Five months into 2026, I’ll be honest: this has been the toughest stretch since I started Mad Cave Studios. Print and freight costs rose, paper became harder to source, the retail base thinned compared with a decade ago, and a few bets did not land as we expected. Put all of that into a short period and you end up making decisions that affect people’s lives. I am the founder and CEO. I made those calls and I take full responsibility for them.
Here’s something most people outside this business do not see: the economics of comics work a lot like a casino. You place bets on books. A few hit, many do not, and the successes pay for the misses. The point is not to avoid hard stretches but to spot them early, know when to push and when to pull back, and keep moving without losing sight of our direction. As my wife likes to remind me, this is a marathon, not a sprint.
Twelve years in, the pulse here is strong. We adjusted carefully, protected the work and the people who make it, and focused our energy more sharply. I have never been more excited about what is coming next. I wrote everything down—the numbers, the lessons, and the franchise that is coming home. Click the link below to find out more:
madlondon.substack.com/p/the…