stormflora

To be fair, it's kind of on the buyer to comparison shop and ignore sellers who upcharge items. It's obvious that these people who overcharge will almost never cut down their price by much, so trying to haggle with them would only waste both parties' time. There's a reason why Best Offer is an available feature, and people aren't typically supposed to negotiate via contact. But asking for combined shipping discounts is a perfectly valid inquiry.

With third-party logistics, they tend to set minimum costs, and customs and commission fees tend to bite you in the bum. The Canadian government often waives customs fees for USPS-originated parcels below a certain value, whereas with FedEx/UPS/etc., you front that cost no matter what. I don't know why, but it could be because they precharge you instead of asking for what's actually charged of them. (Probably one of their ways of making money in the middle.) I'd rather go with USPS than FedEx unless the shipping cost is fully covered by the seller. Any of those have a sizable Canadian population?

Yeah, social media has been rotting away at the brains of younger people for years now, making them seek instant gratification and fast consumption of content. To be fair, a large part of the blame goes to USA's USPS and Canada's CP. If shipping costs were more reasonable, people would be buying across the border more. But they aren't. And according to many American sellers I've spoken with, USPS has been gradually raising the postage cost to ship to Canada. So much so that they'd rather not sell to them. Yikes.

Yeah, exactly. Just say no. Don't need to be an AH and condescend. It's eBay. Things are being sold used, second-hand.

Seems to me like someone who just read it and then placed it inside of a desk or drawer never to be read again. It happens. Doesn't look like a file copy to me, though. This is the 25c variant, which is better than the 30c one. But yeah, Very Fine range. At worst, Fine/Very Fine or Fine+. Would benefit from a press. Not sure if it's worthwhile grading, as Tom & Jerry doesn't have insane demand, and Toy Fair itself isn't particularly a key issue.

Thanks for the clarification. So basically, it would boost the value of the comic nonetheless, but it still depends on the underlying comic in question in terms of how much of a boost that would be.

As someone new to the scene, I just did some research, and TIL. So any Pre-Code Horror from '40 to '54 without the label is considered valuable. That's nice to know in case I ever stumble upon some in a yard sale or something.

I haven't even bothered with haggling down the price of these sellers that blocked me yet. I only sent them a message to ask about combined shipping and whether it would be possible to cut me a slight break if I bought multiple comics. But nah, they think I'm wasting their breath, when in reality they acquired these comics for dirt cheap and still make a profit either way. Whatever, they can sit on them for another decade.

Oof. Well, at least I don't have to stress out and frantically package comics for buyers, haha. A couple of orders per month is fine for me; I've got better things to do. The profits I'd make from reselling these would mostly offset the cost of coffee or dinner.

"009 dated issue"? What does that mean? This particular lot does not have #208 for Mickey. It's very much a common lot, albeit without any duplicates. Same goes for the other two lots. I will bid on these three lots by offering a value of $1 per comic after shipping. Basically consider them to be dollar store buys. Anything higher and someone else can take them. What I've learned from these lots is that these cartoon comics are basically worth nothing to people, outside of key issues. That'll influence my buying decisions from now on. Collecting gaps in runs, I can understand paying the increased premium to fill them, but I would still avoid fetching too many duplicates in a lot unless the total price is still cheap for the ones I need.

Are Mark Jewelers inserts really all that significant? Or does it depend on the comic issue in question?

As someone engaged in multiple hobby/enthusiast forums, based on my experience, there are several factors involved, but it all really boils down to, "out with the old, in with the new." Like many have said, social media has significantly changed the landscape of the Internet, especially for the younger generations, as people seek instant gratification, social acceptance, and go karma hunting. Besides the typical household names, platforms like Reddit and Discord are huge due to their massive population and ease of access for users, while forums are dated and feel like exclusive meet-and-greet groups. Gen Z and newer also have different interests than millennials and older, and feel that the hobbies that they are interested in are old-fashioned and banal. They also require a specific interest and often times monetary investment, when things on a computer screen/mobile phone/game console are far more convenient and straight-forward. There isn't much of a "cure" for the declining popularity and use of these kinds of forums. But enthusiasts will always stick around. Besides eBay and Facebook, which of those are viable sources for buying comics inexpensively?

Yeah... Not sure why this was so hard for OP. It almost sounds like the $3 book was more valuable than the $50 book, and OP couldn't afford to miss out on both.

