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Future of Comic Book Collecting and the Baby Boomers

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I'm not sure if this topic has been covered or not, but, I'm very curious to see what your thoughts are on the future prices and collection market once the boomers are gone (for lack of a better term)?

 

It would seem there will be a ton of high grade goodies on the market without a lot of demand. Will the silver/gold/bronze market completely tank in the coming decades?

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Joking aside.

 

The best way to see the future is to look at the past.

 

Stamp collecting is a great example of a hobby that has both "key" items and much more common material.

 

The key items in stamps are very rare (in some cases less than 5 existent) and those have held value and do increase each time they are offered for sale - which is rare.

 

The mid-range material in stamps is somewhat readily available immediately, or after a short wait. These prices seem to be steady and holding - with patience often rewarded with a discount.

 

Common material sits in penny boxes and you can get this en mass.

 

There also isn't (or doesn't seem to be) an influx of new collectors into the stamp market. Plus, some of the collectors are really, really old now. So the rare stuff will be released and snatched-up quickly. The other material will likely sit for awhile.

 

I think there is currently a comics "bubble" and that books in the mid-range will settle down and not increase much in value. The characters and licensing will cause some price movement, but even key bronze books like Giant-Sized X-Men are pretty much sitting where they are sitting. I sold a CGC 9.0 for $1000 a few years back and I see that the same book was sold as a "notable sale" in this year's guide at $850.

 

There is a lot of press when Action #1 goes for 2 Million, but much less press when a book like Comico Primer #2 (which I have seen in the past at $300) drops in value. Let's have this conversation 5 years after the Walking Dead TV show is cancelled. I'm not holding onto any hoard of "LOST" memorabilia.

 

The "big" books have had really strong year-over-year increases, but I also suspect that is a supply/demand/ability scenario. Low supply, huge demand, and some ability for wealthy folks to buy them.

 

You are unlikely to ever find an Action #1 in a $1000 price-range ever again. I would also be very cautious about buying some of the "Top 100" Golden-Age books as an investment. They are all over $12,000 (I think), but there are some on that list which I think would have very low liquidity if you ever wanted to sell at the listed prices.

 

======================

 

A note on the new era of "high-grade" collecting.

People can do what they want (and will), but I think the premium that books in the 9.6+ category will bring is something ready to collapse as a market. I may be naive (or cheap, or both), but some of the prices on books I have seen in the "hyper-condition" market seem very unstable and fragile. Tulips in Amsterdam and all that.

 

That's my two-cents worth on the whole shabang. I'm a comic reader anyhow. So the latest issue of Fables is just fine by me! My collection is more happenstance than organized. Except Ducks... I do seek those out. Prices on those have definitely dropped - which works for me!

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I think that narket should continue to be fairly steady given 2 things.

 

1) There is still reasonable print runs and the market doesnt get flooded

2) Adults dont price the kids out of the market

 

Comic fans today are the collectors of tommorrow. As long as kids are still into comics, the market will be fine. The opposite happened with cards, adults priced the kids out. A 10 year old kid would love sports cards but could not buy a Peyton Manning for $20 or whatever the case was. Kids lost interest so the market was left only to adults and the sports card market crumbled. As long as kids can still get moderns and fall in love with the characters, stories, and art like we did, when they grow up, they will want the Batman 181 of Poison Ivy, or X-Men 266 Gambit and the market will stay well above water. Some of the older comics may lose value as interest declines, but classics like Superman, Flash, Wolverine and the like will still demand top dollar.

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I think there is a large set of blinders on collectors who think that they way they collect is how future generations will collect, and therefore, the comic collecting hobby will always be healthy.

 

There are two generations of kids out there that are growing up digitally, without those memories of reading *actual* comic books. That is a major driving force to why people our age collect comics: the memories of reading books in-hand. When you take away the feelings associated with tangible products, you lose future interest in nostaligia for those products.

 

Yes, there will be plenty of people buying Action #1. But that is practically irrelevant to this conversation. What's more relevant is the millions of other comic books that command a fraction of Action #1's price that fill long boxes around the country.

 

What is Iron Man #1 going to be worth in 30 years when 9 year olds who never held one in their hand turn 40? Are they going to buy comics like their dad had, or are they going to be waxing nostaligic on things they had?

 

What happens when comics go all digital in the next 5-10 years? How will we instill in future generations the collectible value of something they don't even have access to any longer?

 

This is a major problem that too easily gets pooh-poohed as a Chicken Little reaction. The world has been shifting how it consumes content, and I believe there are valid concerns that the hobby will face a major downturn.

 

We will still be reading and seeing Captain America in 20 years, but will those adults care about the paper versions? Or will they be collecting manufactured valuables that we have not yet thought of or invented?

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Hopefully there wil still be plenty of people that apprecitae tangible things. I own an iPad and the fancy digital things, but at the end of the day, I still prefer a book over a tablet. There will still be some people that do, I just hope there will still be enough of them. I would argue that music is much more digital than the written word, and while CD's and cassettes have pretty much been done away with completely, there is still a collectors market (albeit small) for records.

Hopefully that will be the worst case scenario for comics and books.

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There are two generations of kids out there that are growing up digitally, without those memories of reading *actual* comic books. That is a major driving force to why people our age collect comics: the memories of reading books in-hand. When you take away the feelings associated with tangible products, you lose future interest in nostaligia for those products.

hm And which kind of "nostalgia" you gain in its place?

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There are two generations of kids out there that are growing up digitally, without those memories of reading *actual* comic books. That is a major driving force to why people our age collect comics: the memories of reading books in-hand. When you take away the feelings associated with tangible products, you lose future interest in nostaligia for those products.

hm And which kind of "nostalgia" you gain in its place?

