Should have posted this earlier but forgot with all the different comic and gaming related things going on. Here’s the text straight from Diamond itself.

Dear Valued Customer,

I’m writing to share one of the most challenging messages of my career.

Earlier today, Diamond made the difficult but necessary decision to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. This step is intended to stabilize our financial foundation and protect the most vital aspects of our business.

This decision was not made lightly, and I understand that this news may be as difficult to hear as it is for me to share. The Diamond leadership team and I have worked tirelessly to avoid this outcome but the financial challenges we face have left us with no other viable option.

Chapter 11 will provide us with the opportunity to restructure and address our financial obligations. This process will likely include the sale of key assets of Diamond Comic Distributors.

We have already received a commitment from Universal Distribution to purchase Alliance Game Distributors coupled with a signed Letter of Intent to purchase Diamond UK, and we remain committed to pursuing offers for all Diamond lines of business.

What does this mean for you?

I want to reassure you that, with secured financing in place to support our operations, Diamond Comic Distributors is committed to continuing business as usual throughout this process.

Our plan is to continue fulfilling orders in a complete and timely fashion and we are working hard to minimize any disruptions to your orders.

We will be as transparent as possible during this process and will keep you informed of significant developments. If you have any questions, please reference the Retailer FAQs below, also available on our Retailer FAQs page on the Retailer Services Website. With further inquiries, as always, you can submit a ticket via our online Retailer Support Center or contact us at [email protected].

Thank you for your support. We are committed to your business and ensuring that your needs are met as we navigate this process.

Sincerely,
Chuck Parker
President, Diamond Comic Distributors

Now what specifically does this mean?

Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code is a reorganization process that allows individuals, partnerships, and corporations to reorganize their finances. It’s often used when a business is more valuable as an operating entity than if it were liquidated.

So now they’re not going out of business completely but they are restructuring because they’ve lost a lot of clients. It’s definitely not looking GOOD for them but it’s still possible to pull out of this, get bought, etc.

This is definitely going to cause some shakeups, most notably the article I just posted yesterday about Vault self distributing, and I’m sure more to come. Looks like from articles at other outlets (ComicsBeat and ICv2) that they’re getting money from their bank to support them through the restructure and hopefully they are able to at least reorient themselves in the new environment they’re in now with a large number of their customers leaving for PRH or Lunar.

Vault comics has announced the launch of direct-to-retailer distribution of all new Vault titles, to operate alongside its existing distribution channels.

Vault’s direct-to-retailer distribution platform will launch on February 3, with select key backlist and frontlist titles immediately available for order. Additional backlist and frontlist titles will be made available to order in the coming weeks.

Retailers interested in setting up direct sales accounts can sign up here: https://vaultcomics.com/direct

New retail accounts that sign up before February 28 will receive free shipping on all orders for the first six months. Products will be made available to retailers at discounts of at least fifty percent of the retail price, with automatic additional discounting per order based on total order cost. Thereafter, base discounts will be determined by account ordering volume, and free shipping will continue for qualifying orders. Packing, shipping timelines, and shortages and damages policies will meet or ​exceed industry standards.

Concurrent with this, Vault is making broad adjustments to its publishing plans to best align formats and release dates across its distribution channels including direct-to-retailer distribution, Lunar Distribution, and Simon & Schuster. These adjustments will require delays or cancellations and new solicitation of upcoming Vault titles. Changes to formats and release dates will be announced in the coming weeks.

“We want to make sure we deliver our books to fans, comic shops, and booksellers in the best way possible, said Vault CEO Damian Wassel. “We believe launching direct-to-retailer distribution is the right step for our business, our creators, and our fans, and we look forward to delivering some incredible books straight to the retailers who helped us build Vault.”

I’ve created a new Top 10 Watchlisted books widget because I thought hey this would be fun. Everyone can see it and maybe that’ll interest you in the watchlist feature if you haven’t already taken the plunge. None of these are surprising. I WANT THEM ALL.

If you ARE a Patreon of mine, when logged in, you’ll see the new “FAB” (floating action button) which is a nice gear icon that will float along the page with you so you can see some of the extra page options. I may add more to this eventually but right now it’s just watchlist related functions. I thought it looked nicer.

