Torpedo comics link sale

[mschmidt]

That's pretty much exactly how the comic book market for current books doesn't work.

 

If you pre-order your books a couple of months in advance, services such as DCBS will give you up to 40% off the cover price of the new books, but there is not a comic book store on the planet that will take all recently-released books and dump them in the $1 box. Why? Because it would make zero financial sense to do so.

most of my LCSes do exactly that. once something is like 2-3 months old and hasn't sold off the rack it goes in the dollar box. they generally don't try to repackage it with a bag and a board and try to sell it for $3. few of them have the floor space to do this. sure, some titles like walking dead stay up there longer because people are more prone to buy an issue from 6 months ago for cover.

The LCS pays around 40% of cover for most of these books (which, on a $2.99 book is, in the $1.25 area), so putting them into the $1 box where you're guaranteed to take a loss on the book after a couple of months is downright stupid. I'm not saying some books won't eventually end up there - if the store isn't large enough to support a section for back issues, they often have no choice but to try to blow them out after a decent amount of time has passed - but when that time rolls around, the number of books remaining is tiny compared to the amount of books that were on the racks when they were first released.

 

What ends up in those bins will be a smattering of random, unsold issues from random series - which is really no different than the $1 boxes at shows.

 

 

At shows, you might get lucky and find some of the new books you're looking for in the $1 bins, but trying to put together full runs of recent books from those discount boxes is near impossible - after you've easily found 7 random issues of the 10-issue run you're hunting for, you then have the option of spending another year trying to find the last 3 issues or buying them online (where the shipping costs pretty much negate your savings so far).

 

Yes, this can be true, but between my local shops and shows (and here) I can pretty much put the whole set together for $1 each 99% of them time unless there's some "hot" book in the run. But yes, it can be a PITA.

No disrespect intended, but that just ain't true. Some sets, sure - "99%" of the sets, not a chance.

[dupont2005]

basically, it's unhealthy for the hobby when the comics inside the box are worth less than the box (nevermind the cost of bags and boards). "lowest possible price" isn't always a good thing. honestly, it amazes me that half the new comics printed are even coming out with these anemic print-runs. if not for potential movies/TV deals, it would seem like many of these titles are a hobby for publishers. how can a book with a 10K print-run possibly turn a profit unless everyone on it is getting paid slave wages or just mailing it in work-wise?

Anyone with copper age books @ 2 cents each should pm me with their list asap

[shadroch]

That's pretty much exactly how the comic book market for current books doesn't work.

 

If you pre-order your books a couple of months in advance, services such as DCBS will give you up to 40% off the cover price of the new books, but there is not a comic book store on the planet that will take all recently-released books and dump them in the $1 box. Why? Because it would make zero financial sense to do so.

most of my LCSes do exactly that. once something is like 2-3 months old and hasn't sold off the rack it goes in the dollar box. they generally don't try to repackage it with a bag and a board and try to sell it for $3. few of them have the floor space to do this. sure, some titles like walking dead stay up there longer because people are more prone to buy an issue from 6 months ago for cover.

The LCS pays around 40% of cover for most of these books (which, on a $2.99 book is, in the $1.25 area), so putting them into the $1 box where you're guaranteed to take a loss on the book after a couple of months is downright stupid. I'm not saying some books won't eventually end up there - if the store isn't large enough to support a section for back issues, they often have no choice but to try to blow them out after a decent amount of time has passed - but when that time rolls around, the number of books remaining is tiny compared to the amount of books that were on the racks when they were first released.

 

What ends up in those bins will be a smattering of random, unsold issues from random series - which is really no different than the $1 boxes at shows.

 

 

At shows, you might get lucky and find some of the new books you're looking for in the $1 bins, but trying to put together full runs of recent books from those discount boxes is near impossible - after you've easily found 7 random issues of the 10-issue run you're hunting for, you then have the option of spending another year trying to find the last 3 issues or buying them online (where the shipping costs pretty much negate your savings so far).

 

Yes, this can be true, but between my local shops and shows (and here) I can pretty much put the whole set together for $1 each 99% of them time unless there's some "hot" book in the run. But yes, it can be a PITA.

No disrespect intended, but that just ain't true. Some sets, sure - "99%" of the sets, not a chance.

 

 

That might depend where you live. In NYC, I'm sure it's quite possible.

I believe you have your discounts reversed, as well. Shops get around 40% off cover, they don't pay 40% of cover.

[mschmidt]

That's pretty much exactly how the comic book market for current books doesn't work.

 

If you pre-order your books a couple of months in advance, services such as DCBS will give you up to 40% off the cover price of the new books, but there is not a comic book store on the planet that will take all recently-released books and dump them in the $1 box. Why? Because it would make zero financial sense to do so.

most of my LCSes do exactly that. once something is like 2-3 months old and hasn't sold off the rack it goes in the dollar box. they generally don't try to repackage it with a bag and a board and try to sell it for $3. few of them have the floor space to do this. sure, some titles like walking dead stay up there longer because people are more prone to buy an issue from 6 months ago for cover.

