Jeffrey Lindenblatt's Paper Trends: The Three Hundred for 1982 - Biggest Winners and Losers

As with the previous year, Garfield continues its rise to becoming one of the most successful strips of all time. From January 1980 to January 1981 Garfield gained 28 papers to reach a total 49 papers, which is the highest gain which we have seen so far. Now from January 1981 to January 1982 Garfield shattered its own record with an additional 41 papers!

No other feature would come near that; the next highest was Herman with a gain of 10 papers. Newer strips like Bloom County, For Better or For Worse, Bloom County, Shoe and Far Side all had nice increases. Here is the rundown:

The Biggest Gainers

1. Garfield – 41
2. Herman – 10
3. Bloom County – 9
4. For Better or For Worse – 8
5. Hagar the Horrible, Ziggy – 7
6. Family Circus, Far Side – 6
7. Wizard of Id, Shoe – 5

The biggest losers are story strips, long-running strips and recent strips continuing their downward trend from last year. The biggest drop was again Star Wars which lost 21 papers in the previous survey. This year the strip lost 16 more papers making a 37 paper drop in the last two years. Steve Canyon who had been averaging a loss of 6 papers per year lost a new high of 14 papers during the past year.

The Biggest Losers

1. Star Wars – 16
2. Steve Canyon – 14
3. Small Society – 11
4. Winnie the Pooh – 9
5. Bugs Bunny, Superheroes – 8
6. Nancy, Berry’s World, They’ll Do It Every Time – 7
7. Judge Parker, Tiger, Short Ribs, Donald Duck, Grin and Bear It, John Darling – 6
8. Amazing Spider-Man, Tumbleweeds, Redeye, Goosemyer, Heart of Juliet Jones, Agatha Crumm, Flintstones, Incredible Hulk – 5

 Among the story strips, only Annie managed to buck the downward trend, gaining a single paper. The only other ‘gainer’ was Lone Ranger, which was a new strip. Here is the breakdown:

• Amazing Spider-Man – 51 (-5)
• Alley Oop – 45 (-2)
• Dick Tracy – 43 (-4)
• Steve Canyon – 33 (-14)
• Buz Sawyer – 32 (-3)
• Captain Easy – 30 (-1)
• Phantom – 25 (-1)
• Mark Trail – 22 (-2)
• Steve Roper and Mike Nomad – 22 (-1)
• Latigo – 19 (-2)
• Kerry Drake – 14 (-4)
• Rip Kirby – 14 (0)
• Star Wars – 13 (-16)
• Little Orphan Annie – 12 (+1)
• Joe Palooka – 10 (0)
• Brenda Starr – 9 (-1)
• Flash Gordon – 6 (0)
• Lone Ranger – 5 (+5) – New Strip
• Star Trek – 5 (-4)
• World's Greatest Superheroes – 5 (-8)
• Incredible Hulk – 4 (-5)
• Buck Rogers – 3 (-2)
• Mandrake the Magician – 2 (0)
• Popeye – 2 (0)
• Brick Bradford – 1 (0)
• Modesty Blaise – 1 (-1)
• Secret Agent Corrigan – 1 (0)
• Conan the Barbarian cancelled, had 6 papers
• Rick O’ Shay cancelled, had 4 papers
• Star Hawks cancelled, had 1 paper

 

The total spots now given to story strips is 429, down from 510 which is a 16 percent drop from last year.