1Cool

There seemed to have been quite a few of these late in 2023 but I'm setting up at this one after a late cancellation got me a table.  There were quite a few new guys at the last one so hopefully we will see some new books that are being blown out at the end of the year.  I'm bringing my e-bay stock with a 25% discount across the board and a handful of long boxes full of high grade Bronze / Copper books.  Stop by and say hi!

Jeff Harper Productions (harpercomics.com)

Price?

On 11/28/2023 at 11:11 AM, mlovest said:

Quick check of eBay has a number of WoS sets that are near for sale around $300, as you noted.  However, they are not hand-picked, in Mylars and half-backs, and they are clearly not in NM condition.  All I saw wee piles of raw books claimed to be NM or "mostly" VF/NM condition.  And I am definitely not trying to get full ap price for these books.  CovrPrice appears to be well under guide price with it's 9.2 highest grade for raws.

CovrPrice lists my almost compete set at $789 for the 126-comic partial set.  No one on these boards would sell a truly NM set of 126 WoS comics in Mylites/half-backs for $150.  I get your point I am likely going to have to split my collection up, but I was hoping I could find someone who would want a large parts or the whole thing in the LA area.  What's the cost of the Mylars and half-backs alone for 126 comics?

Good points but selling here on the boards is probably your best bet since most buyers on E-Bay will not really care if the books at 9.0 / 9.2 or 9.4 / 9.6 when it comes to the prices they will pay.  There is so much drek in that set of WoS that most dealers wouldn't touch a set for probably more than $150 even if they were absolute perfect.  A high grade comic buyer on the boards could get closer to the full $300 - $400 value if they are 9.4 / 9.6 with mylites (if they need all 126 issues) but most e-bay buyers just are not that choosy and you have to account for the dealer typically wants to at least double the price they paid.  It usually comes down to how much work you want to put into it before you blow out the common sets (especially if you are selling the keys separately).

Here is a good exercise in terms of setting your expectation to a reasonable level.  You have a near complete set of Web of Spiderman which retail for about $300 for the set.  Look at what price the app puts on the set to see how inflated the app is compared to real world.  You will also have to take a big hair cut if you want to sell your collection to a dealer (especially the non key books).  So if the Web of Spiderman set is $300 in retail then you will probably get offers of $150 for that set if they are very nice high grade books.  If the app gave you a price of $1,000 for the set then you know you will have to divide the price by 6 (or about $7,000 for the collection) to come close to a realistic price.  Based on your list you posted I don't see $7,000 worth of books in that type of collection but you may be able to generate that kind of money if you do a lot of the leg work and sell directly to people.  Good luck with the sale and let us know how it goes since it's always eye opening when trying to sell books compared to buying them. 

Sad news   RIP Bird!

What constitutes a pickle lover??  Is there a scale we can use to weed out the pickle liker’s from the lovers?

On 11/23/2023 at 12:20 AM, Telegan said:

It's like in the stock market - people always say the drop is crazy, but what about the rise?  I think the rise to $72k was nuts and along with another $60k sale, an outlier of sorts.  Seems more like prices are coming back to reality.  The lowest price it's sold for (on GPA) this year is still higher than the highest price it sold for in 2020.

True, true.  We discussed this at lengths in 2020/2021 when prices were going crazy.  This thread is about the crash after the explosion.

On 11/22/2023 at 1:29 PM, mjoeyoung said:

Let's take a look at some Amazing Spider-Man #1s on eBay

6.0 CGC 2708346001 bought Sep 2022 for $19,800 on eBay for $25,450 - Last sale was $17.1K

4.0 CGC 1239218001 bought Jul 2019 for $12,500 on eBay for $25,999 (signed) - Last sale was $14.7K

3.0 CGC 1118139001 bought Sep 2021 for $17,500 on eBay for $26,750 (signed) - Last sale was ~$7k

5.0 CGC 3989961001 bought Jul 2023 for $12,200 on eBay for $26,999 - Last sale was $13.2K

5.0 CGC 3718226006 bought Nov 2020 for $6500 on eBay for $39,999 (unofficial Lee and Ditko sigs and RESTORED) - Last sales were $4700 and $7K with no sigs

All according to GPA. 3 others had no sales I could find.

 

E-Bay sellers are crazy is what you are telling me?  

But if you bought the ASM 1 CGC 4.0 way back in 2019 you basically break even if you sell it now once you take out fees.  