 

Why does there have to be any 'nostalgia' at all? There are many toys and games I played with in my youth that I am not 'nostalgic' ' about. This is one of the many things that those who believe in the 'rule of 25' seem to forget. A lot of these items I never want to own again, yet I had fond memories with them. I also would never pay a lot for them either.

 

Over the course of the next few decades massive amounts of various collections from all walks of the antiques and collectibles trade will be sold at auction or on the open market. This is just due to the 'baby boomer' generation alone. How will the market absorb these collections is a question asked by many experts and fellow auctioneers. Prices will suffer as a result. This is why 'investing' in these so called items is so dangerous. Unfortunately you will find few threads and articles written on this subject (there are some, but not a lot) as a lot of us who realize this don't want to worry the younger collectors who believe that ongoing price increases are the norm. That is everything that is wrong with the trade; in my humble opinion.

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The way I see it, most of the golden age collectors are 65+, because they read some of these books as a kid, or at least were around back then and feel what the cultural impact of these charecters are. The people who are 45ish, mostly collect silver age books, because again, those were the books that were really defining comics when they were growing up. I'm 32, so most of my collecting began in the late 80's/early 90's. I like modern image books, as its pretty much the age I grew up in. I collect scattered key issues of claremonts x men, akira, hellboy, sandman, hellblazer and swamp thing.

We're kind of pre programmed to seek out alot of the books we enjoyed in our youth. I know i'm going to take some heat for saying it, but there's going to be a point when most of the buyers golden age books grow old and pass away. The silver agers will probably spill over into golden age collecting and keep it going for a while, but how many kids today are going to grow up and want to spend thousands of dollars on an early appearance of superman? They're probably going to be busy collecting toys from the upcoming star wars sequels when they're old. A good example is I have zero interest in old archie, casper, and classics illustrated comics, simply because, by the time I came around, they were considered old and out dated. I like batman, but would never dump thousands of dollars into a golden age batman book.

People seem very focused on older books retaining value, but they quickly forget that until the mid eighties, all of these were still relatively cheap. It took 30+ years for most of the copies to get damaged or lost for the remaining ones to go up in value. Its almost irrelevant what the print run on any given issue was, its more about how many copies survive in good condition.

We're hitting a point where we desperately need to bring more young people into this hobby, or see it go the way of baseball cards. Sadly, most of my friends kids know batman, the avengers, spiderman, but its through movies, not comics. They're more interested in playing arkham asylum on their playstation than reading dark knight returns.

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That more depend on the longevity of the charecter. My friends 7 year old son loves the spiderman books I give him, mostly because, he's a fan of the movies. Certain charecters will withstand the test of time, or at least last longer. Im hoping all these marvel and DC blockbuster movies will bring more youth to the hobby, but worry that time warner etc arent doing enough/any crossover marketing. Its pretty low cost to produce a few issues of digital comics, and you could put a download code on the back of every movie ticket. Practicallly everybody has a smartphone, even kids nowadays. You could put one of those internet bar codes on the ticket that will take you right to the download page, and give away free issues that relate to the movie or add backstory. Avengers was one of the highest grossing box office hits of all time. How many people would download a related free digital comic on their iphones and give it a shot? Im willing to bet at least half. Some among those are going to wonder about what other stories have been told about these charecters, or want to get more background on them. Collectors need to be created. And sadly, theres no more spinner racks at local drugstores to introduce kids to comics. Its sad to say, but the direct market, while making it easier for collectors, kind of cuts off and new blood from coming into or discovering the hobby.

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Im hoping all these marvel and DC blockbuster movies will bring more youth to the hobby, but worry that time warner etc arent doing enough/any crossover marketing.

 

I think the future will be interesting. Yes, the baby boomers will leave the hobby, but I want to believe that a certain percentage of the kiddos that are growing up around all these reboots of super heroes (avengers, dark knight, iron man, Spider-Man, etc.) will desire a piece of comic history from which these characters came.

 

Who knows what will happen in the future. If you're worried from an investment perspective, no investment is guaranteed or safe (housing, gold, the market, beanie babies, etc.). It's all a dice roll. Might as well have some fun with funny books in the process.

 

2c

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Im hoping all these marvel and DC blockbuster movies will bring more youth to the hobby, but worry that time warner etc arent doing enough/any crossover marketing.

 

I think the future will be interesting. Yes, the baby boomers will leave the hobby, but I want to believe that a certain percentage of the kiddos that are growing up around all these reboots of super heroes (avengers, dark knight, iron man, Spider-Man, etc.) will desire a piece of comic history from which these characters came.

 

Who knows what will happen in the future. If you're worried from an investment perspective, no investment is guaranteed or safe (housing, gold, the market, beanie babies, etc.). It's all a dice roll. Might as well have some fun with funny books in the process.

 

2c

 

The problem is the younger generation relates to these characters as 'multimedia characters' and not solely comic book characters. As such, few and few will want an original first appearance of the issue they appeared in. Also, the issue isn't solely about demand, as your answer suggests. Both auctioneers and antique/collectible analysts have been saying for years that fairly soon a glut of supply is going to end up on the open market due to baby boomers dying, retiring, or selling off their collections. This is going to create problems regardless in most experts opinions.

 

 

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Agreed. Why would a kid who's only seen batman in a movie, care bout his first appearance in a comic book that was released decades before they were born? I think people need to be interested in collecting/reading comics before they can get to the level of buying multiple thousand dollar slabbed golden age books.

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