I’ve also done some somewhat slight but welcome style updates around the site. Colors, font sizes, button shapes, all that kind of stuff. Just making things look nicer. The details popup on books is a totally custom popup now and I can mess with it as much as I want. I’m also playing around with adding more types of info in there before too long.

The filters at the top of the table now are pretty checkbox filters instead of select boxes. I really like these a lot more especially on desktop. They’re scrollable too just like before but they just look nicer.

I fixed a few bugs here and there, mostly with the watchlist. If you see anything that seems broken, as always, drop me a line on the contact page.

Finally, this is mostly another “I have cool things now too” type of addon that doesn’t affect you all directly, but I build myself even more tools for keeping book dates up to date AND I built out some semi automation for grabbing solicits. So that should mean less time sitting here slapping them together which means you get them sooner. Win-win on that (I semi-automated Image, Dark Horse, and IDW right now). The rest is not really worth mentioning because it’s mostly just prettying stuff up our admin area and making my code better. I just like making these updates so people know I am in fact still doing stuff. Next up for this sort of stuff is trying to automate actually grabbing new books and adding them. It’ll be from Penguin publishers to start but will allow us to far more rapidly add new books which, again, is always a win for the end user here as you get info faster!

Kieron Gillen & Stephanie Hans Reteam for We Called Giants GN Hardcover!

BESTSELLING, BRITISH FANTASY AWARD WINNING DIE CREATORS KIERON GILLEN & STEPHANIE HANS RETEAM FOR UPCOMING GRAPHIC NOVEL WE CALLED THEM GIANTS THIS NOVEMBER! The Walking Dead meets The Iron Giant in this sweeping, post-apocalyptic story!

The bestselling creators behind the three-time Hugo Award nominated, two-time British Fantasy Award winning series Die—Kieron Gillen (The Wicked + The Divine, Immortal X-men) and Stephanie Hans (Secret Wars 1602: Witch Hunter Angela, Black Bolt)—will reteam for their first ever original graphic novel collaboration to be titled, We Called Them Giants. First announced in an exclusive scoop at Gizmodo, this epic, post-apocalyptic story is scheduled to hit shelves in November from Image Comics.

Gillen and Hans first made waves with their breakout hit dark fantasy Die in 2018. Die quickly caught reader attention and the series skyrocketed to the top of the sales charts and launched Hans’ career into superstardom. It went on to appear on many Best of the Year lists, including that of Tor.com, and snagged multiple award nominations and wins.

“After we finished Die, we knew we wanted to do something completely different. Rather than a sprawling ongoing, do something smaller, intimate, self-contained and really pure,” said Gillen. “So, in the middle of the covid lockdowns, I was left alone with my cats, staring at them, and them staring at me, and thinking about the miracle of relationships between beings of completely different kinds of intelligences, and the wonder of the jump across that gap. The image of the feral girl in the devastation and the giants came quickly after that, and we were away. People will fall in love and have their hearts broken—the full Hans/Gillen experience. Despite the post-apocalypse setting the story has an almost weird-fable kind of vibe, and ends up basically as a conversation between The Walking Dead and The Iron Giant. Basically, We Called Them Giants is the story of communication across a chasm at the end of the world. Folks have seen what Stephanie does on a month-by-month rush on an ongoing comic. Here, it’s a thrill to see her luxuriate—creating this single long story, and being able to shape the whole thing into a poignant, romantic, devastating single canvas.”

Hans added: “As an Artist, it is always a joy to work on new challenges, especially when it is with such a great Writer. Kieron wrote an emotional story in which he let me go wild on designs. It’s a new, beautiful end of the world tale, a little bit epic, a bit nostalgic and a bit contemplative. It’s nothing like we did before. In all the best ways.”

We Called Them Giants promises readers the poignant, romantic, and devastating story of a young girl who wakes up to find her world has turned upside down.

“This book is nothing short of incredible,” said Eric Stephenson, Publisher and Chief Creative Officer at Image Comics. “Kieron and Stephanie had already established themselves as one of comics’ premier creative teams, but they’re operating at a whole other level with We Called Them Giants.”

We Called Them Giants hardcover (ISBN: 978-1534387072) will be available at local comic book shops on Wednesday, October 30 and independent bookstores, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books-a-Million, Indigo, and Waterstones on Tuesday, November 12.