Westy Steve

On 2/11/2022 at 2:09 PM, Cornelius The First said:

On 2/11/2022 at 2:09 PM, Cornelius The First said:

Next up is a well loved but complete Sgt. Fury 13 GD $50 

Take

On 2/10/2022 at 1:30 PM, lizards2 said:

to sort of answer your question, it really depends on where your mailing too, as the USPS has a bunch of regions. It is cheaper the closer the region or within region. It is often cheaper to ship not Flat Rate within your region.

I haven't checked out whatever changes paypal has made, but you used to be able to ship up to pound first class.

It is usually cheaper to mail less than a pound using a regular Priority box, than it is a Flat-Rate box.

Typically, if you are shipping 1/2 to all the way across the U.S., and the weight is over a pound / 16 ounces, the next best option is to ship in Regional Rate boxes, as they are cheaper than flat rate, but a bit smaller than Flat Rate boxes. But I believe you have to buy the postage on line from USPS to get the cheap Regional Rate.  There is a weight limit to Regional Rate that is less than Flat Rate, but you'd never get close to that weight shipping comics. What is weird is that you have to add a weight and select not Flat Rate to select the basically Flat Rate Regional Rate.

If I ship quite a few comics, I usually pick the Flat Rate medium boxes, as they are bigger and allow you to use an interior box for extra strength.

I never buy boxes, I just order on line from USPS, AND save all the incoming stuff from purchases and reuse - boxes, bubble wrap, etc.  And that allows me to double box with little effort. A good source of free stout boxes would be your local liquor store, or dumpster dive at the local cardboard recycling bin.

Word to the wise, never, ever use the medium Flat Rate boxes in 11 1/4" x 8 3/4" x 6" to ship comics in, as they are too small to provide cushion, and books usually come in with corner duns.  Never, ever use these boxes.

11 1/4" x 8 3/4" x 6" BAD, BAD, BAD - don't even think about using these - your comics will get damaged.

Here is the Regional Rate A2 box I use:

13 1/16" x 11 1/16" x 2 1/2"

Truly great info. You just helped a lot of boardies save some coin. Thanks 

On 2/10/2022 at 12:42 PM, wombat said:

Seems a little odd to me, but I will say I don't have a ton of experience with it. My wife ships pretty regularly and uses an ap for it to come up with the label. And they ask up front if it is a flat rate box or custom. Once you pick custom you put in the measurements and weight and that is what the charge is based on. I guess its possible that based on the measurements you put it you end up getting the flat rate price. 

Pretty sure that this is what happened. It’s some kind of default rate.  I was so bothered by this I went back to the post office and took my receipt with me and talked to another employee. She filled the information in manually, and came up with the same answer. For what it’s worth the weight was just less than 2 pounds. 
 

In summary, when shipping a comic book in a sturdy container, you may as well use the free boxes. 

I was mailing some comics. I knew it was too heavy to go first class and realized I’d have to mail it priority. Rather than take a priority FLAT RATE box (because that was all they had) I figured I would purchase a box. So I picked out a box the same size as a priority box, but it was brown in color. First they charged me five dollars for the box, (which is higher than I expected) but then they still charged me $16.10 for flat rate priority. The employee told me this was the only way to mail a box that size. I asked her if  they could charge me based on the measurements of the box and the weight of the box, and she said no. I mean, what if I walk in off the street with my own box? Don’t they measured and Weigh it?  There was a hell of a line behind me so I didn’t fight it. So basically, it would’ve cost the same amount if I would’ve mailed a box of rocks or one half cubic feet of lead. There is no advantage to mailing something light weight when you ship in a box via priority???   It all goes flat rate?

Bump for a big price reduction

A shy but perverted friend of mine asked me to ask the group to share their fishnet stockings covers.  He can find only a few  

I won’t say who it is but his name rhymes with “ Schmdaniel “   The “D” is silent.

Hmmm…maybe I was too high …reduced 

My terms are I accept only PayPal goods and services. Shipping is free. US sales only. “I’ll take it“ trumps ongoing negotiations in PMs. 
Price is $150.  I can’t find any hidden defects.  Centerfold is barely hanging from one staple. Page count was verified.  Cool looking book with space monster and bubble helmet.  First appearance of Space Detective.  Cheap GA key. 
 

On 10/7/2021 at 6:49 PM, Bosco685 said:

I can't believe the revisionism that occurs at times with Marvel Comics history.

Iron Man was not only one of the 1966 animated TV shows but also extensively used throughout marketing and merchandising. Even in the 1970s and 1980s he was so popular Iron Man was the early wave of action figures.

I hear you, but bear in mind when the Marvel cinematic universe took off, they were using characters that nobody previously wanted to buy from them.  Hulk, Spiderman, X-Men, Fantastic  Four, those properties were already sold.  So they made movies with the properties they had left.  And made millions and millions of dollars. 

On 10/7/2021 at 5:59 PM, kav said:

White Tiger with them amulets

Where did that start?

