Mile High Chuck's place in the hobby

[DavidTheDavid]

Been following the thread about Chuck's moaning newsletter with some interest, which raised a question I've had before.

 

What is his importance to the hobby, in the history of collecting? How much is legitimate and how much is self-inflated?

[JazzMan]

He's the one who purchased the Edgar Church collection which ended up establishing Mile High as a legit player. I have no idea what his position was prior to that but at least since then he's been a high roller in GA comics and pottery. He buys by the truck load so he's parlayed his big find to create an established business. He's a nice guy, I've met him a few times.

 

His pricing structure and grading practices have always been questioned but if he continues to sell then he must be doing something right.

[JD Glitch-migration]

don't know the man personally but he was featured, prominently in the Morgan Spurlock documentary about SDCC and he wasn't show in the best light. (Again don't know the guy could be editing, who knows.)

 

A lot of centered around him trying to sell a Red Robin #1 9.0 WP, which he claimed was the rarest of all Marvel Comics.

 

There was a part where some collector wanted to buy his entire case of high value comics and he nearly broke down crying.

 

[ChrisInBaltimore]

He's the one who purchased the Edgar Church collection which ended up establishing Mile High as a legit player. I have no idea what his position was prior to that but at least since then he's been a high roller in GA comics and pottery. He buys by the truck load so he's parlayed his big find to create an established business. He's a nice guy, I've met him a few times.

 

His pricing structure and grading practices have always been questioned but if he continues to sell then he must be doing something right.

 

He's been around forever too. I'm always amazed when I'm reading 70s books with his advertisements in them.

 

He's also huge in the CO area. I'm not surprised he says he does well at the Denver Con. He seems to well liked in the area. Anyone in CO attest to that? When I lived in WY, he seemed to have some clout.

 

Anyone that has endured the comic industry for so long must be somewhat successful and should have a place in the history of the hobby. It is a shame he has sort of tarnished his reputation, but from what the old timers say it has always sort of been that way.

[HighStakesComics]

You should read his wikipedia. At a very young age he was an established player selling mail order comics and it was that early success that led him to landing the Church collection. I still buy once in a while from Mile High. I wouldn't bet the farm on a book I couldn.t at least see a pic of, but I did pick up a New Teen Titans #16 the other day in NM from them for $7 shipped. Someone here was talking up Captain Carrot and I got all nostalgic.

[shadroch]

He is a major player. Discovered the greatest horde in comicdom. He was also among the earliest of the distributors and for a long time was the largest mail order dealer in the world. Controversial, but easily in the top ten.

[Monkeyman]

I think that he's also a pioneer in on-line comic retailing. At least from newsletters I read years ago he put a lot of money into his on-line store early on. From the look of his site he hasn't put any money since.

 

Mike

[Dr. Balls]

He's kinda like a great actor who is not-so-great off camera. I think he's done a lot for the industry simply by being a big player (and yes, he is HUGE in Colorado - in the early 90s, there were like 5-6 Mile High Comics in malls around the city) - but I think he must have a skewed view of how people want him to interact with the public.

 

His emails - while chock full of interesting and from-the-heart content, really need to be edited in such a way that he doesn't come off as A) whiney or B) car salesman-ey.

 

If he tweaked his messages just a bit to less self-promotion and more industry-specific topics - he'd begin to understand that the benefit to his business of speaking to a huge online community comes in the residual affinity that followers feel towards an "online persona" rather than trying to do the "immediate sale" pitch to customers.

 

Since social media really started ramping up about 10 years ago, by now he could arguably have been the most well-known and borderline beloved comic dealer in the world, if he had taken his time (or hired someone to take the time) to understand the nuances and psychology of communicating to a customer base online. He could have finessed his legacy much like how Stan Lee has done for himself - and really put the majority of the collecting community on his side with some careful tailoring of what he puts on the internet.

