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What is the future of PGX?

Started by TheShadowKnows,

118 posts in this topic

dupont2005

dupont2005

Posted
Posted
What do you think the future of PGX is going to be?Are they truly on the edge with Danial's recent flame out on another board?Is the other company the final nail?Interested in your thoughts

Wow, that entire thread could've been pulled from ComicsPriceGuide forums circa 2005. Same legit and obvious questions, same non-answers, same mea culpa spin and departure.

 

Here's a question: Why hasn't anyone in your neck of the woods ferreted out those answers over the decade? Not in a stalker way, but in a investigative journalistic blogger type way?

 

It just seems curious that a company could remain 'hidden' for a decade without some enterprising person pealing back all the layers. In the age where even the most private celeb selflies get drug into the light, somehow they've kept a lid on basic company details for 10 years and counting. Seems like such an anomaly for this era.

There's no money in it. There's money in pics of celebs at the beach. Lots of money.
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mschmidt

mschmidt

Posted
Posted
oh man that "flame out" on the other boards was one of the most classic reads in message board histories.

 

Heres the coles notes; another message board was created and there is a sub section for every grading company. Each company was contacted and asked to join the discussion to better communicate with customers and no doubt help grow the community.

 

Well the PGX one the owner/founder Daniel took them up on the offer.

 

Answered questions about PGX's reliability and when asked about the Ryan Elliot.

 

Daniel admitted that they made mistakes in the past but have since cut all ties with Ryan Elliot - the guy who buys restored CGC and send them to PGX and gets unrestored - and buys CGCs, trims them and gets huge grade pumps at PGX.

 

Than the question was asked "who are you graders" with Daniel, not wanting to disclose that information - he did give the first names of the graders.

 

Than someone went on facebook and did some online investigating - found the full names of the graders and did a friend list search - showing Ryan Elliot, his ex wife and his new fiance all as being facebook friends with the graders. There are even statuses where Ryan comments and likes posts - all within 60 days of being posted.

 

Anyways, Daniel took this as a personal attack and instead of explaining it left the board in a fire rage saying things like "none of my customers care about this stuff"

 

CGC only lets us talk about PGX because of how much of a joke they are.

 

Appreciate the Coles Notes (I also appreciate the reference to Cole's - I used to love that bookstore).

 

I don't really want to delve into Daniel's personal life but I am curious about their business practices.

 

I've bumped into Ryan Elliott at shows and I am sure he knows who I am but pretends he doesn't.

 

If Ryan Elliott has cut ties with PGX, why is he at so many shows buying books (and either grading them or reholdering CGC books in PGX holders) and selling them online?

 

This leads me to not believe anything that Daniel says. That is something I'd like to hear a rebuttal to.

I'm assuming he's still allowed to submit. Probably their single largest account. The gift grades could be a conspiracy or could just be amateur graders, sounds like either is possible. Probably a little of both. Knowing the books are from their largest account, they probably rather error in favor of him than against him.

 

I think you're underestimating the relationship.

 

I've seen Elliott at shows, buying books, getting them signed (all by his lonesome) and then watched the books show up in PGX slabs with hugely inflated grades on eBay within a day or two. As far as I'm concerned, it's much more likely that he has full access to the PGX "grading room" and gets to do whatever he wants.

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Mumford's Comics

Mumford's Comics

Posted
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It really wouldn't matter how many graders grade for PGX or if the grading were really done from a house, as grading is subjective & just an opinion. The problem is trust. There have been way too many negatives about PGX to trust them. I've used them a few times many years ago & had a few minor problems but I didn't have a problem with their grading on what I submitted. My problems with them were with quality control with mislabeling my books & one book being ruined by a heat seal for their case (Eternals #1).

 

Then there was the guy who for some reason had PGX grade TMNT #1 & then cracked the case & saw it was a 3rd printing, rather than the supposed 1st print he sent. I still don't know why anyone would send out a big money book for grading only to crack the case when they received it & decide to film it-I still wonder how legit that was. This along with the rumored grading upgrades for personal friends has pretty much killed PGX in the marketplace. Nobody would care about where or how many people were grading for PGX if they truly did the job they were supposed to do & grade comics subjectively.

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kav

kav

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Posted

I think taht TMNT story has been debunked.

As for who buys PGX books....amateurs I guess

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Davenport

Davenport

Posted
Posted
What do you think the future of PGX is going to be?Are they truly on the edge with Danial's recent flame out on another board?Is the other company the final nail?Interested in your thoughts

Wow, that entire thread could've been pulled from ComicsPriceGuide forums circa 2005. Same legit and obvious questions, same non-answers, same mea culpa spin and departure.

