1969 Issue Statement appearing in: #338 Sept. #346 February #359 February #374 March #386 Mar Date of filing: 10/1/65 10/1/66 10/1/67 10/1/68 10/1/69 Issues published during year: 12 12 12 12 12 Annual subscription price: $1.40 $1.75 $1.75 $1.75 No subs Cover price during year: $0.12 $0.12 $0.12 $0.12 $0.15 Total Copies PRINTED (avg): 758,000 754,000 720,000 695,000 673,000 Sales through DEALERS (avg): 518,000 485,000 418,000 422,000 377,000 Sales by SUBSCRIPTION (avg): 7,254 6,135 2,900 1,000 535 Total PAID circulation (avg): 525,254 491,135 420,900 423,000 377,535 Samples by MAIL (avg): 142 330 340 386 386 Samples OUTSIDE mail (avg): 0 0 0 0 0 Total FREE circulation (avg): 142 330 340 386 386 TOTAL DISTRIBUTION: 525,396 491,465 411,240 423,386 377,921 Copies not distributed (office): Copies not distributed (RETURNS): 232,604 262,535 298,760 271,614 295,079 Reported % Paid/Requested: % of RUN RETURNED: 30.7% 34.8% 41.5% 39.1% 43.8% Copies existent: 525,396 491,465 421,240 423,386 377,921 SELL-THROUGH at RETAIL: 69.3% 65.1% 58.5% 60.9% 56.1% 1970 1971 1972 1973 1974 Issue Statement appearing in: #398 Mar #410 Mar #422 March #434 April #447 May Date of filing: 10/1/70 10/1/71 10/1/72 10/1/73 10/1/74 Issues published during year: 12 12 12 12 12 Annual subscription price: No subs $3.00 $3.00 $3.00 $3.00 Cover price during year: $0.15 $0.25 $0.20 $0.20 $0.25 Total Copies PRINTED (avg): 621,030 585,000 542,000 532,922 487,877 Sales through DEALERS (avg): 329,638 325,460 251,230 239,421 253,333 Sales by SUBSCRIPTION (avg): 287 158 1,087 1,137 1,833 Total PAID circulation (avg): 329,925 325,618 252,317 240,558 237,166 Samples by MAIL (avg): 127 0 518 100 100 Samples OUTSIDE mail (avg): 0 0 0 0 0 Total FREE circulation (avg): 127 0 518 100 100 TOTAL DISTRIBUTION: 330,052 325,618 252,835 240,658 237,266 Copies not distributed (office): 259 561 3,481 3,194 Copies not distributed (RETURNS): 290,978 259,123 288,604 288,783 247,417 Reported % Paid/Requested: % of RUN RETURNED: 46.9% 44.3% 53.2% 54.2% 50.7% Copies existent: 330,052 325,877 253,396 244,139 258,460 SELL-THROUGH at RETAIL: 53.1% 55.7% 46.6% 45.1% 48.6% 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979 Issue Statement appearing in: #459 May #471 May #483 May #494 April #506 April Date of filing: 10/1/75 10/1/76 10/1/77 10/1/78 10/1/79 Issues published during year: 12 12 12 12 12 Annual subscription price: $3.00 $3.00 $5.00 $6.75 $6.75 Cover price during year: $0.30 $0.25 $0.35 $0.40 $0.40 Total Copies PRINTED (avg): 493,000 470,000 457,274 476,694 338,546 Sales through DEALERS (avg): 229,000 206,000 177,638 182,135 159,885 Sales by SUBSCRIPTION (avg): 2,000 2,000 2,076 1,466 1,443 Total PAID circulation (avg): 231,000 208,000 179,714 183,601 160,928 Samples by MAIL (avg): 1,000 1,000 400 110 0 Samples OUTSIDE mail (avg): 0 0 0 0 0 Total FREE circulation (avg): 1,000 1,000 400 110 0 TOTAL DISTRIBUTION: 232,000 209,000 180,114 183,711 160,928 Copies not distributed (office): 4,000 2,000 1,484 4,045 121 Copies not distributed (RETURNS): 257,000 259,000 275,676 288,938 177,496 Reported % Paid/Requested: % of RUN RETURNED: 52.1% 55.1% 60.3% 60.6% 52.4% Copies existent: 236,000 211,000 181,598 187,756 161,449 SELL-THROUGH at RETAIL: 46.9% 44.3% 39.3% 38.5% 47.5% 1980 1981 1982 1983 1984 Issue Statement appearing in: #519 May #531 May #543 May #554 April #567 May Date of filing: 10/1/80 10/1/81 10/1/82 10/1/83 10/1/84 Issues published during year: 12 12 12 12 12 Annual subscription price: $7.95 $7.20 $7.20 $9.00 $9.00 Cover price during year: $0.50 $0.60 $0.60 $0.75 $0.75 Total Copies PRINTED (avg): 324,114 290,871 284,046 263,822 253,026 Sales through DEALERS (avg): 116,210 109,426 101,196 104,075 84,887 Sales by SUBSCRIPTION (avg): 2,542 2,303 2,157 1,319 1,535 Total PAID circulation (avg): 118,752 111,729 103,353 105,394 86,422 Samples by MAIL (avg): 127 127 677 740 233 Samples OUTSIDE mail (avg): 0 0 0 0 0 Total FREE circulation (avg): 127 127 677 740 233 TOTAL DISTRIBUTION: 131,245 111,856 104,030 106,134 86,655 Copies not distributed (office): 3,315 3,331 2,403 1,982 2,823 Copies not distributed (RETURNS): 189,554 175,684 177,613 155,706 145,548 Reported % Paid/Requested: % of RUN RETURNED: 58.5% 60.4% 62.5% 59.0% 57.5% Copies existent: 122,194 115,187 106,433 108,116 89,478 SELL-THROUGH at RETAIL: 36.6% 38.4% 36.4% 39.9% 34.2% 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 Issue Statement appearing in: #578 April #587 Apr #599 Apr #641 Mar. 7 #649 Jan Date of filing: 10/1/85 10/1/86 10/5/87 10/31/88 9/29/89 Issues published during year: 12 12 12 42 12 Annual subscription price: $9.00 $9.00 $9.00 $76.50 $9.00 Cover price during year: $0.75 $0.75 $0.75 $1.50 $0.75 Total Copies PRINTED (avg): 201,814 155,111 319,645 116,416 79,215 Sales through DEALERS (avg): 65,288 59,827 180,395 97,261 69,908 Sales by SUBSCRIPTION (avg): 1,368 1,330 1,372 518 408 Total PAID circulation (avg): 66,656 61,157 181,767 97,779 70,316 Samples by MAIL (avg): 127 163 979 327 1,053 Samples OUTSIDE mail (avg): 0 0 0 0 0 Total FREE circulation (avg): 127 163 979 327 1,053 TOTAL DISTRIBUTION: 66,783 61,320 182,746 98,106 71,369 Copies not distributed (office): 3,103 2,246 6,560 792 1,268 Copies not distributed (RETURNS): 131,928 91,545 130,339 17,518 6,578 Reported % Paid/Requested: % of RUN RETURNED: 65.4% 59.0% 40.8% 15.0% 8.3% Copies existent: 69,886 63,566 189,306 98,898 72,637 SELL-THROUGH at RETAIL: 33.0% 39.4% 56.9% 84.0% 88.8%

Statement history

Like many DC titles, Action failed to run a Statement for 1963, apparently due to confusion overthe postal rules. But unlike the other books, which skipped 1964 as well, Action ran a Statement for that year.



Action has the unique distinction of being the last DC comic book for which a Statement of Ownership was filed. Because of the shift from weekly back to monthly frequency, Action must have been slightly ahead of the other books in its production cycle when DC decided to stop shipping comics Second Class in 1989. For whatever reason, the result was that Action alone among DC comics ran a Statement for 1989. (Mad magazine, also published at that time by DC, would continue to do so for years.)



