Foolkiller's Wizard NY Comic Con Report

[Foolkiller]

Let me apologize in advance for the lack of pictures. Normally, I don't care that I missed out on taking pictures, but there were some really interesting things to take pics of (shatner, the batmobile, the delorean from back to the future etc).

 

As I mentioned, this con was just straight out weird. It wasn't all bad weird, it was a mix.

 

First of all, as others stated, the convention had a huge amount of space to it, probably one of the largest square footage cons that I've seen in terms of layout. It was shaped like a T which was equally weird. On top of that, the heating was not uniform. Poor Joe Verenault had a 40 degree wind tunnel at his booth, and he bought a space heater -- it really didn't help all that much. Most of the other portions of the con were well heated and the temperature was normal. The show security did a poor job sweeping the floor when the con was over. So much of the con did not have any carpet so it was basically a very dingy sort of atmosphere.

 

Of course, some of the good things were that there were a lot of dealers. Now, most of the dealers were the usual suspects, and some of course were all the way in the back. I found that there were far more deals to be had in NY than were in Baltimore. The food there was, hands down, the best con food ever offered at a show on the floor. The quality was actually really, really good. CGC was great as always, though I wouldn't say it was really easy to find their booth. I didn't submit a ton on site, but what I did submit I was very happy with the results. My grades were: ASM 300 CGC 9.8 white, Avengers 16 CGC 8.5 ow/w, ASM 44 CGC 9.2 white, ASM 55 CGC 9.4 white, Nick Fury 7 CGC 9.2 cr/ow, Werewolf by Night 32 CGC 9.0 white, Batman 47 CGC 4.5 o/w, JIM 118 CGC 8.5 o/w, Avengers 11 CGC 8.5 ow/w, and one other that I can't remember at the moment.

 

I got one additional book, graded, a TOS 58 CGC 8.5 ow/w, the first book I picked up raw from Harley Yee...

 

More a bit later on the day by day report, my purchases and my general impressions.

 

I had a great buying show, and there were a lot of great deals in the room, but a lot of dealers who did not have great shows.

[MutantKeys]

"The food there was, hands down, the best con food ever offered at a show on the floor."

 

That's the first thing I noticed on friday !

 

Good seeing you again, BK

[arexcrooke]

Dont forget the shortest phone conversation in history

[arexcrooke]

"The food there was, hands down, the best con food ever offered at a show on the floor."

 

That's the first thing I noticed on friday !

 

Good seeing you again, BK

I guess they had chicken fingers and french fries

 

I miss you Elf

XOXO

Arex

[MutantKeys]

"The food there was, hands down, the best con food ever offered at a show on the floor."

 

That's the first thing I noticed on friday !

 

Good seeing you again, BK

I guess they had chicken fingers and french fries

 

I miss you Elf

XOXO

Arex

 

I miss you too

[Green]

"The food there was, hands down, the best con food ever offered at a show on the floor."

 

That's the first thing I noticed on friday !

 

Good seeing you again, BK

I guess they had chicken fingers and french fries

 

I miss you Elf

XOXO

Arex

 

I miss you too

[TSwift25]

My biggest complaint is how damn hard it was to get there. Honestly, it made me miss the national and its easy access. I'll go out of my way for the Javits and the NYCC, but I bought a 3 day pass and only ended up going on Friday. For whatever reason, this show left a very bad taste in my mouth.

[skypinkblu]

My biggest complaint is how damn hard it was to get there. Honestly, it made me miss the national and its easy access. I'll go out of my way for the Javits and the NYCC, but I bought a 3 day pass and only ended up going on Friday. For whatever reason, this show left a very bad taste in my mouth.

 

If you drove in, it was hands down the easiest place to get to ever:)

 

Nice seeing you again, Brian...

 

and Danny, too!

[Professor66]

I took a cab from Penn Station. $11 to the Con and $8 back to Penn! Guess thats cause I walked a bit first.

[Comcasthawk]

I had a great buying show, and there were a lot of great deals in the room, but a lot of dealers who did not have great shows.

 

I never do understand why dealers "hold" on to books for a long time. If the book, or books, are not moving, isn't it wise to lower the price and sell the book..?? This works in every form of business I know, so when i "hear" dealers had a "bad show", whose fault is it...?