 

Here's a question: Why hasn't anyone in your neck of the woods ferreted out those answers over the decade? Not in a stalker way, but in a investigative journalistic blogger type way?

 

It just seems curious that a company could remain 'hidden' for a decade without some enterprising person pealing back all the layers. In the age where even the most private celeb selflies get drug into the light, somehow they've kept a lid on basic company details for 10 years and counting. Seems like such an anomaly for this era.

There's no money in it. There's money in pics of celebs at the beach. Lots of money.

You're right. It's probably because comic book chat boards are relatively tiny communities and PGX isn't all that important. At the same time those core questions have floated around for a decade across multiple boards. ComicsPriceGuide, then STL, Comics Corral, and now this newest board. Exact same stuff.

 

Would it be all that hard for some local to go knock on their door with their iPhone recording: "HI. I'm making a video for my comic book blog. This is PGX, right?" And let it roll. A persistent and productive exposé might garner a fair amount of YouTube hits.

 

 

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dupont2005

dupont2005

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Posted
It really wouldn't matter how many graders grade for PGX or if the grading were really done from a house, as grading is subjective & just an opinion.
To me it does matter for several reasons. One is, when you're having your near mint copy of Action #1 graded, do you want the businessmen in a sterile and professional facility grading this thing under a microscope, or a kid who lives with his mom grading it under a Superman lamp in the attic?

 

And then, why rely on the opinion of one grader when you could have the opinions of several? And then of course comes the restoration detection, which if we give PGX the benefit of a doubt and assume when a PLOD winds up in a universal PGX (which I believe has happened more than once) it's an error and not an act of fraud, how can we trust them for their signature verification? I'm all for signature verification in the hobby, but only from people I consider to be both professional and trustworthy.

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dupont2005

dupont2005

Posted
Posted
What do you think the future of PGX is going to be?Are they truly on the edge with Danial's recent flame out on another board?Is the other company the final nail?Interested in your thoughts

Wow, that entire thread could've been pulled from ComicsPriceGuide forums circa 2005. Same legit and obvious questions, same non-answers, same mea culpa spin and departure.

 

Here's a question: Why hasn't anyone in your neck of the woods ferreted out those answers over the decade? Not in a stalker way, but in a investigative journalistic blogger type way?

 

It just seems curious that a company could remain 'hidden' for a decade without some enterprising person pealing back all the layers. In the age where even the most private celeb selflies get drug into the light, somehow they've kept a lid on basic company details for 10 years and counting. Seems like such an anomaly for this era.

There's no money in it. There's money in pics of celebs at the beach. Lots of money.

You're right. It's probably because comic book chat boards are relatively tiny communities and PGX isn't all that important. At the same time those core questions have floated around for a decade across multiple boards. ComicsPriceGuide, then STL, Comics Corral, and now this newest board. Exact same stuff.

 

Would it be all that hard for some local to go knock on their door with their iPhone recording: "HI. I'm making a video for my comic book blog. This is PGX, right?" And let it roll. A persistent and productive exposé might garner a fair amount of YouTube hits.

 

The reason paparazzi live at LAX is they're getting paid every time they stuff a camera in someone's face, or up their skirt, or under their car when they dive under it to act like they've been hit.

 

Real investigative journalism doesn't need that kind of payoff, but they do need to investigate stories they think their viewers/readers will care about. In the grand scheme of things, with how little the common person knows about comics, with how little the common comic book fan knows about graded comics, and with how little the common graded comic book fan knows about the inner dealings of PGX, the market for the story may not be huge.

 

Then again, maybe a local paper would pick it up. I've seen local news shows go investigative over smaller fry's. Someone has to convince them there's a cool story to run though, because spying on PGX for weeks is going to cost them money.

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Mumford's Comics

Mumford's Comics

Posted
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It really wouldn't matter how many graders grade for PGX or if the grading were really done from a house, as grading is subjective & just an opinion.
To me it does matter for several reasons. One is, when you're having your near mint copy of Action #1 graded, do you want the businessmen in a sterile and professional facility grading this thing under a microscope, or a kid who lives with his mom grading it under a Superman lamp in the attic?

 

And then, why rely on the opinion of one grader when you could have the opinions of several? And then of course comes the restoration detection, which if we give PGX the benefit of a doubt and assume when a PLOD winds up in a universal PGX (which I believe has happened more than once) it's an error and not an act of fraud, how can we trust them for their signature verification? I'm all for signature verification in the hobby, but only from people I consider to be both professional and trustworthy.

