Massive Publishing concluded 2023 on a high note with their successful crowdfunding campaign for the deluxe edition of Sean Murphy’s Zorro: Man Of The Dead. Their second collaboration with the Batman: White Knight creator and first foray into crowdfunding, finished as one of the top 20 all-time most funded projects in Kickstarter’s “Comic Books” category, raising over $302,000 via nearly 2700 backers. The one month campaign featured deluxe cover treatments, limited edition formats and exclusive variant covers from some of the most notable names in comics including Joe Quesada, Humberto Ramos, Walt Simonson and Adam Hughes.
Massive established itself early as a company looking to innovate in the crowdfunding space with the campaign’s hybrid Kickstarter/Retail release and “Retail Unlock” stretch goals. As Kickstarter backers pushed funding past each milestone, special variant covers were unlocked and made available to order for Direct-Market retailers through their standard distribution process. By merging Kickstarter’s exciting crowdfunding spirit with perks only available through comic retailers, Massive created a unique way of bringing first-time buyers to local comic shops. Now the company looks to bring that same out-of-the-box thinking to digital reward fulfillment.
“We are approaching the digital reward tier with the same thoughtfulness that we do our physical rewards. Just like with printing physical books it’s all about finding the right production/distribution partner who brings a level of care and delivers something special to readers. For us, that choice was clear.” – Michael Calero, CEO, Massive Publishing
Massive has just announced its partnership with the digital comics platform Omnibus to distribute all digital rewards for the Zorro: Man of the Dead campaign to their Kickstarter backers. Through this collaboration, Massive will streamline digital fulfillment while providing digital-tier contributors the opportunity to consume their rewards using the Omnibus reader and access content directly from their Omnibus digital collection. This will simultaneously deliver a reading experience closer to the real thing and enable Massive to offer a better final product to backers who supported the campaign at the digital level.
“Through our partnership Backers will be able to access their digital rewards, any time and from any device without needing to keep track of download links or files. We can also easily provide custom digital bonus content to backers in the same app.” – Travis Schmeisser, CEO, Omnibus
On January 10th, Omnibus will provide every Zorro: Man Of The Dead backer with a unique code giving them access to issue #1 of the series on the built-in web & tablet reader, a downloadable PDF, access to a digital library which will store backers' future digital rewards all in one place, and grant early access to books on the phone app reader which is launching soon. Each subsequent release of the mini-series will be made available to these backers directly on the Omnibus platform with no requirement for large PDF downloads and will grow the reader’s digital reward libraries.
“As someone who lives in Canada, shipping costs can be 4x the tier price. For that reason, most of the time I pledge at the digital level. A lot of times the feeling as a contributor is that the digital tier is a donation without a true reward. Not having that item to add to your collection can make you feel left out of the community experience. The PDF is sent somewhere and I lose it forever in the abyss of my other downloads! With Omnibus, our goal is to turn digital backing into an experience as inclusive and exciting as physical backing. Every supporter deserves equal treatment. Their dollars are just as important to bring your dream projects to life.” — Kevin Roditeli, President, Massive Publishing
The breakout publisher of 2023 is no stranger to partnerships. Massive launched with its imprint Whatnot Publishing, a collaboration with the livestreaming shopping app Whatnot, that saw the release of titles such as Ninja Funk and Wesley Snipes’ The Exiled which each sold over 100,000 units. Massive also entered into an exclusive Direct-Market distribution partnership with publisher Sumerian Comics for their periodical titles, including recent hits like Bad Omens: Concrete Jungle and American Psycho, which were written by Massive co-founders Kevin Roditeli and Michael Calero respectively. More recently, Massive partnered with Montreal based Studio Lounak to release comics based on the top-selling Ubisoft video game franchise Assassin’s Creed.
Massive Publishing has no plan to stop in 2024. Starting strong with the retail release of Zorro: Man Of The Dead #1 which hits comic shop shelves this Wednesday, January 10th. Massive plans for a wide digital release for the debut issue later this month.
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COMPANY INFO:
Massive Publishing was founded in 2022 by Michael Calero, Trevor Richardson, and Kevin Roditeli, and launched with its first imprint Whatnot Publishing, a partnership with the social commerce platform, Whatnot. After distributing over 800,000 units to retailers in their first six months, Massive was added to the Deluxe Publisher Tier of Diamond Comic Distributors, the world’s largest distributor of comics, graphic novels, and pop culture merchandise. Massive is distributed to the book market through Simon & Schuster.
WEB: www.massivepublishing.com
SOCIAL: @massivepublishing
Omnibus is a modern digital comic book store and reader app carrying your favorite single issues, volumes and omnibuses (all day and date). We’re pay-per-book like your LCS, but digital! Our focus is on building an excellent customer shopping and reading experience and using novel discovery features to help fans find their next new favorite book. We feature top-tier content and already have many of the top publishers in comics today.
WEB: https://omnibus.app/
SOCIAL: @theomnibusapp
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For Comment,
CONTACT: Dr. Robyn Crook
COMPANY: Massive Publishing
EMAIL: Robyn@massivepublishing.com