Larryw7 Posted November 27, 2004 Share Posted November 27, 2004 I try to buy nothing under VG these days. VG- or Good+ if it's a scarce book, but I'm tired of books with chips falling off, detached centerfolds, brittleness, etc. Those are tough to read. Yeah, some "Good"'s fall apart when you touch them. Every time you take one out of the Mylar another tiny piece falls off. I don't mind an accurate "Good"(a well worn but well put together book), but some of what is considered "Good" these days would have barely made Fair in the seventies and eighties. I had copies of BATMAN #5 and quite a few EC's graded Fair that are better than many so-called "Good" books I see today. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
*paull* Posted November 27, 2004 Author Share Posted November 27, 2004 Good point... a lot of the "Good" books that I see out there are inaccurately graded "Fair"s. I'm amazed at the prices that I see on fair/good pre-code horror and L.B. cole covered books at shows.... they are severely overpriced, perhaps by 2x or 3x. At a show, it may be priced $70, but on eBay, it would probably fetch $20-$25. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Larryw7 Posted November 27, 2004 Share Posted November 27, 2004 . At a show, it may be priced $70, but on eBay, it would probably fetch $20-$25. I haven't been to a show in awhile, but the material at the last one I went to was so overpriced that I wondered if the dealers were clueless or not. I mean, 150 bucks for a very low grade VAULT OF HORROR from the middle of the run? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
precodekeith Posted November 27, 2004 Share Posted November 27, 2004 Doiby - I second that opinion! Show dealers really need to get a clue! In fact, most of the LCS owners around here need to do the same as well. I pretty much gave up on cons for several years because of the overpriced mid and low grade books, now I go to one very now and then just to roll the dice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
*paull* Posted November 27, 2004 Author Share Posted November 27, 2004 Low-grade ECs have been some of the most overpriced books for many years now. Recently, I looked at the prices I spent on low-grade copies of Impact #1 and Shock Suspensestories #18 ten years ago, and I don't know if I would even pay those prices now. The best bet for low-grade, non-key, pre-code horror is buying online. Shows are robbery... they should be selling it for half the prices they are asking, and I bet there would be resistance then, also. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rjpb Posted November 27, 2004 Share Posted November 27, 2004 I haven't been to a comic-con since the late 90s. Ebay pretty much sucks up my vintage comic budget. However, I keep thinking I'd like to check one out again, but I've heard the monthly LA con is mostly toys and porn these days, and the reason I stopped years ago going was the lack selection of GA & pre-code material ( I would often end up buying stuff I was only marginally interested in, in order to justify the time spent there). Back in the 90s, while there were always a few dealers with books both overgraded and overpriced, many dealers were flexible and willing to work out a deal on low-mid grade books, even when they were reasonably priced to begin with ( It seemed pretty easy to get at least 20% knocked off the asking price on most books, and towards the end of the day as much as 50%). I'm surprised with all the competition from Ebay and other on-line sources, that there are apparently many dealers out there with unrealistic expectations of what their inventory is worth. Who are they selling to? Is there really that large a collector base interested in low-mid grade books, who don't use Ebay and are therefore unaware of the FMV of these books? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
precodekeith Posted November 27, 2004 Share Posted November 27, 2004 I'm surprised with all the competition from Ebay and other on-line sources, that there are apparently many dealers out there with unrealistic expectations of what their inventory is worth. Who are they selling to? Is there really that large a collector base interested in low-mid grade books, who don't use Ebay and are therefore unaware of the FMV of these books? I don't think these guys are moving their mid-low stocks in comparison to eBay, personally. Many if not most of these people have unrealistic prices and expectations on this material. There is a market for these books certainly, but as you mentioned it doesn't take a savvy buyer to know that better deals can be made online when compared to convention prices. Why don't these guys just adjust their prices lower? The stuff would move if they did. Being "dealers" they should be aware of