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That CMA is GORGEOUS regardless!!

Ditto, which caused me to withdraw from my dealings with MCS. Without getting into a political debate, and keeping the answer as "yes" or "no" or as simple as possible, does anybody know if Conan shares Buddy's leanings? I would feel better about resuming business with them if he does not - or at least, does to a much lesser degree.

Yikes. Makes me afraid to send mine in.

Wow, some HUGE (e.g. 30%) drops here...! yikes

Well, I've been collecting for over 40 years, and by collecting, I mean COLLECTING since then. I've rarely gotten rid of a book, and still have the books I bought when I was 5 years old. I've just been adding, and adding, and adding....

I got bought some Marty Nodell sketch Zero Hour comics directly from his table as well! I was shocked that I was the only one at his table at the time. Same with, I think, Joe Staton. Everybody was lined up for John Cassiday or something.

Welcome to my life. I've gotten behind in my filing (and cataloging to a lesser extent). I have about 5 longboxes worth that need incorporating into my ~35,000 book collection

All I can say is hang in there. I just had a submission shipped that had been in the final stage for 3 weeks. When the fourth week started, it got shipped. It's now been sitting in the Sarasota, FL post office for over a week. Grr.

Ditto. I'm not saying that the consumer should find them acceptable, but agreeing that QC does.

I think the OP said/meant Fed-Ex, not EX as in Express.

If you want to insure for fair market value, you can post the book in the grading request forum topic and field responses, then see what Hulk 181 in that grade has been selling for using eBay's sold listings, GoCollect, or other FMV resources.

CGC Services & Fees | CGC (cgccomics.com) Now opening comic book submissions delivered the week of June 28, 2021.

There really needs to be a FAQ that includes this question and the polybag question, each of which I see posts about multiple times per week.

It seems pretty basic to me - "If this were flattened, what would it look like?" In other words, pressing is most effective on rippling, bends, curls, etc. It's "cleaning" that gets sketchier for me. Like, in a "clean and press," what are the limits of a clean? Getting rid of pencil? Pen? Grime? Light soiling? Food? Clearly not water staining. Do the insides get done? Is it "spot-clean," or does the whole thing get done, sometimes (key word: "sometimes") resulting in colors looking better, and whites whiter?

Yeah, tape pull and color breaks aren't fixed by pressing. I still don't understand why some people think pressing is a magic process that can reverse color loss.

I have my slabs in a special "graded comic" sized box and would be fine with that if it wasn't for all the posts warning of the possible danger of doing so. I know in reality the threat of damage is probably really low, but all I can hear in my head is: "YOU FOOL! YOU'RE RUINING YOUR BOOKS!"

YUP

I totally hear what you're saying here. I also like the continuity. What I do is keep the slabs separate, but in with the raws, where the slabbed book would be, I have a bagged board that has the issue written in sharpie on it with the CGC grade. This way I know there isn't a "hole" in my collection and know where to find it. I should say I have thousands of books with many long runs, some mid-completion. Only in the past year or so have I been pulling books to be graded by CGC.

Well, mine all wiggle a little. I'm sure if I gave the slab a few taps could get the books perfectly centered

Or worse - Columbia House.

Jelly-of-the-month club

I'm no pro, and don't have the book in front of me, but as Lightning said, this looks like blatant amateur color touch with a marker to mask cover color breaks.

I would absolutely not get this graded unless you wanted it for display purposes. It's a very common issue, and those color-breaking spine creases make it really not worth it at all. The cost of grading would be more than the book is even worth. Like I said, though, if you wanted to get it slabbed because you like the look of a slab and want to display it, then by all means have at it.

I see what you did there

I would be especially concerned about the apparently brittle edges!