"Wonder why major bookstores and companies don't have your favorite manga, or maybe you can't any manga? find out why." --zoe deetz 7th grade
The pandemic affected a lot of things in the economy, from small businesses to supply chain and shipping woes. One surprise has been the uptick in Manga sales have been one of the things in high demand. With everyone being at home, what better to do than buy an ungodly amount of Manga? While that’s a great idea, however publishers were not ready for the rapid increase in Maga purchases.
“Big retailers such as Amazon and Barnes & Noble can’t keep some titles in stock either.as of this writing, neither had volumes 2, 3, or 4 of Chainsaw Man or the first volumes of My Hero Academia or Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba available for online purchase, and neither had a full run of Jujutsu Kaisen,” writes Brigid Alverson in their article, The Great Manga Shortage of 2021. The article points out that the Mangas that are usually in full stock and have multiple copies, are not in stores or available to purchase online. This problem began in North America, but gradually spread. There are two main reasons this is happening now. The first one is that printers are struggling with capacity issues for a while, and this is not caused by the manga market alone. Over the past couple years, printing lead time has been increasing steadily and substantially. This was and is compounded by the dramatic increase in Manga sales in 2021, with big orders from key accounts that is shrinking inventory, that in the past would have lasted a year or more.
Epic Dope Staff, who wrote the article, Great Manga Shortage in North America in 2021 Due To Covid writes, “The local printers were already operating at full capacity in order to fulfill the recent orders for sold-out manga under COVID restrictions. The increasing demand meant that some of the printing had to be outsourced, which meant transporting books from other countries.” The article continues, “The rise in shipping rates and backlogs at ports all over the world led to new orders getting delayed.”
If you’re on the hunt for manga, a couple things you can do is ask a local book store and see what they might have. Barnes and Noble has some manga, just not a really popular title. You can pretty much get less popular manga, but it will still be a bit expensive. A couple local comic stores are Cape and Cowl Comics, and Dr. Comics & Mr. Games which are in Oakland, California. Kinokuniya San Francisco, and Mission: Comics & Art, which are in San Francisco, California. King's Comic Books, and Fantastic Comics are in Berkley, California.
The predicted time when this great manga shortage will end is early 2022. So let’s hang in there till this ends, you and me both.
“Big retailers such as Amazon and Barnes & Noble can’t keep some titles in stock either.as of this writing, neither had volumes 2, 3, or 4 of Chainsaw Man or the first volumes of My Hero Academia or Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba available for online purchase, and neither had a full run of Jujutsu Kaisen,” writes Brigid Alverson in their article, The Great Manga Shortage of 2021. The article points out that the Mangas that are usually in full stock and have multiple copies, are not in stores or available to purchase online. This problem began in North America, but gradually spread. There are two main reasons this is happening now. The first one is that printers are struggling with capacity issues for a while, and this is not caused by the manga market alone. Over the past couple years, printing lead time has been increasing steadily and substantially. This was and is compounded by the dramatic increase in Manga sales in 2021, with big orders from key accounts that is shrinking inventory, that in the past would have lasted a year or more.
Epic Dope Staff, who wrote the article, Great Manga Shortage in North America in 2021 Due To Covid writes, “The local printers were already operating at full capacity in order to fulfill the recent orders for sold-out manga under COVID restrictions. The increasing demand meant that some of the printing had to be outsourced, which meant transporting books from other countries.” The article continues, “The rise in shipping rates and backlogs at ports all over the world led to new orders getting delayed.”
If you’re on the hunt for manga, a couple things you can do is ask a local book store and see what they might have. Barnes and Noble has some manga, just not a really popular title. You can pretty much get less popular manga, but it will still be a bit expensive. A couple local comic stores are Cape and Cowl Comics, and Dr. Comics & Mr. Games which are in Oakland, California. Kinokuniya San Francisco, and Mission: Comics & Art, which are in San Francisco, California. King's Comic Books, and Fantastic Comics are in Berkley, California.
The predicted time when this great manga shortage will end is early 2022. So let’s hang in there till this ends, you and me both.