their market, but they are not. Dealers are a weird bunch. I remember in the early 90's I would just walk right up to a dealer at a show and ask "Got any pre-code horror?" MOST didn't even know what that meant, haha! One dealer said, " Oh yeah! I've a whole long box of horror, but I don't bring it cuz it never sells!" Well, there I was asking for it, wasn't I? Eventually he did bring the box, and I was less than thrilled to see that books other dealers were moving at $15 -$25 at the time were tagged out at $45-$90!!! NO WONDER THEY NEVER SOLD! Now, I had brought big $$$ to that show in expectations of this box, but I wasn't about to be ripped off! I asked the guy if he would consider giving me a discount on the stuff (MOST dealers then would!), and even was prepared to BUY HIS WHOLE BOX if he made the price right. His response: "NAH! This stuff is hard to come by." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
*paull* Posted November 27, 2004 Author Share Posted November 27, 2004 That anecdote covers most of the lesser dealers that I see at shows. They have no knowledge of the pre-code horror market and price everything at guide or above. They have no clue that certain material is more sought after than others and that most of the pre-code horror material is hard to sell at even 50% of guide. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rjpb Posted November 27, 2004 Share Posted November 27, 2004 I always got the feeling more than a few small time dealers were hobbyists, who if they sold enough to pay for their table they were happy. They really weren't interested in liquidating their stock, because they weren't working too hard to replenish it. I think they liked to feel they were part of some larger dealer community, but lacked the skills to really make a business of it. That they would sell just enough books to warrant paying for a table convinced them that eventually there were buyers out there for all their overpriced stock. Another catagory of dealer is the guy who's bread and butter is selling silver, bronze and modern in bulk, and who has a few GA or pre-code books on the wall, or maybe HG or key SA books, and isn't really interested in cutting a deal on those books as they pull people to the table who might decide to look through the cheap stuff after checking out the wall books. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
*paull* Posted November 28, 2004 Author Share Posted November 28, 2004 Good point... I think a lot of these dealers keep a couple books of each time period and genre on their wall simply as an advertising device, even though the boxes on the floor don't represent what's on the wall. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
precodekeith Posted November 29, 2004 Share Posted November 29, 2004 I always got the feeling more than a few small time dealers were hobbyists, who if they sold enough to pay for their table they were happy. They really weren't interested in liquidating their stock, because they weren't working too hard to replenish it. I think they liked to feel they were part of some larger dealer community, but lacked the skills to really make a business of it. That they would sell just enough books to warrant paying for a table convinced them that eventually there were buyers out there for all their overpriced stock. From my experience, some of the small time dealers are the best folks to buy from! I'm not speaking of Joe Schmo who has a few VG books at a flea market all marked at NM price, but the "lil guys" at the comic-oriented events. Those guys are more apt to make trades and discounts because they ARE hobbyists. They may be willing to move book "X" if you are interested in it, to make money so that they can run over to another dealer table and snatch up something THEY were interested in. Certainly I agree though, that some of these dudes just don't "get it." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
precodekeith Posted November 29, 2004 Share Posted November 29, 2004 300th post!!! Here's my Mid-Ohio Con 2004 report: one day admission: $20 !!! OUCH! (at least I got to meet some cool people (artists, etc.), which is all that cons are coming to these days .... see following...) Pre-code horror selection: AWESOME!!! MULTIPLE LONG BOXES of the stuff!!! Prices: CRAZY!!! VG- F "commons" priced as high as $200 - $300 !!! HEY DEALERS: The "boom" went bust about 5 years ago! get off your LAZY behinds and change your price tags!!!! I went to the show packed to the gills with THOUSANDS of dollars to blow (the most I've taken to a show in a LONG time!). My girlfriend wanted to kill me! How much did I drop on pre-code? ZERO! I wasn't about to be RAPED by these people! My girlfriend actually spent $40 on two pre-codes for me, because the dealer was cool and had realistic prices on his books (he cut us $10 off sticker), and I think she felt bad for me. Instead, I only snatched up about $40 of HG BA horror. Yeah, I actually bought HG! They were priced RIGHT and they were NICE as a bonus! You know, had these dealers priced their pre-code right, it would have moved! I would have BOUGHT IT ALL (if I could)! But their unrealistic knowledge of their buyer-base put their prices out of reach. Instead, I'll just watch eBay, be patient, and get my books at FMV there. I guess these dealers just didn't want to change any books to cash, and they must really like hauling all those full boxes all over the country. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
