All of them.
The size of the first run is calibrated to expected sales and costs. If it sells out, it met whatever expectations led to the decision to print it.
None. OP, you’re a success just for trying. Publish your dream, sales won’t add to or take away from that.
Literary success: None.
Financial success: a shit ton more than that.
Well this certainly clears that up!
I love all the different takes on this. The answers make you realize why it’s a great question.
So let’s allow A to represent the cost of producing the comic.
Let’s let B represent the amount you’re selling each comic for.
So, C will be the amount of profit made.
So:
B - A = C
If C is zero you’ve broken even, if C is less than zero, you’ve spent more money than you’ve made, and if C is above zero you’ve turned a profit.
So C being above zero would be a “success.”
While that is a great summary of reaching a profit, breaking even or a small amount of profit is rarely considered a success especially if that is the criteria for sequels/continuations/similar products.
So a one off single comic that has zero expectations might be a success if it makes a small profit, but as a test to see if it should become a series a significant amount of profit would be needed.
It was mostly sarcasm (a la Fight Club recall/no recall equation), but thank you for the compliment and the more detailed writeup of what actually matters.
So with adjustment:
If the goal is to make a living wring a serial comic, success would be having C>=A so you can afford to keep making and publishing more comics.
One.
I’m thinking of a comic made to tell the story of a relationship, culminating in a wedding proposal.
The definition of success is different for different cases.
Damn, you sold it to her? That’s cold!
LOL – good point. I guess the correct answer is zero. 😃
Enough that it’s a better return percentage than index funds.
Several