Hey guys,  So I’m the proud owner of the WWBN with the first appearance of the Darkhold.  It’s a cool comic, but mine isn’t in that great of condition so feel free to share a picture of your nice one

ANYWAY!   It got me to wondering what other cool relics or magical artifacts are floating around the Marvel Universe  that aren’t infinity stone driven?  Can you tell me about them?  Where did they first appear?  What do the associated comicbook covers look like? (I never forget a cover)

TIA,

Steve

On 10/7/2021 at 3:13 PM, rexinnih said:

Could be interesting. I'll watch it but wondering if they are oversaturating the MCU with not major characters getting their own series. Maybe more of a What if? type with standalones for a different character each week that can have an overall arch. 

Seemed that was kind of true with Ironman back in the day. He wasn’t much of a major character until his first movie. He was an Avenger but not exactly hotly collected until the movies made him hot. Same with Thor.  I bleed Marvel universe, but you have to agree that the MCU has a way of pushing less popular characters into the limelight.  Done right, by a good actor, second tiered characters can move up. Not saying this will happen with Agatha, but who knows?

On the other hand, Hahn did get an Emmy nomination and she is pretty funny. Seems like an update to Bewitched but with MCU tie ins. I’ll watch it. 

Thanks. I was trying to check that. I read overstreet  it wasn’t immediately clear.  I will definitely take it.

Is the Diary Secrets a Baker cover?  If so, I’ll take it 

On 10/2/2021 at 8:09 PM, rube11 said:

STRANGE TALES #178  7.5 WHITE PAGES  $100

 

Take it

Great info. I feel I learned stuff here. My luck on grading books is almost always bad…I’ll leave it alone. 

Thanks. Interestingly, the slab says cream to off white.  Could it have fallen that far?  Makes me wonder if they were chips that fell off from rough handling. Check out the grade.  Does that change your opinion?

This one has me stumped.  A couple of tiny chips fell off the top of the cover and they’re trapped in the slab. There is a tear on the back cover, and a tiny chip on the bottom of the front cover. CGC calls the page quality cream to off-white pages. 
 

The grade on the slab does not denote a loose centerfold or a loose staple or Rusty Staples or anything at all.
 

On 9/24/2021 at 6:17 PM, catman76 said:

Yeah, love that. Night scene with fire light.  I’m amazed there are so many great examples. 

Hi guys, I find that I really enjoy comic book covers with lighting in the foreground. A lantern, a fire, etc. here’s a couple of examples. Got any more you can share?

FYI the Batman picture was plucked from eBay. Not mine.  The dark mystery belongs to a friend of mine. 
 

There’s definitely a reason to go to shows.  Not just the wall books for second mortgage prices, but the box of wall books that the dealer didn’t have room for so he keeps it behind the table (always ask!), but the “junk” $10 boxes are fun to look through.  Look for the dealer with $10 boxes with activity reminiscent of seagulls on a fresh garbage truck. Not meaning to repost this, but found this in a junk box.  Still junk to many, but I thought it was a cool mash up book.  

Besides, it’s good to take the temperature of the market. A lot of dealers wish they had gold right now.
 

On 9/22/2021 at 12:04 PM, shadroch said:

The internet killed the thrill of the hunt for me. Back in the day, it took me over a year to find a copy of Avengers 3 that was priced right. Today there are dozens of copies on the web. 

There was something special about saving up for the semi-annual convention and hoping one of the dealers would have what were then obscure Marvels. It took me forever to find a FF 2 without marvel chipping, which wasn't so accepted in the mid 1970s.

I get what you’re saying. I talk about that with friends sometimes. Books that were hard to find back in the day are easy to find online. I’ve adapted my hunt to look for books that are “Internet rare“. With a few exceptions, I try to find collectibles that are difficult to find even on the Internet.   And if you’re at a show and you run across a strange book that isn’t online anywhere, there’s probably somebody looking for it.  These days I can hunt from my couch, which has its own charms after a hard day at work.

On 9/22/2021 at 10:04 AM, batman_fan said:

I first saw the cover to Green Giant Comics in a book that reprinted covers from classic GA books.  For some reason I fell in love with the cover.  Once I read the background on the book, I was hooked and knew I had to own a copy.  An 8.0 was auctioned twice on Heritage which I just could buy at the time due to other things in life.  I missed out on a real low grade copy on EBay (but did snag a picture of it).  Fast forward to the Berk collection on ComicConnect and there began the LONG wait for the auction to close.  I almost tapped out during the live bidding but ended up winning it.

Those are amazing.  I know of that book, and understand it’s crazy rare.  Can’t imagine THAT hunt. How long (active search) did that take?

On 9/22/2021 at 9:42 AM, Surfing Alien said:

That's high eye appeal for a 2.0 (which I assume was the criteria you were looking at most) so you did great on that pickup Westy!

Heh, thanks,…no that was blind luck. It was more about price and availability. Picture a Venn diagram with one circle representing books I can afford and one circle representing problem-free desirable books…and the two circles just barely intersecting   .   Most often low grade is a necessity to make it happen.  Not sure why I’m wading in this end of the pool.