On 11/22/2023 at 1:35 PM, stormflora said:

I wouldn't doubt that there has been an increase in comic prices. COVID really hurt everyone's finances, and gave them a reality check in focusing on what is important in life rather than impulsive buying and overoptimistic investments and speculation. I wouldn't be surprised if luxuries purchased pre-COVID as collectables are now being sold to try to recoup and regain some cash.

However, naturally, people do not want to sell at a loss, so chances are, they're selling at at least break-even prices. And obviously, they're going to compare with other listings to have an idea for whether or not their items have appreciated in value before doing so.

I think the data reflects your intuition since the number of books sold would also be way up if people were successful in making a sale (especially if the number of books available is up 75%). The fact that the number of books sold is holding steady means some people are finding books at the price point they want to buy at but there is a large jump in the number of books which are a priced too high to make a sale (either new to the market or hold overs from 2020 - 2021).  The 1.5 million sold books probably are books that got a nice haircut in price and it will be interesting to see if people have to eventually drop their prices to push that sold number up or if people will just put their books back in the attic and wait things out (even if that takes a decade).  

On 11/22/2023 at 12:55 PM, mjoeyoung said:

Very interesting.  If you filter to Auctions, there are only about 300,000.  I wonder if that number has decreased substantially.  The pessimist in me thinks that there are a lot of people who bought at inflated prices that are trying to sell.  

My data set is very limited but where are all the sellers coming from?  If the same number of books sold then the extra 75% in E-Bay inventory would have to come from books that were bought at Cons or on other web sites.  My gut is telling me people are hurting for cash because of inflation and extra expenses (ie possibly gearing up for retirement) and they saw all the high prices and now are flooding the market with all the books that were in the attic or basement.

I'll check it again next August to see if the pattern holds up but it's just a pet project of mine to see how e-bay items fluctuate over time.

I think the Japanese dominance in terms of cars was because they were perceived as being more dependable and a better bang for your buck.  Anime can be seen as having the same benefits - low cost and great bang for your buck.  The US big 3 have not really put much of a dent into taking back the dominance of Honda and Toyota after quite a long time table so is Marvel / DC destined to follow the same path where they just can't compete (other than in certain niche markets).  I don't see a way for Marvel or DC to produce comics at the same price as anime and I just don't see a way for them to compete without paying artists nothing and using the poorest paper quality.

Is there any way for Marvel or DC to complete for younger readers with the current prices?  There sure seems to be demand when free comic day comes around but most don't come back.

On 11/20/2023 at 4:08 PM, Prince Namor said:

It's the Jimmy Olsen 'fish boy' story, perverted to the nth degree.

In the 60's, in order to sell more books - DC realized that when they had a storyline where something shocking happened to a character - it pumped up sales.

If on the cover, Jimmy Olsen had been turned into a 'Fish Boy', people wanted to know what happened. By the end of the issue, Jimmy was back to normal, and comic fans of the day could breathe a sigh of relief.

Then some genius figured out, they could make it a continued story and get sales up for maybe TWO issues.

See where this is going?

Fast forward to the 90's and 12 part Secret Wars and 17 part Maximum Carnage, etc.

Even now with 'Wolverine Dies' and 'Captain America becomes a Nazi spy!' and... someone's Gay! They run with it as long as they can.

It's all gimmicks.

Based on the current print runs it appears the gimmicks are not working   I always thought the age of multiple variant covers was the beginning of the end of printed comics since it was just one big gimmick to get extra sales on a lagging product. 

On 11/20/2023 at 4:13 PM, Prince Namor said:

I'm attacked pretty regular on my Lee-Kirby-Ditko threads, usually by the same people.

I put them on ignore and report any post that is directed at me as opposed to the topic.

It seems to have mostly went away because of this, with the exception of one specific troll - but I don't engage him at all. I just have him on ignore and report any post that is directed at me as opposed to the topic.

Sometimes moderation steps in and sometimes they don't.

I just do my thing.

 

This is directly the opposite of the way I used to handle it.

I am no wallflower when it comes to a verbal battle.

But it got me into nothing but trouble. I LEARNED.

Some people learn and some people don't.

But I feel no pity for wounds that are self inflicted. 

You seem to have laid out a pretty good route for avoiding pretty much every conflict on the boards.  Ignoring people should be pretty easy considering the filtering options we have and the fact that it's very, very easy to just pass on by if you don't like a post of a series of posts.  We all know Roy doesn't like to let slights go unanswered - especially if he is passionate about the topic. I hope he gets the ability to just ignore some people when they start picking at his every word.