 

I pretty much agree, it's just that CGC has had several issues of people getting differing grades & label colors on resubs on the same books. People have resubmitted books that had blue labels come back with purple & actually some were purple that came back blue. Despite all the quality control that CGC has, grading is subjective and not a perfect science.

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mschmidt

mschmidt

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Posted
It really wouldn't matter how many graders grade for PGX or if the grading were really done from a house, as grading is subjective & just an opinion.
To me it does matter for several reasons. One is, when you're having your near mint copy of Action #1 graded, do you want the businessmen in a sterile and professional facility grading this thing under a microscope, or a kid who lives with his mom grading it under a Superman lamp in the attic?

 

And then, why rely on the opinion of one grader when you could have the opinions of several? And then of course comes the restoration detection, which if we give PGX the benefit of a doubt and assume when a PLOD winds up in a universal PGX (which I believe has happened more than once) it's an error and not an act of fraud, how can we trust them for their signature verification? I'm all for signature verification in the hobby, but only from people I consider to be both professional and trustworthy.

 

I pretty much agree, it's just that CGC has had several issues of people getting differing grades & label colors on resubs on the same books. People have resubmitted books that had blue labels come back with purple & actually some were purple that came back blue. Despite all the quality control that CGC has, grading is subjective and not a perfect science.

 

CGC has also graded more than 2 million books - it's crazy to think that there wouldn't have been mistakes along the way.

 

When you say "People have resubmitted books that had blue labels come back with purple & actually some were purple that came back blue" you're talking about, what, 3-4 examples that have been highly publicized here on the boards? In the grand scheme of things, for a company that grades 1000s of books a month, it's not indicative of anything other than the fact that no company is perfect :thumbsup:

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Designer Toast

Designer Toast

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PGX had the potential to be a valuable company, but their greed and stupidity got the better of them. I wouldn't let one guy wreck my entire business and continue doing him favors. It is clear what is happening between certain parties and PGX.

 

PGX could have been big had it been managed correctly - clearly it hasn't and that likely isn't going to change anytime soon. Watching people throw away these fantastic opportunities just kills me. :screwy:

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Mumford's Comics

Mumford's Comics

Posted
Posted
It really wouldn't matter how many graders grade for PGX or if the grading were really done from a house, as grading is subjective & just an opinion.
To me it does matter for several reasons. One is, when you're having your near mint copy of Action #1 graded, do you want the businessmen in a sterile and professional facility grading this thing under a microscope, or a kid who lives with his mom grading it under a Superman lamp in the attic?

 

And then, why rely on the opinion of one grader when you could have the opinions of several? And then of course comes the restoration detection, which if we give PGX the benefit of a doubt and assume when a PLOD winds up in a universal PGX (which I believe has happened more than once) it's an error and not an act of fraud, how can we trust them for their signature verification? I'm all for signature verification in the hobby, but only from people I consider to be both professional and trustworthy.

 

I'm pretty much agree, it's just that CGC has had several issues of people getting differing grades & label colors on resubs on the same books. People have resubmitted books that had blue labels come back with purple & actually some were purple that came back blue. Despite all the quality control that CGC has, grading is subjective and not a perfect science.

 

CGC has also graded more than 2 million books - it's crazy to think that there wouldn't have been mistakes along the way.

 

When you say "People have resubmitted books that had blue labels come back with purple & actually some were purple that came back blue" you're talking about, what, 3-4 examples that have been highly publicized here on the boards? In the grand scheme of things, for a company that grades 1000s of books a month, it's not indicative of anything other than the fact that no company is perfect :thumbsup:

 

I pretty sure that was exactly what I said. My point was as I stated earlier, if PGX actually graded comics subjectively, nobody would care where or how many graders they had. They would have the trust of their customers & carve out a niche in the comics community rather than the irrelevant company they are today.

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dupont2005

dupont2005

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Posted
PGX had the potential to be a valuable company, but their greed and stupidity got the better of them. I wouldn't let one guy wreck my entire business and continue doing him favors. It is clear what is happening between certain parties and PGX.

 

PGX could have been big had it been managed correctly - clearly it hasn't and that likely isn't going to change anytime soon. Watching people throw away these fantastic opportunities just kills me. :screwy:

I'm wondering how much they actually pull in. Don't they charge like ten bucks for a grade? The slab probably cost a dollar, that leaves three dollars per grader. If they grade a hundred slabs a month that's $300 each. What if this guy is half their business?
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