Hudson

I think that when one dealer starts marking up their prices by some factor over what they actually expect to sell the book for, it puts pressure on other dealers to do the same thing. Say a "buyer" at a convention becomes accustomed to being able to "negotiate" a dealer down by 20%(arbitrary number), then I believe that buyer becomes conditioned to "expecting" a 20% discount. If that buyer then goes to a dealer who does not price the same way, then the buyer may feel that he is not getting a "good deal" when that dealer only offers him 15% (the wiggle room that dealer had priced into the equation). In the end, we have a buyer who might not buy a book that is actually a "fair deal", just because he/she has become accustomed to a greater discount.

. i think you are one of the few that price pretty close to actual sell price.

I have no clue how "dealers" price books at conventions. A lot of prices that I see often seem "unrealistic", however, I know that going to a convention can be like going to a used car dealership. Many dealers are looking to price high and then "negotiate" the price. Maybe they "need" to get $3k for a book to make a decent profit, but they mark it at $4k in hopes that they get even more than the $3k once the negotiation is done. I don't really know. I do know that I personally hate to negotiate, so high tags usually make me just walk away. I would love to see a convention in which the organizers made a rule that every book must be sold as marked or not at all. In other words a "no negotiation convention", so a guy like me does not have to guess what the "real price" is and whether or not to waste my time at that booth. I know this will never happen but a guy can dream. This is likely the number one reason I don't go to many conventions anymore. I used to travel all over the place to attend conventions, but I just don't enjoy the whole "negotiation" thing and so with the invent of the web, I find myself traveling less to these things.

+1 (please excuse the old school +1, but this deserves more than a "like").

Just wait a bit and check Rick's sales thread. He doesn't let books get any dust on them before moving them on to new owners.

Has anyone been to this show in the past, that can tell me if this is a "comic book" show, or something else? I understand there are some comic artist there, but I guess what I really want to know is if this is a good place to go and buy Golden Age comics. Are any of the big dealers going to be there?

Join the boat (the boat I am in). I can't tell you how many of these I passed on thinking another would come along. I think the ship sailed on this one for me as well.

I agree with you 100% on this one, Bob. The perfect example of this is perhaps the recent price realized by the 1.0 copy of Suspense Comics #3.

Of course all this really only matters if you want to buy and sell. As a "collector" with no interest in selling, the FMV is not as important. Regrettably the world of comics has turned and is far more of a business than it once was. Thus the ability to "perfectly" price every book becomes the ultimate goal. No no disrespect to sellers, as without them I would not be able to buy.

Thanks for the report and all the photos, Jay.

This is an interesting way of grading. I don't think CGC grades this way, however, as I don't recall seeing any "positive" CGC notes. CGC typically notes the book's defects in their "grader's notes". I will say, however, that it is refreshing to see someone (like you) who looks at the positives in life (glass half full). Way to go.

I was happy to add this to my collection.

Thanks, Bob. I had often wondered what qualified as a "perfect 10" (besides Bo Derek of course).

Thank you for providing this insight. I did not look at it that way.

Thank you for this information. I knew about some of these past grading systems (such as Overstreet and even the 100 point system), however, I was unaware of others. Thank you for responding, for your thoughts, and for your very thorough descriptions of these other grading "systems".