[Old Fashion PB and J]

I had a great buying show, and there were a lot of great deals in the room, but a lot of dealers who did not have great shows.

 

I never do understand why dealers "hold" on to books for a long time. If the book, or books, are not moving, isn't it wise to lower the price and sell the book..?? This works in every form of business I know, so when i "hear" dealers had a "bad show", whose fault is it...?

Alot of dealers had way out of whack pricing. But I also have a fairly small focus. I all in all bought 2 books another FF112, and another Bats 227.. Hordes are the new in thing..

[Speedy-D]

Yeah, all the dealers I talked to seemed to have had a pretty rough show.

 

Here're some pics of the Batmobile. It was tough to find a good angle.

[CheezyWhiz]

I had a great buying show, and there were a lot of great deals in the room, but a lot of dealers who did not have great shows.

 

I never do understand why dealers "hold" on to books for a long time. If the book, or books, are not moving, isn't it wise to lower the price and sell the book..?? This works in every form of business I know, so when i "hear" dealers had a "bad show", whose fault is it...?

 

This confuses me too. Without naming names.. There are always a few dealers that habitually price everything way above fair market value. I wonder how they are possibly breaking even. I think these guys live off of their key book sales. Who cares if no one buys the drek.. as long as they can move a few GA/SA keys, they generate some money.

 

It was a great show for cheap readers. I was trying to hunt down a few usually hard to find fills and found every single one in a $1 or $2 box. I saw a few $1 book dealers that looked pretty depressed by the end of the day on Saturday.. I wonder if there were just too many of them for one show.

[Agent 007]

I was there Friday for the show and arrived at 5pm or so. It was dead. It was nice to walk around my daughter and wife and not be slammed around like the S.D.C.C.

NY did not advertise the show well and it was hard to find. To get the tickets at Pier 92 then walk to the show at Pier 94 sucked. Some nice stuff in there though. All the Celebs were in arms length, that was cool.

I met Joe Simon there as well Friday. That was a great honor for myself since I collect Captain America books. Took a picture with my daughter and I with him for free. We were the last person to meet him. He turned 96 on 10/15/09. 10/16 he was at a booth, he has great energy.

I didn't buy any books, all the dealers had a few items I wanted but didn't budge on prices so I walked. To bad, had cash in hand. I think pride in not selling books for 10% off the price they wanted. Do they want to make $$ or collect dust? I have an eye on some expensive books as well over $1k. Saved some $$ on the trip.

I was dissappointed in all the RAW books I saw and not that many CGC.

I like the SF Con and S.D.C.C. better overall. Guess next year they will have a 4 day event. I am not sure if that will work. I did not see the thousands of people I am use to at a Con. That was good though.

NIck

[Point Five]

This works in every form of business I know, so when i "hear" dealers had a "bad show", whose fault is it...?

The show organizers, who charged $30 admission for a show in a gloomy, shabby aircraft hangar teetering on the edge of the Hudson River. (thumbs u

 

I actually had a great time, thanks to Sharon's kindness in procuring a pass and to the wide selection of dealers, and it was neat to at least fleetingly meet so many forum members (hi Brian!). But man, I felt sorry for the dealers at this show. They work hard and deserved better.

[Foolkiller]

It was great seeing all the boardies, thanks again to Danny for the assist on getting the books graded and I should give a shout out to Gemma who always helps me out as well.

 

Great seeing Danny, Pat, Sharon, Bill (tuppeny), Jim (watson), Andrew (GA Collectibles), Borock, billy the kid (briefly), Ed (fatpinko), pointfive (great finally meeting you!), and all the other boardies I run into and forget their exact name or handle.

 

Friday:

 

I was originally going to take the train up on Friday and then come down to the con from there, going back Saturday late evening. Unfortunately, my wife had a little fender bender on the drive up to NYC in the morning, so I had to make some adjustments. I was in the middle of picking a jury and have been busy with trial prep all week while I have basically relocated myself to Philadelphia for probably the next 4 weeks or so. We finished up at 3 PM and I went and picked my wife up. We decided just to get a hotel since my son was a bit fussy and we didn't want any of our friends we could crash with to suffer. Traffic was somewhat predictably bad and it took about an hour to get through the tunnel into the city. I was able to make it to the show at 6:45 pm with about an hour or so left. I picked up my badge and ran into Mr. Woogieman there picking his up as well. Badge pickup was in the building next door, Pier 92. Getting to the location was a significant pain, and I was really very unhappy with how disorganized Wizard was in even finding badges and pick up of them. Typically, Wizard staff really isn't all that helpful.

