Manga Publishing

A Look into the Rise and Fall of Manga Publshing Companies

I've only been in the manga reading game since about 2003, but it was apparent to me who the big publishing companies were from the very beginning.
Tokyopop and Viz Media jumped at me from the spines of nearly all of dozens of series at Borders, Barnes & Noble and Walden Books.

My first few series were all from Tokyopop and that publishing company still owns over half of my 18+ series collection.
Tokyopop, in 2003 was publishing series by some of the most renowned manga-ka in world, Manga-ka that have managed to release numerous hit series.
Marmalade Boy, Mars, Paradise Kiss, Love Hina, A.I. Love You and Kare Kano were just some of the most popular titles that were published by this power house.

It seemed that Tokyopop would take the place of Viz Media, a company that had been printing more classic titles and that had been in the game a bit longer.

Because Viz wasn't printing in the "authentic" manga manner, many were of-put. Not to mention that their thin and tight binding was was hard to work with.

Viz Media had series like Ranma 1/2, Neon Genesis Evangelion, Inuyasha and Rurouni Kenshin are just the most popular Viz titles. It was apparent that with the many classic and extremely popular and long series, Viz would continue profting for some time, but many wondered what would be of Viz after their time ran up with these series. Viz knew what it was doing though, launching it's two component publishing names, Shonen Jump and Shojo Beat and their successful magazines that sparked interest in some of their series, Viz planned to stay in the game. They did it well; even now they are launching new and successful series and have caught many series that have been extremely popular, even for those who don't read manga.