Comics UK

I concur re the page rates artists like ken Reid and Leo were on and these were a really good salary (a very good salary) and keep in view that both (especially Leo Baxendale) churned out a lot of pages a week (to the detriment of the mans health it has to be said - so maybe not worth it). But Ken Reid did about 3 pages a week for ODHAMS plus (I think) pages for the Irish Express (compititions as noted eleswhere) which menat Ken was coming out with at least £72 a week - pretty nice and probably a lot more in real terms than what artists get today. I bought about 20 issues of Smash and Wham when I worked in London from a UK dealer (and got a few on this site as well) of Odhams file copies with the page rate. As its already know what the rates are I'm not being intrusive on their personal details but thee rates weren't quite £30 a page. Kens page rate in 1966 was £24 a page for art (plus £5 for "revising the script" by W Thorburn - although he didn't do that every issue) this was for Queen of the Seas when it was a single colour back page. Leo got £30 a page (more for a cover) but that included writing the script. Colouring and lettering (and in some cases inking) were done by studios like Linden Artisits and Kingleo studios etc) - It was strange to see that strips like Ghost Patrol were noted as "Free" so I assume artists never got paid for reprints?? the Marvel reprints were charged at a rate per issue it would seem (not a page rate) 7 1/4 pages of Avengers in smash NO 37 WAS £87. 10 shillings (£87.50p) plus £5 to touch up the art.

Digifiend wrote: Basically, it's a x10 modifier for inflation, as a weekly wage full time would now be nearly £200. Before tax admittedly, so don't complain at me if your take home pay is less than that!

I think your modifier needs an upgrade Digi. The minimum wage today is £5.73, so for a 40 hour week that's £229.20. Therefore the average wage must be over the £200 you reckoned.

Digifiend wrote:Comic prices have increased disproportionately though, as Beano and Dandy were 3d at the time - just over 1p (1p = 2 1/2p, so the x10 modifier I used should only make it about 12p, so the Beano's price has gone up x100, and Dandy x200 (based on current prices of £1.25 and £2.50).

Again, I'm afraid your calculations fall short. Over the last 45 years prices of many things have increased far more than x10. Otherwise today a cinema ticket today would be about £2, a bag of crisps 25p, a bar of chocolate 25p, a daily newspaper 10p, a brand new Fiat £4,000, and a box of Scott's Porage Oats 90p. (Prices taken from a 1964 Daily Mirror and multiplied by ten).

A few things work to your system, but not many. For example a top of the range washing machine/dryer in 1964 was 39gns, just over £300 today (x10). You could buy one for £300 today, but not top of the range.

Lew

STARBOY wrote:It was strange to see that strips like Ghost Patrol were noted as "Free" so I assume artists never got paid for reprints?? the Marvel reprints were charged at a rate per issue it would seem (not a page rate) 7 1/4 pages of Avengers in smash NO 37 WAS £87. 10 shillings (£87.50p) plus £5 to touch up the art.

No, artists aren't paid for reprints.

Fascinating to discover that Odhams paid Marvel US a staggering £87 in 1966 to use that material! I knew they'd have to pay them a fee, but didn't realise it'd be that much.

Lew

Really shocking that artists don't (didn't) get something for a reprint. I was also stunned at the £87 plus for the Avengers reprint material (Batman was more costly, understandable as it was the most popular tv series at the time) - they seemed to pay Marvel for the pages they got from the US edition , so if its was 8 pages of US material and it took up 5 3/4 pages in Smash etc they paid for the 8 pages (if that makes sense).

Re the average UK salary, yeah I agree the 10x factor needs to be revisited - The results of the 2008 Annual Salary and Household Earnings survey (ASHE: UK Gov' National Statistics) showed that median weekly pay for full-time employees in the UK to April 2008 reached £479 a week (a growth of over £4.6% in one year) - The bottom 10 per cent earned less than £262 a week (some a lot less) which is more in line with Lews figures.

STARBOY, if they had to pay for reprints, I doubt the Beano would be using them, as they wouldn't be any cheaper!

I admit I underestimated the minimum wage... Seems strange how wildly different the price increases have been, look at newspapers as another example. They cost as little as 20p (The Sun and Daily Star) now, and would've been maybe 1d in the 60s. Roughly a x50 increase. Should've done more research before posting that. It seems working out inflation just isn't that simple.