On 11/20/2023 at 3:42 PM, jsilverjanet said:

I think there are several discussions going on being tied into one discussion

1 the decline of comics as a media form

2 the decline of marvel

1 - there are far more outlets as people have mentioned, i think video games is a great one. why spend $5 on a comic that i can read in 5 minutes etc, or play a video game for $60 that not only will last me forever (in a young persons version of time/space), but it's what all my friends are doing and i interact with while doing it etc

2 - the problem with Marvel is very complex. you have a set of characters with a backlog of history (over 60 years for Spiderman). Haven't all the spider-man stories been told already (over 5-6 titles throughout the years)? so what can i do with this character creatively that hasn't been done before

the people who were buying Spider-man in the 80's 90's 00's and even beyond, aren't buying the title anymore (unless you are completely the entire run) , what could they do to bring those readers back? anything? everyone claims better stories etc, but let's be honest we probably won't come back to buy it and if we do, how many issues will we stay on the run? are we going back to getting pull lists, or stopping at the comic shop on Wednesdays? how many of you are at your shop every wednesday?

go to a shop on Wednesday, look at the people who still have pull lists, look at those pull lists, that's an entire different group of buyers and I suspect not many on this CGC board

and this is with Spider-man, what chance does a b character have?

so Marvel needs to appeal to a new audience, an audience that has nothing to really do with the buyers from the previous decades etc

change the character too much, that group will be completely unhappy, but they weren't really buying your product so it doesn't matter

the smaller publishers like Image are successful because they can create a character and move on once their story is completed. Marvel is in a tough spot, they are damned if they do and damned if they don't.

so they made changes to some characters to appeal to a different group of buyers, because their old buyers stopped buying their merchandise

this lie that we tell ourselves that we would go back to buying modern comics, if A B C happened is a lie, we aren't going back, i certainly wouldn't be spending $5 on a new comic, even it was good. I got other responsibilities and choose to spend my money differently.

 

 

You still talk to that board member that opened a store several years ago (I think it was Jason)?  It didn't sound like it was working out pre-COVID so I hope he either turned it around of got out when the going was good.  

On 11/20/2023 at 4:01 PM, Prince Namor said:

When I want to read comics, something new, I usually pick up a Manga I've been considering. The stories are inspired, sometimes weird, and the stories come from an angle that sometimes surprises me. 

With mainstream Marvel and DC, it's just the same regurgitated ideas I've read for years. It's boring.

 

I've not read a new comic since around the time Saga came out so it's good to hear what books people are actually reading (even if they are not super hero books).  

On 11/20/2023 at 3:43 PM, jsilverjanet said:

b/w for one, probably being printed on the other side of the world another

Sounds like comics need to go back to fun stories on cheap paper (which are printed on the other side of the world) to get kids reading again.  The only way I'd buy new comics was if they had them for $2 a piece and they were in spinner racks at the super market.  Who am I kidding - even then I'd probably not bother if I missed a couple issues.

On 11/19/2023 at 5:13 PM, VintageComics said:

Thanks. This is why I chose not to have a debate. It always ends this way (Marvels movie thread for lots more).

-----------------------------

On a positive note, if you all want to know why these companies are NOT successful, how about studying a model that IS successful at selling comics and related products? 

Why is Anime so appealing?

Why is it outgrowing the entire industry?

And why is nobody asking these questions and instead discussing numbering and other non-factors?

Why was the NYC Comic Con, arguably the largest show in the country AND THE FACE OF AMERICAN COMICS in the greatest economic city in the USA completely represented by Anime but underwhelmingly NOT supported by US publishers?

There's a message in there somewhere if you read between the lines. 

This was the MAIN ENTRANCE to the NY Comic Con. Anime took up the most important space in the room and about 1/4 -1/3 of the main showfloor. 

It's hard to describe how big and impressive these displays were unless you saw them in person.

This is what the public saw as they walked in the door. 

Based on these images I can see why young teens and kids like anime.  It looks designed for kids whereas modern comics seem designed for grown adult (mostly males).  But as Janet said - how can you change the look of comics without alienating all us older collectors which has been their bread and butter for decades.  They seem to have painted themselves into a corner.

On 11/20/2023 at 3:22 PM, Buzzetta said:

Again, this has been mentioned but it is an example of the problem.

The cost of this four issue mini series was $4 an issue.   Someone that read this went through the entire $16 series in twenty minutes. 

Twenty minutes.  