 

I got into the show and was immediately struck by a) how there was basically no one there and b) how friggin' big the place was.

 

I saw all the usual suspects, ran into Paul Meroli, Roy Delic, Bob Storms, Ted VanLiew, Dale Roberts, Watson, Tuppeny, Dave Reynolds, Terry O'Neill, Harley Yee, Vincent Zurzolo, Matt Nelson, Steve Ritter etc. I tried to get around as quickly as possible to see who had what. My initial impression was that there was a lot of significantly over priced stuff there with people who couldn't grade or price or a combination of both. Very disappointing initial gut impression.

 

Bob had some nice books and he and Ted both had feedback that they had successful Fridays. For almost everyone else, there were not a lot of good reports about Friday. Most of the dollar book guys were already down on the show for not having enough foot traffic. I just didn't see a lot of other stuff in the room and ended up heading back to my room at the Residence Inn so my wife could go out and I could watch my son. Split a cab with Mr. Woogie and Dave Reynolds in the rainy, dreary weather.

 

I had a modest dinner back in the room while my wife went out, turned on the Yankee game and fell asleep.

 

Saturday:

 

I had been running on very little sleep all week, and Saturday AM I got a little more than I had lately so I felt pretty good. I got to the show around 9 AM, and saw that there was a line outside (the rain held off for a day). I wandered through the autograph area and saw a few cool things like the 60s batmobile and the delorean from Back to the Future, both of which were pretty cool. As I scouted the room, I saw a number of dealers who basically were the same ones from Baltimore with most of the same inventory.

 

I decided to immediately hit Harley's booth since I had not had the opportunity to see his "A" stock the week before. I bought a TOS 58 that I thought would be a raw 9.0 but unfortunately turned out to be a CGC 8.5 ow/w -- win some lose some.

 

I have to say that after I made that purchase for my personal collection, I was extremely uninspired to look for books. I wandered around in a daze for most of the convention. It was a little sad because i kept thinking about how this was the last show, and this show had sort of a lame feel to it. I wandered by one of the food set ups -- there was also a lounge area right by where CGC's slabbing and on site grading was walled off. I ran into Mark Haspel, complained a little about consistency, but ultimately decided to see what happened with my latest batch, and I was very happy. All of the books except one graded at or above what I had graded them, so I was pleased.

 

I ended up getting some food -- the pasta was actually decent quality and the burgers and dogs looked really good. Fast service and the prices were actually reasonable.

 

After lunch, as I started talking to more and more dealers it was one comment after another -- this show is really rough, this show doesn't have any customers, do you want a really good deal etc.

 

I thought, well, maybe I have to spend some coin since apparently you can get some deals at this show.

 

So I did.

 

My first stop was Terry O'Neill and Dave Reynolds. These guys are terrific to deal with and I came up with a beautiful stack of books. Since I'm on the road, I don't have my scanner but... here's a list of what I scored. I was able to negotiate a very nice percentage off on some books (20-25%) and as much as 55% off on others. They were all very strictly graded, and these are my grades on the books:

 

FF 13 7.0

FF 50 7.5

ASM Ann 3 (Valpo) 9.0

Avengers 58 9.4

All Star Western 11 9.2/9.4

X-Men 9 9.0

GL 81 9.2/9.4

DD 24 9.4

ASM 49 9.2

ASM 48 9.2

 

I was very happy and probably could have easily just spent all my time and money with these guys, but decided to sort of spread it out just a little bit.

 

I next went next door to Dale Roberts booth and looked through his very nice selection of books... and picked up a sweet 9.0 copy of JIM 92. Gorgeous rich colors on this puppy.

 

I wandered around for a bit and found a terrific dealer named Dean who had some really, really nice books. I stopped by, poked around, and purchased a Cap 117 that's an easy 9.0 for a very nice price. Dean and his helper were super nice and just a pleasure to deal with, so I thought what the heck, I'll see what else I can snag from them.

 

I hadn't even looked at a lot of his wall or 50% off boxes, and much to my surprise there were some total gems.