In another recent thread, there has been some discussion about how CGC grades. I believe (although I could be wrong) that as “buyers” we appreciate and respect the “tight” grading standards of CGC. (I cannot speak to the selling side of the house, as I am not in that camp). Regardless, however, if you are a “buyer”, “collector”, or “seller”, I would think you would want more than anything to see “consistency”. I don’t think the numeric grade is as important as knowing that any given book with the same defects will be given the same grade, regardless of what day of the week it is or which CGC grader is grading it. From reading through many threads, I believe there are a few camps of thought on this… There appear to be those who believe that CGC has always graded consistently, from day 1, and that it has not changed. There are those who believe that CGC has gone through periods of “tight” grading and periods of shall we say “more liberal” grading. These people appear to believe that CGC grading was at least “consistent” during each individual “period” even if not “consistent” when comparing one “period” to another (say when a different “head grader” was in charge). There are those who appear to believe that sometimes it is a flip of the coin as to what grade a book will receive. It is likely, we have all seen posts by members who post an image of a book and ask how it achieved a given grade. So then if CONSISTENCY is the goal of CGC (which I would like to believe it is) AND is the goal of the collecting community in general (which I again believe that it is), then I would like to know how CGC grades defects. I am going to assume that a book starts at a 10 and that each defect (minor or major) brings that grade lower. If this is the case, then by how much does each defect cause the grade to fall? I have heard it said (although I don’t personally know) that an otherwise perfect book, with a full length subscription crease will top out at 5.5. Does this mean that an otherwise 10 book falls 4.5 points simply because of a subscription crease? That seems harsh to me, HOWEVER, I can accept this IF it is consistent. What about other defects? Does each defect deduct a certain amount until a final score is reached, or is this book looked at as a whole? What about “overall eye appeal”? Does that count for anything? I am asking a lot of questions and writing a “wall of texts” (for which I apologize), in order to make the following suggestion to CGC…. I would like to suggest that CGC write a book on how they grade. I think this would be a big seller to many collectors and more importantly, it could lead to people feeling more confident that CGC is consistent in their grading (for those who are in the questioning camps). To begin, I believe CGC should find a collector who has at least a 100 copies of a single SA book (in multiple grades). This should be the same book (Title and Issue #), so as to make it easy for everyone to compare “apples to apples”. (this eliminates a lot of the issues that could arise in comparing two different books). They should then start with a high grade copy and take detailed photos of every defect they find and say how much they are deducting for that defect. In the end they should then show the final grade for that copy. Then they should move to a slightly lower grade and continue this process until they get down to a 0.5 or incomplete. For many of the mid grade books, they should show multiple examples. They could show how two books might at first glance appear the same (say 6.0, but are numerically different or vise-versa (perhaps two books have the same numeric grade but look completely different). After that they should perhaps find another book (probably modern) where they can do the same thing for say grades 10 – 9.0 (since I am not sure they will be able to effectively cover that entire range with the silver age book chosen above). This would be the high grade section, usually found in newer books. Finally they should do a golden age section using a similar principle, however, I would expect less copies of a single book to be available (not sure any collector has 100 or more copies of any given GA book in a variety of grades wide enough to accomplish the goal). I suggest this as I have often heard the term "Golden Age Bump" and would like to know how the age of the book is taken into account when judging defects. This is just my thought for day on a possible “solution” to the question of grading consistency. Before any discussion begins, I want to thank CGC for the opportunity to post suggestions like these and for allowing collectors a place to gather and share ideas.

I can't tell you how much I enjoy it, whenever you post a photo of this incredible book. Simply awesome!

Looks like I am going to be forced to go buy a Mega Millions ticket.

Thank you for letting me know that I am not the only one!

Thanks for the info on this, Bob. I haven't done the SDCC in several years now. This may be a fun alternative.

Thank you. I think I will try setting up a want list with Bob, although I am guessing many more comics flow through MCS than through highgradeconics. I will also add, that I have done business with Bob in the past and would recommend him.

I appreciate everyone's thoughts and comments on this.

Perhaps this is the problem, if in fact it takes an extra day to notify "want list" customers. Perhaps they are listing books on eBay, before notifying "want list" customers. Then if I see the book and buy it the same day it is listed, I suppose they would never end up emailing me, since it is no longer available.

I just went to my account and doubled checked. I have it set for "no minimum grade" on every book on my list. Thank you for the suggestion and for letting me know that at least it s working for some of MCS's customers. I really like MCS and I hope they will one day resolve this issue. I agree with KAV that as a general rule they are a "top notch" organization.