To think there should be more cheap comics like we had in the olden days.

[MilaMae]

Ie without the plastic tat stuck to the front which inflates the prices.

Comics encourage reading especially in boys but I'm really struggling to find any affordable comics for the dc. Dtwin 2 likes The Beano at £1.30 which is just about affordable but struggling to find any more.Am I missing something,not looking hard enough??

I can remember my dsis and I having a comic (Twinkle etc)every week so they must have been cheap but at £2.80 with 3 kids there is no way I can shell out the best part of a tenner every week as that's £40 a month !!!!!!

We don't even want the tat,just a comic.

The dc are twin boys 7,7 and dd 6. Are there any more out there under £1.50 that we've missed???

If there aren't,there should be.

I used to love magazines like Mandy, Judy, Pink, then Jackie etc as I got older. Do they exist anymore? I was in South Africa when we used to get those magazines - Wednesday was the day we would all (5 sisters!) go with our mum to the newsagent: Wednesday was Comics Day!

Oh, after that nostalgic trip, YANBU!

Sadly girls comics like Bunty and Mandy which had a few good stories in them seem to have disappeared. It seems to be the Disney type rubbish and then straight in to pre-teen girly stuff.

do you need new ones? I found an armful of Beanos at a car boot sale, dating from 2003, and they have kept DS going for weeks! you could dole them out once a week..

I wanted to do the once a week trip thing perhaps on a Friday so they could read them over the weekend as remember it being a weekly highlight as a kid.Well I had a look and seriously could find nothing under £2.80 without tat(other than Beano).Was really

Surely I'm missing something,there must be others. Wondering if I need to try Smiths??????

Are there any that anybody recommends?

ds1 (8yo) has been having NG Kids for a few years - via tesco clubcard subscription - it is £13 vouchers for a year now.
Also for the last year he has had Kick and Match of the Day, also from clubcard vouchers.
I agree, they do seem very expensive.

I am watching this thread with interest. I would love to buy my dcs a proper comic with proper stories in it and puzzles etc. (and no tat)

too right, it takes the piss. most of them are full of ads and rubbish. dd only has the pokemon one, but i did the direct debit deal which took the price per issue down. Other wise it's 3.99. MInd you thats a monthly.

I bought her the xmas special, without thinking, chucked it in the trolley and it was a fiver !!!

The Beano is £1.30?????? That is atrocious!

I was a huge fan between 1998-2001 and it was 50p!!! I had to stop getting it because it went up to 60p and I couldn't afford it with my pocket money - yes I really was that hard done to as a kid :o

Yes I used to love Twinkle, Bunty, Mandy, Jackie, Cathy & Clare, Blue Jeans ... there is nothing like that now. Bunty used to have really good stories and a cut out doll on the back.
They are all Disney tat or TV tie ins now. Surely there must be a market for some new children's comics! Dread to think what they would cost now though, if Beano is £1.30 ...

Wow what a coincidence I was having this exact conversation with my dt's on the way to school this morning! And yes def agree! Comics are a ridiculous price and mainly because of the toys stuck on them.

I only buy them v rarely for dc if they are ill as a treat.

I feel old saying it, but when I was a child they were real pocket money prices. I had Twinkle, then went through a tomboy stage and got Whoopie! then progressed onto Jackie. I LOVED it when it was time to buy a new one each week. Our dc really miss out imo.

There is The Dandy too. Think that is £1.50.

There is a real gap between young children and pre teens. I struggle to find many decent comincs for 8y DD. She likes The dandy, The beano, NG Kids and Spongebob magazines.

Have you asked your library if they could stock them to read on site?

I used to read Whizzer and Chips every week. Loved it

Art Attack is pretty good if they are 'crafty' but I don't know what it costs-DD and DS borrow comics from the library. He gets Beano she gets Girl Talk

I used to get Whizzer and Chips too. [nostalgic emoticon]
I had no idea you could borrow comics from the library though. How long do they keep them?

I have no idea if you can borrow comics from your library but my one has newspapers and some magazines and I'm sure they would consider comics if asked.

they get issued for a week-although there aren't any fines for children so I suppose you could keep them longer

ah do you remember the Holiday Specials!?

I remember the Whizzer bit was about 4 times the size of the Chips bit adn I always felt sorry for the Chips

Where did they go?

I guess you didn't see The DFC, a weekly comic published as part of Random House for just under a year? It was subscription-only and got crunched by the recession, partly because the payment model meant that not as many people saw it quickly enough to get into it (I reckon). But there are book collections available of the stories from the comic, and they're really great:
DFC Library

Unfortunately the comic folded, as i say; but just recently there's been some good news. It's being relaunched as a new weekly comic, due out next year, called The Phoenix. Not sure what price it will be, but it'll be all great, quality, solid comics & story-telling.

Junior magazine promoted a couple as well which you had to send for online. They were lovely comics but so, so expensive (£4 or £5 per issue).
The DFC one looks fab.

This is a real bugbear of mine.

The Beano makes me particularly mad, as they have a 'gift issue' about once a month or so and they put the price up to charge for the 'gifts'!

DS used to buy it from his own pocket money and he wanted the comic, not the plastic shite. And it's hard to teach him about managing money when the main thing he buys each week isn't a consistent price.

Also, DS emailed them about this and they never replied.

YANBU.

"the olden days"

Bunty, Mandy et al. Quite right OP.

carrots, the British weekly comic substantially disappeared in the 80s though Girl and Bunty lasted until more recently. The comics publishers lost the plot, did loads of mergers of comics because the new issue of the joint comic (eg Tammy & Jinty) was guaranteed a bigger sale than the comic it was replacing, but that practice ended up getting rid of most of the comic titles and also getting rid of the goodwill on the part of the readers I reckon. The publishers just took their eye off the ball and then before they knew it comics were less popular with kids than computer games & telly.

The rise of merchandising / tie-ins has also had a massive impact. Kids do like the plastic tat, at least loads of them do even if others of them are just as interested or more interested in the story. But if you have to pay Disney loads of £££ in licensing then you have much less to pay to creators of original comic strips.