Dollar Comics

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Dollar Comics was a line of DC Comics comic book publications issued from 1977 to the 1980s.

Writing for the Silver Bullet Comic Books Web site (now Comics Bulletin), John Wells described some of the innovations introduced by Jenette Kahn in the late 1970s:

When Jenette Kahn took over as DC's publisher in 1976, the average comic book contained only 17 pages of story for 35¢. Nearly half of each issue was filled with advertising and editorial content. Kahn's initial response was 1977's line of Dollar Comics. In terms of content, a Dollar Comic gave readers approximately the story pages of four 35¢ comic books for the price of three. From the retailer perspective, the Dollar Comic represented a greater profit than the standard 35¢ issues. And just to make sure nobody missed them, the books were a quarter-inch taller than other comics and had a distinctive trade dress. The first two conversions to the format -- House of Mystery and Superman Family -- hit the stands shortly before Christmas in 1976 and the other two expanded titles -- G.I. Combat and World's Finest Comics -- debuted in January of 1977. Sales on these -- and several summer specials with the umbrella title of DC Special Series -- paid off well enough to justify an expansion of the line in 1978. The Batman Family joined the fold in January and, at the dawn of the line-expanding DC Explosion in June, Adventure Comics came aboard. One of the perks of the Explosion was the complete elimination of advertising in the Dollar Comics and the addition of wraparound covers. They lost the quarter-inch height advantage, though. The DC Explosion, sadly, became an implosion almost immediately and, within a year, the ads were back, and the page count had shrunk. In 1980, DC made its second attempt at a line expansion and this time it clicked. The Dollar Comics were ad-free again by the end of the year. ^[1]