Well, on a quarterly basis, that would average out to around $50 a month. That's not too bad for a high grade, high value comic.

For those three listed lots, primarily to resell. But I'd read through them once, at least. I'm not particularly interested in collecting their runs, though. Yeah, I'm aware that it's a small market compared to superhero comics. It would be one of those things where you leave the issues listed indefinitely, and simply wait for buyers over a year or two.

Yeah, from my personal observations, it feels like the Mickey Mouse comics are not particularly valuable. It's definitely the lowest on my list. I might pick up Woody Woodpecker and Bugs Bunny for a low bid, but that's all. I'll skip Mickey Mouse.

Very good points made. So you would lean more towards just letting the next guy take it as opposed to having a ton of stock sitting in the basement to have to trickle-sell. Some others in another auction-related thread also stated that they'd rather not deal with all of the resale. If there is something you need, then go for it, otherwise, it is not worth the trouble. I just took a look through the rare Whitman comic list, and only the Mickey Mouse lot has one, #207. But it is also coincidentally the more expensive auction of the bunch. Thank you for your insight

Right, but it wouldn't really be sensible to camp there for hours trying to look up each and every issue from an assorted box. Surely there must be some general pointers. Again, newbie to the scene.

Haven't looked into it in detail, but I can't imagine the prices being too far off. Would imagine them to be higher due to the eBay fees, and also, no Black Friday sale.

I made a response about this to the Whitman thread as well, but wanted more exposure and insight as they are time-sensitive auctions. The seller I'm looking to buy a massive lot from has a bunch of other massive lots as well. I'm thinking liquidation/divestment by the seller. These other lots look incredibly tempting from a ROI perspective. Hard to pass on. Of the lots I believe I could secure, it would only cost $1-2 per issue (before shipping). Pretty much guaranteed to take them. The lots that interest me a bit are: Bugs Bunny, Woody Woodpecker, and Mickey Mouse. Note: The Woody Woodpecker one has a few duplicates within, while the rest do not. Are any of those series worthwhile? Do they have resale value? Considering that they do not have aggressive bidding, I wager that they do not contain any key issues. Grade-wise, they seem to be G/VG.

Question for you Whitman experts: The same seller I'm looking to buy a Tom & Jerry lot from has a bunch of other lots as well, especially for Gold Key/Whitman. I'm thinking it is a liquidation/divestment by the seller. At this time, I'm only interested in Tom & Jerry, but these other lots look incredibly tempting from a ROI perspective. Hard to pass on. Of the lots I believe I could secure, it would only cost $1-2 per issue (before shipping). Pretty much guaranteed to take them. The lots that interest me a bit are: Bugs Bunny, Woody Woodpecker, and Mickey Mouse. There are some other large lots too, but with aggressive bidding which I am not interested in bothering with. Perhaps they have key issues or something to warrant such behaviour. Note: The Woody Woodpecker one has a few duplicates within, while the rest do not. Are any of those series worthwhile? Do they have any resale value? Considering that they do not have aggressive bidding, I would wager that they do not contain any key issues. But it would still cost less than $1-2 per issue, which I can accept for the resale potential. Grade-wise, they seem to be G/VG.

Is it you selling, or an actual store? Because it's super easy to circumvent with two separate receipts. One for the $50 comic + bonus, and one for the $3 comic + bonus. Having to pay for two $50 books and getting only two $3 books is an awful move and deserves contempt.

Side note: I just realized that it is possible to buy his comics with PayPal by doing so via eBay. Just in case someone was genuinely interested but did not want to fork out their CC info on some sketchy 90's website.

Sadly, as a newbie collector, I have no idea what comics are considered valuable. Even if I dropped by some yard sale that had tons of vintage comics for sale, I wouldn't know which ones were valuable or not for resale. Perhaps someone could provide me with some summarized pointers for what would be must-buys if I ever encountered them.

Yeah, at the moment, I'm interested in one eBay lot auction, but only because more than half of it would fill a huge gap in my collection while also having an under-FMV per-issue average cost at my highest bid. It's a no-brainer for me to acquire even if I'll end up with a batch of issues as duplicates to have to resell. I've crunched the numbers and it's still cheap. Unless someone decides to throw up a ridiculous bid, the one I'm making is guaranteed to grab it and still be an amazing deal. I imagine that my maximum bid won't even be necessary. But I'm smart with auctions and will only bid at the last minute.