blazingbob

Where's Gene when you need him. If I remember one of his posts it's not like Europe and other developed countries aren't experiencing the same inflation pressures. And the dollar hasn't continued its plummet that basically was giving my UK buyers a 50% off sale. Now why Goldust didn't buy more is beyond me

Joe, I agree with some of your post but frankly the UK/Euro buyer has had a bigger incentive due to currency strength of the Euro versus the dollar. Even my Canadian sales increased substantially once the Canadian dollar literally went 1 for 1.

Joe, I'm sorry if I came across as Naive but I didn't have GPA when pricing most pre-65 books and keys. Do speculators, flippers etc need GPA when watching auctions and seeing how books are doing? That's how we did it when I went to Christie's and Sotheby's auctions in the 90's.

George, I have no problem with GPA being used in addition to the other sources of pricing data out there when it comes to buying/selling books. I do however do not agree with the following Not directed at anyone... 1. What do you think the CGC Comic Market would be like right now if the GPA service was never created? My opinion - The Market would probably be the same as it is today 2. What if the the best info you could get on CGC Sales (if you did not spend considerable time and effort tracking it manually yourself) was CPG's formulaic online data (for free) and/or Wizards monthly printed data ($4-$5 a month... and compare that to what you pay for a 24/7, at your fingertip service)? My opinion - Learning the multiples of CGC pricing can be a starting point. You can always price a book too high and come down. Relying on just GPA means you are always behind the market, never ahead of it. 3. With that in mind, If you own CGC Slabs do you think the value of your collection would be worth more or less right now? My Opinion - The same 4. How "comfortable" would you be owning a significant amount of valuable CGC books without such a service to quantify the market? My opinion - A service does not quantify a market, Just because a book sold for X today doesn't mean it will sell for X tomorrow. 5. How comfortable would you be spending money in the CGC end of the hobby... especially now during an economic downturn? My opinion - Every purchase whether CGC or raw is a leap of faith in the market and you should always be buying with a "Dump/wholesale" price in mind. 6. How comfortable would potential "new" collectors/investors/speculators be spending money in the CGC end of the hobby (almost 9 years old) without any reliable tool providing them with an in-depth market performance history to reference? My opinion - If the new collector knows to use GPA than yes historical performance is useful. But again, what something sells for in the past doesn't mean it will continue going up. 7. Is it possible that GPA's existence has had "something to do" with the market correcting "gradually" over the years... instead of a potentially more destructive crash? My Opinion - I don't believe GPA had anything to do with this. 8. Shouldn't we all (CGC Collectors and Sellers) be kissing GPA's arse for coming along when they did, doing an excellent job, and playing a crucial role in this end of the hobby? My opinion - why am I kissing George's azzz? GPA is a useful tool, just like the Overstreet Price guide. Should I be kissing Bob Overstreets azzzz? I think many people take for granted the numerous benefits GPA provides to the CGC end of the market. My Opinion - I don't see this at all.

How would you know that "cherry picking" is going on? Unless a site has historical archives it's very hard to spot the cherry picking. Unless the consignment site identifies company owned material it's all assumed to be consigned.

Next time I'll ask you to Please put the pom pom's down before I comment on your post. Quite the potty mouth you got going there in this post. Name calling also. What are you, five?

Do NOT ever tell me how to post Bruce.

Bruce, put down the pom poms. You don't think that CGC sellers wouldn't see or figure out the multiples to price books at? It still comes down to negotiation to come to the final selling price. When both parties agree the deal is done. I think that GPA is sometimes used as a crutch by inexperienced sellers. I didn't have GPA when I sold my collection. I have no problem buying books without having GPA to fall back on. I don't have to kiss George's Arzzz in order to continue selling my CGC books.

So are you hinting that maybe Vinny played the role of Robert Downey Jr. in his version of Natural Born Comic killers? I see a movie happening baby! Vinny, Call my agent!

Wow, what an interesting post. I guess I fall into the category of "Shady dealers" from NY. I guess so long as you smile and are nice it's ok to rip people off. Being that we have so little charm being New Yorkers it's easy to hate us and lump us all together.

I'm spamming but I currently have a CGC 9.0 and 9.2 X-Men #99 .30 variant on my site if anybody needs that issue.

Ding Ding! Let round 3 begin! This is exactly what I am talking about "Price that is within reason" Please define this. I do and go across the country and sell in different markets. Depending on what part of the country, what time of year, what current financial the person is in all influences his/her defintion of "Within reason"

Using some of Bruce's new replies you should have bought the copy in the Heritage auction. Guide is $550 on a 7.5. The last time I sold a JLA #3 was an 8.0 in 2002 for $575. Ok, So what you and George are telling me is that this particular issue in mid to high grade is selling for under Overstreet guide CGC graded. The seller is not listing a JLA #3 6.5 for double Overstreet Price Guide. He is listing it at double GPA. If he cracked it out and sold it raw would you feel better? Then we can argue if he is pricing raw books too high according to the Overstreet Price Guide. Lastly, Heritage sold the book. Well that explains the low price.