The LCS pays around 40% of cover for most of these books (which, on a $2.99 book is, in the $1.25 area), so putting them into the $1 box where you're guaranteed to take a loss on the book after a couple of months is downright stupid. I'm not saying some books won't eventually end up there - if the store isn't large enough to support a section for back issues, they often have no choice but to try to blow them out after a decent amount of time has passed - but when that time rolls around, the number of books remaining is tiny compared to the amount of books that were on the racks when they were first released.

 

What ends up in those bins will be a smattering of random, unsold issues from random series - which is really no different than the $1 boxes at shows.

 

 

At shows, you might get lucky and find some of the new books you're looking for in the $1 bins, but trying to put together full runs of recent books from those discount boxes is near impossible - after you've easily found 7 random issues of the 10-issue run you're hunting for, you then have the option of spending another year trying to find the last 3 issues or buying them online (where the shipping costs pretty much negate your savings so far).

 

Yes, this can be true, but between my local shops and shows (and here) I can pretty much put the whole set together for $1 each 99% of them time unless there's some "hot" book in the run. But yes, it can be a PITA.

No disrespect intended, but that just ain't true. Some sets, sure - "99%" of the sets, not a chance.

 

 

That might depend where you live. In NYC, I'm sure it's quite possible.

I believe you have your discounts reversed, as well. Shops get around 40% off cover, they don't pay 40% of cover.

 

If that's the case, the store would loose even more money by throwing these books in the $1 bin :shrug:

 

My point still stands - it's a myth that you can just wait a couple of months and magically find every newly-released book in the $1 bin like ComicConnoisseur claimed. It doesn't matter where you're located, it doesn't matter how many stores are around you (and I'm in the Chicago surburbs with 30+ stores within a 60 mile radius), you're still not going to find them all within a reasonable timeframe & without spending an amount of time that's completely disproportionate to the actual value of these books.

 

The odds change if you expand the timeframe - let's say you're fine with getting books that are 12 months old - but if any of those books have become hot in the meantime, they will probably already have been picked out of the $1 boxes at that point. And that's only if your store actually puts new-ish books in their $1 bins - my LCS certainly doesn't, nor have I seen any larger stores in NYC or Chicago that do.

[shadroch]

When scavangering comics, you don't want to go to the larger, well run stores. You want to hit the smaller, under-funded stores, where the owner works 50 hours a week and your dollar bin purchase may well mean the difference between him eating a Buck Double or two or ordering Dominos.

[HouseofComics.Com]

Stores in the Bay Area are starting to put books in the 50-cent or dollar bins within 3 months of publication. I can see a slight benefit to it--the newer it is the likelier it A) might sell and B) might get the person to start picking up the new one on the shelf every month if they really like it after trying it.

 

There's nothing wrong with taking a loss on a book as long as you sold enough of the other copies in the first month it came out. If you order 50, sell 45, then sell 2-3 for a slight loss and end up having to eventually wholesale the other 2-3 at ten cents each, you're doing okay.

[dupont2005]

When scavangering comics, you don't want to go to the larger, well run stores. You want to hit the smaller, under-funded stores, where the owner works 50 hours a week and your dollar bin purchase may well mean the difference between him eating a Buck Double or two or ordering Dominos.

I know where there is a comic shop where pretty much everything is cover price. It will go in the back issue bin without a sticker and whatever the cover says is what you get rang up for. I imagine there is potential for finding good deals there but I haven't had the time. Anything really old is marked up. Early Groo comics are about $5 each. I did buy a handful of TMNT back issues during FCBD because they had a 50% off sale though

[batman_fan]

I think comics suffer a severe image issue. They just aren't cool. Now they haven't been in that cool category for a while but they certainly don't seem to be moving in that direction either. Even with the high profile prices for the two Action 1 and Detective 27. People that know I collect ask one question "do you have that one" I say no and the conversation shifts to another topic. I have not talked to a single person that is motivated to start collecting or "investing" based on any of these high profile prices.

 

Anyone watch the recent episode of Made on MTV? There is a big time dork trying to go on his first date and get his first kiss. He wants to be made into ladies man. The episode starts with him saying"it's Wendesday and that could mean only one thing, new comics would be out". They then proceed to show him looking through comics at a comic store. Stuff like this does not play into the "cool" category.

[the blob]

That's pretty much exactly how the comic book market for current books doesn't work.

 

If you pre-order your books a couple of months in advance, services such as DCBS will give you up to 40% off the cover price of the new books, but there is not a comic book store on the planet that will take all recently-released books and dump them in the $1 box. Why? Because it would make zero financial sense to do so.

most of my LCSes do exactly that. once something is like 2-3 months old and hasn't sold off the rack it goes in the dollar box. they generally don't try to repackage it with a bag and a board and try to sell it for $3. few of them have the floor space to do this. sure, some titles like walking dead stay up there longer because people are more prone to buy an issue from 6 months ago for cover.

The LCS pays around 40% of cover for most of these books (which, on a $2.99 book is, in the $1.25 area), so putting them into the $1 box where you're guaranteed to take a loss on the book after a couple of months is downright stupid. I'm not saying some books won't eventually end up there - if the store isn't large enough to support a section for back issues, they often have no choice but to try to blow them out after a decent amount of time has passed - but when that time rolls around, the number of books remaining is tiny compared to the amount of books that were on the racks when they were first released.