Digifiend wrote:look at newspapers as another example. They cost as little as 20p (The Sun and Daily Star) now, and would've been maybe 1d in the 60s. Roughly a x50 increase. (

No, the cheapest newspaper (Daily Mirror) was 3d in the early sixties, rising to 4d in 1965 and 5d by 1968. No publication was 1d. It wasn't the 1930s you know!

Lew

Yeah I just imagined using a reprint would mean the artists involved got a nominal fee for their work, (similar to when an old record is played on the radio etc) -Classics from the Comics must be a cheap book to produce then lol.

Inflation is very complex - newspaper costs are probably cheaper in real terms today (I think) due to new and cheaper printing and IT technology that is available, plus in the late 70s/80s there was the controversial relocation of print works to other cheaper ares outisde the main cities and the resultant mass cutting of staff etc etc. Plus it's more of a cut throat business with more competiton than say comics so that keeps costs down. The weekly wage is influenced by many things, geographical location (it's higher in London than Belfast etc) the cost of living , cost of houses etc they need to keep pace with salaries then you get into a spiral of increases - and of course there is now a minimum average wage law (quite correctly imho) that wasn't in place till recently.

To put 60s prices into perspective, JOHN LENNON'S first stately pile he bought after hitting it big set him back a 'princely' 17 thousand quid!


LENNON'S lush abode, circa 1964-68.


I've just checked on this: it was nearer 20,000 quid in 1964. It had 27 rooms, though! What would a house like this cost today?!

klakadak-ploobadoof wrote:I would be curious to see an example or two of the competitions Ken Reid drew for Sunday Express.

Me too! I wonder if the British Library have copies of the Irish editions?

STARBOY wrote:Re the average UK salary, yeah I agree the 10x factor needs to be revisited

Wage inflation is a tricky subject, especially when it comes to creative types. For example in the early 1960s the maximum wage for Manchester United footballers was £50!

- Phil Rushton

philcom55 wrote: Wage inflation is a tricky subject, especially when it comes to creative types.
- Phil Rushton

True, but the "average wage" never includes that anyway presumably. We're outside of society as far as that's concerned, just in the same way that the minimum wage doesn't apply to the self-employed either.

Lew

Your own local library might have them on microfilm or microfiche if you're lucky philcom, so go check them when you have the time. No guarantees of course, but I'm pretty sure Hull's Central Library has national and local newspapers stored that way, no reason why that doesn't apply to other parts of the country. Unless you live in London of course, in which case the British Library is local enough anyhow.

NP asked the price of two INdecent 1960s publications: well, I ain't too sure how much two TJANAU BIBLES would have set you back at the time, but two copies of the controversial OZ would change hands for 5 bob [25p in today's dosh] going by this cover:





something tells me I'm not in KANSAS anymore......


just noticed: is the above by GERALD SCARFE?

philcom55 wrote:It was purely down to money. In 1964 he was getting £18 page when Odhams rang him up out of the blue and offered him £30. He explained the situation to DC Thomson saying that he didn't really want to leave and would turn down the offer if they could just increase his rate by half that amount. Unfortunately R D Lowe replied that the suggestion was completely unrealistic and they weren't prepared to increase his page rate by any amount...!

- Phil Rushton

I've done a bit of searching, and found the article you got the info from on this very site, if anyone's interested. http://www.comicsuk.co.uk/Interviews/Ke ... erview.asp Pretty much a history of Ken Reid's career. Another thread referred to The Adventures of Fudge, I suppose that came from this article too.

Digifiend wrote: http://www.comicsuk.co.uk/Interviews/Ke ... erview.asp Pretty much a history of Ken Reid's career. Another thread referred to The Adventures of Fudge, I suppose that came from this article too.

That's a good article presenting Reid's career in a nutshell. I am sure fans are familiar with it because it has been up for a while. One comment regarding the information on Frankie Stein presented in the article: it says that Ken Reid wrote all of the scripts, which isn't really the case. He may have contributed a few, but generally they were provided by Odhams.
As for the interview in Adventures of Fudge, a Savoy book, it also had some inaccuracies. I don't have my copy at hand to check, but I remember that Ken Reid was quoted saying that he drew Georgie's Germs for Wham, although in fact the strip was drawn by other artists.

klakadak-ploobadoof wrote: I remember that Ken Reid was quoted saying that he drew Georgie's Germs for Wham, although in fact the strip was drawn by other artists.

Unfortunately this is a mistake that others have made too, including Pat Mills a few times in interviews. Ken never drew Georgie's Germs. They are of course confusing it with The Nervs, which Ken took over for the last few months in Odhams' Smash!

Lew