 

First of all, he had a super nice high grade (like 8.5s and 9.0s) run of Batmans. If they had flaws, they were very, very minor, and even if I passed on them, again, there were just so many it was only because I wanted to get as much as I reasonably could.

 

Picked up the following from Dean...

 

Batman 163 (joker jury) 9.0

GL 29 solid 6.5

Batman 171 8.0/8.5, presents like a 9.0 with just a tiny hint of foxing on the back cover

Action Comics 316 9.0

Action Comics 340 9.2

 

From his 50% off boxes:

 

Hulk 116 9.4

Tomahawk 123 6.5

Tomahawk 124 6.5

Phantom Stranger 17 9.4

DD 85 9.4

 

Dean was very willing to deal and gave me a sweet discount. I would deal with Dean again in a heartbeat and thought he was just one of the more genuine new dealers I've met. Really happy I met and ran into him.

 

I wandered by Joe Verenault's booth who I was talking all day about the freezing cold. Joe was bundled in a jacket and had to endure an arctic blast. Be amazed if Joe isn't sick after that.

 

At any rate, I was able to pick up a two nice books, a Strange Tales 145 9.2 and Strange Tales 134 9.0.

 

I kept running into Borock all day and he invited Dave Miller and I out to dinner with his group at Brazilian bbq.

 

I was done buying for the day and decided to pack it in.

 

Went to dinner, had a blast, really enjoyed just hanging with Borock, Gus (from silverage), Roy and Louise, Ron Murray, Bob Storms, the guy who owns Best Comics and his wife and some others. Really a great time.

 

Unfortunately, me evening ended with lead counsel on my trial team emailing me at 10:45 pm that he needed something from me, so I went back to my hotel at 11:30 pm and worked for 3 hours to get some work done. Finally fell asleep at 3 AM.

 

Sunday:

 

This is short -- I woke up at 7:30 AM, wondering why I was dragging myself to a show. I needed to finish a deal and pick up a few books...

 

I traded 8 of the 10 slabs I got back from CGC for a stunning, and I mean stunning, ASM 10 9.2 -- the book has a legit shot at 9.4 if pressed. I mean just super. Did the trade with Ted VanLiew for my 8 books and got the ASM 10 9.2 + cash. Very happy. Also got a JIM 109 8.5 as a book in exchange for a return.

 

I checked out some other stuff, but after that big deal went down, I just decided to go. I ran around saying goodbye to everyone and promptly forgot that I bought 5 trades from t.v. comics. Oh well... they got paid, and one day I'll pick them up from him!

 

I had a great buying show, and even with what I spent, I could have spent even more. There were so many guys willing to wheel and deal at this show and I had no problem negotiating with any dealer. All wanted to cut me some super deals on some really, really nice quality material.

 

I drove back to Philly -- and enjoyed the rest of the day watching a little football, doing some more work and hanging with my son. And I'm looking forward to the local cons and hanging with my Philly buds!

[JvR11]

The show was great for me. I grabbed some nice books like a really nice Seven Seas 4 that I've been looking for a nice copy for about a year. I was surprised it was still there on a Sunday.

 

I do think they should have charged less for admission...but hey there also wasn't a line to get in! I think it was a really nice show for buyers.

 

I didn't think the layout was that bad. I think the main reason it wasn't busy is because of marketing and there weren't a lot of big corporate booths like what you see at NYCC or a lot of really big name celebrities. Although, it did seem to be getting busy in the mid-afternoon. I thought it was great for GA comics and not feeling overpowered by the crowds.

[CheezyWhiz]

This works in every form of business I know, so when i "hear" dealers had a "bad show", whose fault is it...?

The show organizers, who charged $30 admission for a show in a gloomy, shabby aircraft hangar teetering on the edge of the Hudson River.

 

It's the same venue that they use for the annual Armory Art Show. Millions and millions of dollars of modern art. I've been to that show a few times and I've never felt that the space was gloomy or shabby. That's probably got a lot to do with the frigid, windy, wet weather we had this weekend.. and that the art dealers usually have better spaces (rooms with walls) and lighting.

[kc120us]

Great report, Brian!!

[capt_comics]

Must be Dean from the Bargain Box

 

Always has fantastic books at great prices