 

Instead, he's managed to shoot himself in the foot on a near month-to-month basis for the past several years (I personally enjoyed the times where he'd talk about a national tragedy, and in the next sentence offer a special sales on books ) . He may be successful in terms of numbers and dollars, but boy - he probably left more than that on the table due to some social media and online missteps he's made.

[Ryan.]

Top one on the all-time Shirtless Comic Dealer list.

[Vikingreed]

I've read his history, and his life has been amazing.

Just amazing.

 

 

[Dick Pontoon]

Top one on the all-time Shirtless Comic Dealer list.

 

Body slammed Theo Holstein to the mat.

 

[goldust40]

He was certainly a major player prior to the arrival of the net and ebay, not to mention online forums. He has been left behind somewhat since then, also due to the arrival of the behemoth that is Heritage, as well as Clink, etc.

[Dr. Balls]

Top one on the all-time Shirtless Comic Dealer list.

 

Could be worse, could be Top One on the all-time Pantsless Comic Dealer list. That would be bad for business.

[nearmint]

He made a big mistake at SDCC this year. In past years, he brought a vast array of trade paperbacks and his booth was always crowded. This year he brought a vast array of overpriced back issues, and lost $10,000. Of course, he's blaming the producers of Comic-Con exclusives for draining the wallets of attendees. He, apparently, hasn't considered the possibility that it's his own fault for pricing his books ridiculously high.

[topofthetotem]

I see Chuck as one of those faded movie stars that were once the biggest ticket in town but now they are mostly forgotten and survive doing off off way off Broadway and dinner theater.

[01TheDude]

he's a captain of industry, dag-gummit

[dupont2005]

He found a valuable comic collection. The proceeds floated him for a while but looks like that's coming to an end. Since he made multiple millions of dollars off one deal he's never had to have competitive prices, a website from this millennium, or reasonable overhead. He just had to write big fat checks for dealers inventory then up the price a thousand percent and watch people who didn't know any better buy it all.

[Dr. Balls]

He found a valuable comic collection. The proceeds floated him for a while but looks like that's coming to an end. Since he made multiple millions of dollars off one deal he's never had to have competitive prices, a website from this millennium, or reasonable overhead. He just had to write big fat checks for dealers inventory then up the price a thousand percent and watch people who didn't know any better buy it all.

 

I'll take a wild stab in the dark, especially since he's airing financial grievances to everyone in the free world:

 

He likely has enough money to either A) go to conventions to promote Mile High or B) invest tens of thousands of dollars (or much more) to invest in a total re-vamp of his website and cataloging system. That is a HUGE time consuming undertaking, and the band-aid fix to his problems is definitely choosing to attend conventions.

 

Having a dilapidated website is much like having a building that looks like it's falling down. Sure, many people will go in and do business, but you drive away a lot of other people that feel that a businesses appearance and first impression is reflective of how they conduct themselves (like myself).

 

[DavidTheDavid]

I've read his history, and his life has been amazing.

Just amazing.

 

 

Yeah, I've enjoyed his "tales" as it's one person's insight into comic collecting history, and from someone who has been very involved with it. It's idiosyncratic, which is fine. He's not striving for impartiality from what I see. It's him providing his take on things.

 

Like others, though, I've gone to the website, found something on my want list, and suffered enough sticker shock to keep looking elsewhere. I wonder if he's painting himself into a corner. If he re-priced everything to what's commonly understood to be market value and at the same time released all his back stock, maybe he really would flood the market. Does anyone here have an idea, because I don't, of what his back stock is like? I get the impression that he must have mountains of books that probably aren't even available at any given time.

[dupont2005]

I don't doubt he has the cash either, I'm just saying he's not a genius businessman simply because he's remained in business all this time. He was an average businessman who got a windfall of luck having nothing to do at all with business savvy. It gave him an edge and allowed him to prop himself up as the big guy on the block because he could write the checks nobody else could. But his actual business practices were not that of an industry pioneer worthy of cornering an entire market. Just a ranting hippy showing everyone on his mailing list his nipples once a month.