Let that sink in. 

That means that if we were to equate this to an hourly rate, he is being entertained at $48 per hour. 

Kids these days are better off buying the video game.  

 

If anime and manga are the wave of the future in terms of what teens are reading then is it just because of the price point?  Why is anime and manga so cheap if that is the case?

On 11/20/2023 at 3:20 PM, Prince Namor said:

Personal opinions CAN be wrong.

I can believe, with all my heart, that the head of CGC is an alien from the planet Vulcan. I would be wrong.

No one who ever says that is 'done' with the discussion.

On a public discussion forum - if you make a statement - someone is going to possibly reply. It's inevitable. 

If you manipulate statements - and make statements that go against what you previously said - and can't back up what you say and it gets pointed out - that's not an attack on the PERSON - it's an attack on what they say.

If I go around saying that the head of CGC is an alien from the planet Vulcan, and I manipulate quotes to make it seem as if it's TRUE and someone shows where I manipulated the quote to prove me wrong...

How is that an attack on me?

It's NOT.

But pretending it is, is a manipulative, disingenuous defense. 

Opinions can definitely be wrong and I love a good debate where people express their opinions and try to sway the other person but when I devolves into just arguing and name calling then I usually just tune out the bickering and move on to less argumentative threads.  Roy is very polarizing so I do see why he can make it easy to "fight" with him but just realize it gets very tiring to read the arguing when it goes too far. 

Roy hates to not get in the last word in a discussion and genuinely like him when I see him in person so I thought it was worth a nudge to not have him get into trouble again.  In terms of you - I really don't see your post very often so I don't have an opinion about your posts but hopefully we can get into some good, productive debates in the future.

On 11/20/2023 at 3:02 PM, Prince Namor said:

It's not an attack. I used his own words to show exactly what he said.

Roy has a habit of going back and editing his posts to cover things up, hoping it'll confuse moderation or whoever is trying to follow what he's saying. That's why people have learned to quote him.

The bottom line is - he DID say that Marvel is being influenced by outside FINANCIAL forces to make these changes. That it DOES extend to comics. I SHOWED were he alluded to it and how in his OWN words.

He previously DENIED it ("I said no such thing."), tried to take on the role of Victim again (comparing being held accountable for what he writes as "cancel culture") and then when SHOWN he DID actually say it, pretended it was never in question and deflected to "I'm not here to discuss people. I'm here to discuss ideas."

The discussion isn't about HIM, it's about what he WRITES. But when he can't back it up, he goes on the defensive and tries to play martyr. 

When he gets caught in a discussion he can't actually prove with anything other than his usual shell game, he becomes a VICTIM and blames everyone else. I've taken my share of abuse on this forum for my beliefs, but I don't parade around and show it off like a badge of honor. My actually BELIEFS are what I stand by and go back to. Not some strange masochistic drama dance I can do to drum up sympathy and make it all about myself. 

And I sure as hell don't edit other people's quotes to make it fit my narrative. 

I really have no idea about your back and forth with Roy but I can say that it appeared you were picking at what he saying and twisting some of the stuff he wrote to prove him wrong which is really tough when most of what Roy writes is his own personal opinions which can't really be wrong.  I don't agree with what Roy believes quite a few times but I don't feel the need to keep picking on the guy to try to get him angry.  He said he was done with the discussion so it really wouldn't have been hard to just let it drop (especially since you guys had both expressed your points).  In this one case I thought you were on the attack and appeared to be goading him into a fight (which never ends well for him) so I gave him a gentle reminder.  I have no interest in defending what Roy writes but I do defend his ability to voice his opinion without getting attacked at every turn.

On 11/20/2023 at 9:54 AM, VintageComics said:

I'm not here to discuss people. I'm here to discuss ideas.

Why moderation continues to allow attacks on PEOPLE I don't understand.

People can read the entire locked thread themselves. In fact I think everyone should read it and form their own ideas rather than just read soundbites from the discussion. It's one of the greatest discussions we've had in a long time with lots of nuance and facts that are relevant to this thread and I think they'd learn a lot. Thanks for bringing it up! 

I fully stand by the points I make. 

Carry on. 

Part of saying you will not debate someone is to just not respond when they type things about you.  Even if it's an attack or false - just don't respond since you have made your points enough time that it's not like people are confused by your stance on the stuff he is "attacking" you on.  Report him if you think it's way over the top but just stay strong since he is obviously trying to pull you into a debate that wlll probably get you a strike.