*paull* Posted November 29, 2004 Author Share Posted November 29, 2004 Hey Keith, thanks for the report! See any pre-code rarities there? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
precodekeith Posted November 29, 2004 Share Posted November 29, 2004 There were some NICE books there! Fantastic Fears #5, Weird Mysteries #5, Beware #10, and the much maligned AIU #1 were all present, to name a select few. Decent looking books, I just wasn't in the mood to spend approx. $600 a pop! As far as "rare," I didn't see anything TOO obscure. There were some "common" horror books that I had NOT seen in 11 years of pre-code collecting, but that alone does not make them rare. Maybe I would have picked a few of them up if they weren't tagged out at $60 - $90 for G condition! SIDE NOTE: I had also developed a bad attitude, as one dealer with some pretty cool material couldn't even bother his LAZY @Zz to say "need help?" or "hi" as my cousin, his girlfriend, her daughter, my girlfriend, and myself all verbally poured over some cool books he had. He DID have at LEAST one book I was going to buy , if ONLY he could have managed to peel his eyes from his magazine he was reading! (we stopped at his booth 3 times, folks!!!) Guess he wanted me to hand him $295, and turn his page for him while he sat there like a concrete birdbath??? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
*paull* Posted November 29, 2004 Author Share Posted November 29, 2004 Wow.... nice stuff! Fantastic Fears #5 is a book on my want list. What was the condition and price of the Weird Mysteries #5? Was is unrestored? I saw two copies a couple months ago in NYC that had amateur restoration and high prices. Much maligned AiU #1? Not by me! I'd love to have one for my collection if only for the cover alone! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
precodekeith Posted November 29, 2004 Share Posted November 29, 2004 Fantastic Fears 5 was probably the "rarest" of the batch. Not to say it had low print run or anything, but as you probably know it IS out there, just changes hands mighty infrequently. The Weird Mysteries 5 was the book I was potentially going to pony up $295 for. I couldn't tell if had restoration or even what exactly the grade was (appeared f- from my distance) because it was on the wall of the dealer who couldn't be bothered to even look away from his magazine. Man, that must have been a great story he was reading! Believe it or not I had not even noticed the book until the 2nd time our little gang came up to his table. My attitude at that point (even though I was mulling a purchase over heavily) was that since this guy couldn't even acknowledge us with eye contact when we were verbally expressing interest in his material, I wasn't going to even initiate a "excuse me, can I look at book X" line. His loss, not mine. There will be other WM 5's that come along.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
*paull* Posted November 29, 2004 Author Share Posted November 29, 2004 The WM #5 sounds interesting... if it was anywhere near VG, it was a good deal. But that issue seems to be prone to restoration... make sure you know what you're getting. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
precodekeith Posted November 30, 2004 Share Posted November 30, 2004 Yup. That is one book that would have been worth the money. One of the few at that show worth asking price..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shrunkenhead Posted December 3, 2004 Share Posted December 3, 2004 It's about time I posted some scans on this thread! For the longest time I couldn't, thanks to some firewall or something on my PC that I didn't even know about. Here's two books I recently got back from CGC. First off, the Bethlehem copy of Witches Tales 19, featuring one of my favorite devil covers! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shrunkenhead Posted December 3, 2004 Share Posted December 3, 2004 Up next, one of my holy of holies. Great Comics #3!! Technically not pre-code horror...or is it!?!? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
