Alan Elliott of Queen City Bookstore saw the comments of Jim and Crystal Brown of Midwest Comics & Games (see 'Jim and Crystal Brown of Midwest Comics & Games on Hellboy Out-of-Stocks') and Matt Lehman of Comicopia (see 'Matt Lehman of Comicopia on Hellboy Stock-Outs') on Hellboy stock-outs and had this response:

I really wasn't interested in continuing a discussion on the lack of the Hellboy trade paperbacks, but the comments of the Brown's and Mr. Lehman struck a nerve.

Mr. Lehman asks why we didn't order more Hellboy trades?  In checking over our invoices, I realized that since January 2004, we've ordered and received over 250 copies of the various Hellboy trades.  We have dealt with Diamond, and with Dark Horse directly, and even now we are experiencing shortages from what we are told is available to order and what we receive.

What is becoming apparent is that whatever inventory that Dark Horse had, it's been eaten up by stores ordering just because of the movie.  Meanwhile, we who have been selling the books on a regular basis, suffer the shortfall.  I hope that six months from now, while we continue to sell Helboy, these other organizations will be stocking Hellboy, instead of following the latest trend.