Overstreet Price Guide FN is $234, FN+ the way I calculate it is $341. Which means the seller is using a 1.25X guide multiplier. Factoring in Comiclinks comission of $34 + Guide you are looking at $375. According to my sources GPA is $189 which is less than fine guide of $234. The sellers price may be double GPA but it is not double what someone who follows the Overstreet price guide could price this book at.

Your points are also very very accurate. Regarding BB's position on not reporting prices to GPA: He's correct in his approach. 1)As was said before, He has no incentive upside to report his sales data. to anyone. If he sees trends developing it's his proprietary info and he needs not share that with the general population. If anyone wants the data then subscribe to Bob's pricing service. 2)In my business, I make money generating ideas for myself. Many times I'm solicited for ideas and I will only give very general info keeping any specific trading thoughts for myself. The last thing I need is additional competition.

Aussie: I'm still on coffee #1 so forgive me if I'm not clear. I will speak to CGC sales that I know would cause an uptick in GPA, not the ones that would cause a downward one. If I felt that CGC prices would continue there upward run with no downside risk then having those GPA prices submitted causing price increases wouldn't bother me in the least. But when I am seeing price compressions in certain parts of the market why exactly do I want to be increasing my buying cost? And since I was a collector there is nothing more exciting than seeing your books increase in value yet you get annoyed because the books on your want list just became more expensive to acquire. I waited 6 months to get first shot at the Mass books. My want list was going up in guide $1000 a month when Overstreet was issuing the monthly guide. And don't think Marnin wasn't waiting for that latest issue to price those books. Yes, it's not as easy to make money as it used to be. There are more competitors out there, more people play "dealer" than ever before. They cherry pick the good stuff and leave a lot of the rest for us to buy. Lastly, Every dealer has a "Bail out" price on a book. Especially on CGC graded books. You pay a certain price and if you had to sell you could still make a little bit of money. Every dealer has sometimes had to sell something because a bill or their "monthly nut as some of my buddies called it" came due. Be at a bad convention and you will see this type of selling. Maybe this is not answering your question, maybe it is.

"Russ, I think Bob already answered this question. At some point, he has to buy the books that he later sells. If the GPA for those books rises because of higher sales prices reported by him, CL and others, then his purchase price rises. In this hobby and as in many others, information is power, and profit opportunities arise from exploiting discrepancies in information between buyers and sellers" Again, very astute observation and absolutely true. This is not only true about sales being reported to GPA, the same goes for sales being reported to the Overstreet Price Guide.

"Actually, that discussion is a sideshow too. This whole thread came about because one member seemed to think that sellers have an obligation to base their selling prices on GPA" Thank you Tim, I thought I had communicated that more than a few times

Actually I wasn't even aware of this being on the GPA site until now. Thank you. I have not provided GPA with any of my sales data so I guess I am guilty of self promotion. Ah, I must have touched a nerve since the infamous Mark tone comes out. Maybe you need to read a few more of my posts but I'll spell it out to you again. I am not against a person using GPAnalysis when negotiating with me on price. What bothers me is when they feel I should sell the book for the GPAnalysis price as if it's the End all/Be all price. Hence my many posts about the fact that I have sales data to back up my pricing.

Are you really a dealer or a hobbyist? What value do you put on your business? Your proprietary information? You feel very free on how much you sell your books for? How much do you pay for them? I am able to sell a lot of books over GPA. Why would I want that to become public knowledge? GPA prices go up, buying prices go up, margins get squeezed. I run a business and quite frankly am not in business to make other people money. Let them work as hard as I do to find the books, write the checks and sell them.

Well, let's see. I have a large number of dealers that I do a lot of business with that are very willing to give me a price to sell a book at. Just because I may not have sold a book before doesn't mean that I cannot make a phone call or partner with the dealer to buy and sell the book.

Hmm, very interesting statement "But the more data GPA possesses the more true to the actual market it reveals, and perhaps that is why some dealers are concerned" Maybe the seller of the Hollywood Hills books should have checked GPA before he sold them to you and Southern Cal?

Amazing that when it comes to Self promotion I can think of no better person than yourself. They're coming! They're Coming! They're here! They're here!

My venom is because I am tired of some posters who feel that 1). Books should be priced at their interpretation of "Fair". 2). The books should be priced at their buy it now price because it's not in their nature to negotiate. 3). High grade books should be sold at the minimum amount of profit. My time and my hard work isn't worth paying a profit for. The 75% of the collection that I'm never going to sell or schlep to shows for the next five years isn't their problem either.

Let's all be clear on this. I don't subscribe or use them regularly. I'll listen when a collector quotes GPA but remind them that I also have sales data to pull prices from. I did not use GPA to price my FF collection and no many of them were not the Highest graded copies. I priced them based on the fact that there wasn't a large collection of FF's offered to the market in a long time. I don't need GPA to gauge market trends. Besides it's historical in nature and could be out of date since the last reported sale. Did I need GPA to figure out AS #300's were hot? Or what I could price them for? No I did not. You can get a sense of the market when "Everybody" and I mean "everybody" starts asking for a book. Or want lists in your system start showing up with the same books. My database sales go back over 14 years. I've been around this business since 1973. Before GPA there was an Overstreet Price guide. I've already stated that "Useless" was too strong a word, it's another "source" of pricing information if you want to use it. And I have many sources to pull pricing information from.