shadroch

I think Whitman packaged their competitors books in order to gain access for their own stuff. A store or chain might not have much interest in getting a bunch of poor selling Gold Key comics, but offer them a case of 72 3packs, half of which feature popular characters like Spider-Man, Batman and Superman and they just might be.

As I recall, and it was well over thirty years ago, Man Of Steel #1 came with two covers. The Newstands got one with Clark Kent ripping open his shirt to reveal the Superman emblem. The DM got one with just a close up of the Superman emblem. Added: Mile High has both DM and Newstand copies of the Clark Kent cover, so it appears you were correct. The closeup is a variant cover.

Several of my friends that had shops had newsstand accounts, as well as Direct . This let them carry magazines and they would get small amounts of returnable comics. Problem was the comics were three weeks behind. I never did, because my first shop was done on a real shoe string and the local magazine distributor wanted something like a $1,000 deposit and I had to buy a rack from them. Had to sell a boatload of .60 cent comics to clear $1,000. My money was in back issues and D&D, at least for the first few months. Transformers, as well. I couldn't keep those things in stock.

Friendly Franks I bought a lot from them before I opened my first shop, but with Seagate offering free pickup, it didn't make sense to use them for new books.

Absolutely. MH2 was the result of one mobbed up distributor illegally diverting books. A rather small distributor, in fact. So, if one mobbed up distributor did it, and there were hundreds ,if not thousands of such mobbed up distributors across North America, what are the chances that dozens or more such hoards existed. It's just that most buyers of stolen goods don't shoot their mouths off like Chucky Woodchuck, or brag about committing bank fraud to do so.

I don't recall which distributor I was using at that point. I'd started with Phil at Seagate. When they went bellyup, I switched to Comics Unlimited. They wrote a nasty article about a Marvel suit and Marvel pulled their ability to sell Marvel books so I switched to Crown. Then Diamond came in and pretty much drove Crown out of business. Now, in the mid-1980s, we would get DM books approx. three weeks before the same book would appear on the newsstands. Did you get both editions at the same time or were these reorders that came in later?

My apartment has a Roman tub. It's akin to a mini- Jacuzzi. I think I've taken one shower since I moved in. Nothing like a good soak.

That's strange. I don't recall being able to split orders like that. In fact, my distributor made a big deal out of locating newsstand Spidey Annual 21s for us, as it had a different cover than the direct. I do remember being able to order the newsstand Man of Steel #1 covers from my distro. When discussing the overall condition of newsstand copies, you have to keep in mind that many of the copies that exist today were never actually distributed to the stands. Whole bricks ( 100-200 copies bound together ) were diverted. Remember that the entire Mile High 2 collection is newsstand copies, and is just one of many such hoards.

I've been storing my slabs in that position for a decade or more with no ill effects. That said, there have been issues with storing slabs in safes. Early on, some very valuable books developed rusty staples. There is some sort of device that people place in the safe to ward that off. Never paid much attention as I don't keep them mine in safes but I would investigate it pronto ,if I were you. Are you storing them upside down? If so, why?

I can't think of a single Mini-Series that sells better individually than in sets. Possibly Wolverine, but not any others.

It's funny. I just had a flood in my apartment , and lost aa couple thousand dollars worth of books, all insured. After hearing about the flood, my friend called me up and said how great it was, how I was going to sell them anyway and this way I could use the money to open another bar or something. He sounded disappointed when he heard it was only a fraction of the books. Then I got to thinking, wondering if I might enjoy things better with a much bigger check and much less books. Not an easy thing for me to decide.

The last thing you'd want in a bug out bag is a couple of million dollar comics.

Buy the book and find out

Does a signed and graded copy of a book have more value than a raw copy in the same shape? Is that a serious question?

You could sell half of each.

I don't think it undermines the theory. it simply doesn't support it. UPC scanners were far from universal in those days.

If you notice the Diamonds on those two packs, the BIG Diamond books seem to be harder to come by than the smaller Diamond ones. The Big Diamond books were usually specially made for Whitman, while the smaller were just early Direct copies. Whitman books have the slash thru the UPC code so a cashier doesn't scan that and charge forty cents for the whole bag. As usual, there are no absolutes when it comes to the way these were distributed. I've heard of many people who bought a book off a newsstand with a Big Diamond. It's possible some retailers bought the three packs and opened them up to sell individually, making an extra six cents in the process. Some states charged sales tax on the packaged three packs but not on individual comics, others didn't charge sales tax on purchases less than a buck.

Imperial News, the only true Newsstand Distributor for comics on Long Island was out of the comic business right after 1991. The only comics they carried were Digest sized, distributed to supermarkets. I'd want to see proof if anyone claimed newsstands were anything near 25% of the market in 1990.