 

What ends up in those bins will be a smattering of random, unsold issues from random series - which is really no different than the $1 boxes at shows.

 

 

At shows, you might get lucky and find some of the new books you're looking for in the $1 bins, but trying to put together full runs of recent books from those discount boxes is near impossible - after you've easily found 7 random issues of the 10-issue run you're hunting for, you then have the option of spending another year trying to find the last 3 issues or buying them online (where the shipping costs pretty much negate your savings so far).

 

Yes, this can be true, but between my local shops and shows (and here) I can pretty much put the whole set together for $1 each 99% of them time unless there's some "hot" book in the run. But yes, it can be a PITA.

No disrespect intended, but that just ain't true. Some sets, sure - "99%" of the sets, not a chance.

 

 

That might depend where you live. In NYC, I'm sure it's quite possible.

I believe you have your discounts reversed, as well. Shops get around 40% off cover, they don't pay 40% of cover.

 

If that's the case, the store would loose even more money by throwing these books in the $1 bin :shrug:

 

My point still stands - it's a myth that you can just wait a couple of months and magically find every newly-released book in the $1 bin like ComicConnoisseur claimed. It doesn't matter where you're located, it doesn't matter how many stores are around you (and I'm in the Chicago surburbs with 30+ stores within a 60 mile radius), you're still not going to find them all within a reasonable timeframe & without spending an amount of time that's completely disproportionate to the actual value of these books.

 

The odds change if you expand the timeframe - let's say you're fine with getting books that are 12 months old - but if any of those books have become hot in the meantime, they will probably already have been picked out of the $1 boxes at that point. And that's only if your store actually puts new-ish books in their $1 bins - my LCS certainly doesn't, nor have I seen any larger stores in NYC or Chicago that do.

 

And they would be losing even more money on these books bagging and boarding them and pricing them at $3 and having them never sell! They'd rather get 25-75% of their money back than nothing, particularly if we're only talking about 5-15% of the total # of copies of the book they ordered (or less). They've still made a profit overall that month on their new issue sales.

 

Believe me, nearly every unsold mainstream Marvel/DC title my LCSes order, unless it gets "hot" (which usually means it sold out, which doesn't happen often), winds up in the $1 box (or half price at some shops ... but 50 cent box at some other shops!). The other companies are a little dicier as there seems to sometimes be less overordering going on with them. Sometimes I get my copies before they have been bent up and they're pretty darn NM. Sometimes I have to settle for a ding or two. Remember, for Marvel/DC (and some others) they're getting variants too with larger orders, so there's a financial incentive. This does not hold as well for some titles like WD, Invincible, Chew, Goon for which there seems to be willingness by folks to pay cover price for the back issues off the rack 9 months later, although I did get a year's worth of Invincible recently (all a bit dinged though). Sure, he's still holding out hope right now on extra copies of Haunt 1 and nemesis 1, shooting for cover price, but I expect to see at least the damaged copies in the $1 box any day now.

 

OK, maybe 99% is an exagerration, but I do not go to shows rumaging through $1 boxes to fill in my modern runs, so I don't know what I might pick up there to complement what I pick up at my shops (and there are 4 or 5 I hit in NYC). I do keep pretty current on my Spiderman, Hulk, Iron Man, X-Men, Avengers, Wolverine, some Bat titles and so on via dollar box hunting at the shops I hit. I just don't have the time or carrying capacity to do that at shows (and don't even know what I'm missing anyway!) and tend to focus on vintage stuff, almost totally ignoring moderns in the discount boxes. It sure does seem like there's a TON of overstock at shows too being sold at a loss.

 

honestly, if it weren't for the fact that I try to be picky about condition even out of the $1 box I'd probably be picking up 50-60 titles a month out of there. i really only buy a sub-9.2/9.4 copy if I REALLY want to read it (eventually) and that's all there is, like if folks here have given it good buzz. so i have some slightly dinged copies of shuddertown, locke & key, DMZ, proof and a few others I want to get around to reading one of these days.

 

[Snake Eyes]

Interesting differences in how shops manage their inventory. To add to the data pool mine goes this route...

 

For the first month after release in the overstock box at regular price...

 

After about a month it finds its way to the half-off section...

 

Another month in there and it is off to the dollar boxes...

 

As the dollar boxes fill the older ones (generally about six months old) go to the quarter boxes.

 

Generally, the books stay in pretty good shape throughout this process...no 9.8 candidates, but 80% plus remain VF/NM or better. By the time they are in the quarter bin, it is difficult to pick up any meaningful runs on popular series or short printed stuff. However, I have found it is ideal to get intact runs of major event stories (i.e. I snagged complete runs of 52, Countdown, Secret Invasion, etc. this way...and by complete I mean all the issues plus several ancilliary one-shots or cross-overs to other books). It has actually broadened my reading quite a bit. The only problem is you have to be OK with being behind the times (for instance it looks like the Dark Reign stuff is about to hit the quarter bins).

 

SE