I've been beating this drum for awhile, but the online deal site, Tanga.com, has had several DC relaunch titles for postal subscriptions at less than one-third the cover price.
Snail mail subscriptions are always cheaper, but never before have they regularly beaten even the discount that retailers get in buying the book through Diamond.
If you couple this with the returnability commitment that DC keeps expanding out for additional months, it might seem to indicate that the publishing strategy on the physical side is to increase circulation so that ad buys will be more attractive and/or increase the pool of potential digital subscribers.
Six or so DC titles offered up at a dangerously low price (not quite a loss, necessarily, given DC cutting out retail and distribution, but having to pay lower class mail rates) upping the circulation and putting them in direct contact with the customer in a way that retailers won't be as alerted to as Marvel's "free digital copy for every comic" idea seems like it is good for the reader and possibly the publisher, but not anyone in between.
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