Update. All State told me to have my landlord hire a company to come in and take care of the carpeting and any potential mold problems. Landlord said three companies would stop by and put in a bid for the job. One guy showed up ,looked at the various storage racks filled with comics and passed on the job. The leading nationwide company came by, wanted to bring in a storage pod and quoted north of $3,000. Third guy showed up and quoted $923. He spent the afternoon moving everything out of the master bedroom, removed the padding, installed these huge fans and vacuumed the rest of the place. Very friendly guy, pleasure to have in my house. I got a real scare as the bottom row of Comic Drawers looked terrible. Much more damage than I had expected. However, moisture didn't penetrate six of the eight outer shells and even the two that had inner damage only had a few books ruined- all unbagged moderns. I dodged a bullet here. Lots of books ruined but it could have been so much worse. Lost about 100 HG Marvel BA books, but no keys or semi-keys., and another 70-80 Modern books. Also lost a full case of Legends of The Dark Knight #2. I have no ides how to price that one. Got to give a big hand to Comic Drawers as they really did their job- protecting the books within. Still haven't heard from CIA Adjustor.

There are some extremely rare newsstand variants from the mid to late 1980s. A few Indie companies managed to get newsstand distribution of their books in a few cities. First and Now distributed in the Chicago area and Comico supposedly distributed in Pennsylvania, but their newsstand copies ended up in some remote locations thanks to a few vendors packaging returns into multi-packs. It's just that there isn't much for demand for them.

A Single Mars Patrol, which survived.

If they can fake the moon landing, you don't think they can fake some comic book price?

A member, who wishes not to be known, told me that in a similar circumstance, he wrote up a list of damaged books, priced them using mycomic shop and CIA offered him about 75% of the total, letting him keep the books. So far, pretty painless. My renters insurance is sending over a pod and a crew to empty everything out, then servepro comes in extracts the water and looks for potential mold problems. Nothing out of pocket. People at CIA were friendly and I was told to expect to hear from an adjustor within 24 hours. It's the little things that suck. My deceased Sisters 7Th grade sketch book is ruined. A book of JFK quotes I received for my birthday in 1967, gone. A Cap portrait a dead friend drew for me for $25 when he didn't have twenty five cents to his name is water stained and ran a bit. Can't imagine what others are experiencing, losing everything. As they say- I felt sorry that I had no shoes, until I met a man with no feet.

Last night, I was running water for a bath when my phone rang. It was in the kitchen so I walked away from the tub to answer it. It turned out to be a classmate from a class we are sharing and she was stuck on a homework problem. I sit at my computer and try to walk her through it. Suddenly my dog starts barking and acting crazy. I think he must have to "go" so I grab his leash and we walk over to the dog walking plaza. He doesn't do anything so I try to walk back home. As we get to the front door, he starts pulling backwards, not wanting to enter. I take him back to the dog walking area but again nothing. We go back to my apartment and enter. I see a comic on my living room floor where it wasn't before. Except it isn't sitting on it, more like its floating. Walk in and get a squishly feeling. Look down the hall and there is about two inches of standing water in it. Long story short, about 15 boxes of comics that are on the floor are soaked. Good news is, my valuable stuff is elsewhere. I rate comics A thru G and all my As and most of my Bs are secured elsewhere. Better news, most of the books appear undamaged. the Mylars and mylite protected books have a very high survival rate. Preliminary results show about 80-85% of the books are fine. Lost most of a box of 60s Indys, including a nice run of Solar and a good chunk of Thunder Agents. Had a box set up vertical of stuff I was getting ready to consign , and only the bottom ten or so books got damaged. A Ragman #1 and a first run Firestorm, along with a couple 1960s JLA. I'm still sorting stuff out but most stuff seems okay. Did lose a couple of nice lithos that were leaning against the wall in the hall. One in particular hurts. Its a Blue Angels tem photo-23 X17, signed by the team and inscribed to Connie Stevens. Then on the back was a paragraph ,handwritten explaining how she got it, signed and dated by her. All told, I'm looking at about 500-700 comic books damaged, along with a box of unprotected TPBs and hardcovers, and maybe 20 boxes that will need to be replaced. Called CIA this morning and was told an Adjuster would be in touch today. I'm pretty sure the loss will be in the 5K-10K area. A nasty bite ,if not for insurance. Photos of the boxes. 98% of the comics in the Drawer boxes were A-OK https://www.amazon.com/photos/share/cGqi2Y1HiFZLgF89wRtEaEbbfBOYv1MUsqPhiWsLiZH