Where do you prefer to shop for comics online?

[thecopperagekids]

That's why I asked for some examples to look at, because it sounded like both posters who mentioned pricing were talking about common, lower grade books, not consignments.

 

I sent a PM to explain my post. It wasn't a negative against MCS. When I purchase comics, I check a variety of sources and do price checking. I mainly concentrate how has the most for shipping at the best prices since I am a bulk purchaser.

 

It wasn't taken maliciously, and I appreciated the info and feedback you provided. I only replied because we do try to be very competitive on price (balanced with keeping books in stock in the first place). If anyone has concerns about our pricing on something I want to look into it and see if we're legitimately priced higher than the market, or if our pricing is driven by the market.

 

Here's one of the examples that was mentioned to me: for Legion of Super-Heroes in the 31st Century, why are some issues $6-8 rather than $2-3?

 

http://www.mycomicshop.com/search?TID=702371

 

I looked at issue #19 where we have two copies for sale, a VF for $8 and a VF+ for $8.49.

 

We've sold 5 NM copies in the past few months at between $8 and $10. Mile High has that issue in stock for $32.40 in VF or $45 in NM.

 

On eBay, the only copies for sale are the ones from us and Mile High. It's not in stock at Midtown, Newkadia, Comic Collector Live, or Atomic Avenue.

 

My guess would be that there were fewer copies printed of the later issues, #19, and #20, and thus they're harder to find. People who read that title want to read/collect the whole run, but since there are fewer copies available of that issue, the limited supply pushes the price up.

 

Or maybe the print run's exactly the same, I have no idea. Either way, the pricing is working for us: we're selling multiple copies a year, our price is high enough to get additional copies offered back to us for sale (which might not be the case if we were selling it at only $2-3), and our price is 75% cheaper than the only other seller I could find online who has this book in stock, Mile High.

 

That is an excellent, well thought out reply.

 

 

[TheLiamSturgess]

I don't do a lot of buying from high-volume dealers (mostly private sales and eBay) but when I do shop online, it's exclusively MyComicShop. (thumbs u

[Gatchaman]

All of the books I am looking for are Pre-Hero Marvel/Atlas Horror/Westerns so eBay is where I look.

I used to use Lonestar but in the past couple of years Lonestar thinks these books were printed on stone tablets by God and wants "Stupidly" high prices and very seldom do the lower grade copies they have go on the auction block, whats the problem, you may get the "Real" price for the book?

 

I agree, MCS has gotten too expensive for common issues.

 

If either of you don't mind providing me some examples of lower grade, common issues where you feel our price is high, I'd really appreciate it. I'd like to take a look and see if there's anything we want to adjust.

 

Generally, for low volume, higher-priced books our prices are influenced by guides like Overstreet and GPA. But for common books our prices are influenced by supply and demand. If we're selling out of the stock we have and aren't getting more copies sold to us, we raise the price (what we sell at and what we buy at). And vice versa, if the copies we have aren't selling, or are being offered to us for sale faster than we can sell them, we lower the price.

 

I do know that a lot of issues from the late 70s and 80s that used to be considered drek/bulk/dollar bin material has changed status in the past 2-3 years and are now selling more strongly. Don't know if that's any part of what you're observing, but it's entirely a supply and demand issue, not us suddenly deciding the books are more valuable.

 

Not to turn this into a burn fest, but this has also been a concern of mine also. I have bought a lot of books from your eBay to fill my runs lists. A lot of them are non-key books and I'd be getting them from you at around $1.20-1.80, but then some of the books in the run, that are common, would raise up to $5-6. This does become a deterrent to me and would get from you what I could and then buy the rest from another site.

 

I buy a lot of runs of comics that are not spot light or "hot", like, 90's Ghost Rider, 90's Green Lantern, Jademan books, a lot of indies, etc. I bind them together to make custom trades - http://boards.collectors-society.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=8695985&fpart=1

 

I would rather do all of my business with you. I like your business moto and excellent customer service.

 

 

[nocutename]

Since you posted only part of my PM to you which is quite odd, I will reply. I purchased my Losh 31st Century run a few years back. So I have no idea of why TODAY you have one or two issues so much higher than most of the other issues. My comment on that particular one was referring to animated comics on your site in general.

 

When I was collecting them many years ago, your site always had several issues at what appeared to be inflated prices. No these where Harley Quinn appearances either or when animated comics became all the rage. They were strange singled out issues for no reason priced around $8-10 for VF to NM. If they are were due to a "low print" on certain issues, it would be wise to let the consumer know this little nugget of info. If you are quoting MH prices, well I guess I should stop shopping at MCS all together then.

 

My comment still stands as MCS is too pricey to collect full runs. I have no idea why anyone would pay more than a buck or two for any issue of Losh 31st Century. I just used that as an example as I had recently read that run. Which was all mentioned in my PM that you parsed out to your make your point. My point was this isn't an in demand series for any one particular book to be over a few bucks.

 

It is funny how you fail to comment on the actual common drek portion of my PM. For everyone else reading this thread, I looked at MCS early this year when I wanted to fill in on my Batman and Tec run from Doug Moench's 80's run. For some reason, Conan didn't want to comment on that part of my PM to him.

 

Those issues, are quite pricey around 5-8 dollars. Some even higher. In needing 25 issues, going to MCS for common drek like that is too pricey for me.

Edit: Personally I would rather go to my LCS at those prices. However, none of the shops around me have the issues I need.

 

Bold so that Conan doesn't skip this:

 

Personally, I find this very unsettling that you would take private email to you and publicly post part of it. You could of taken this to me via PM first. Nothing is truly confidential but it still has a feeling of being violated. Is this how you conduct your business? Is all my shopping and trade history with MCS going to be put out for all to see? Seriously, will rethink about using your service ever again.

 

Maybe I should just post my full PM. Geez, this is why I stopped *helping* people. You just seem to get attacked over stupid stuff. A few months of lurking around here and posting only a handful of times, the same feeling of viciousness returns. Wow, just when I thought this place has turned around.

 

I just woke up to read this thread. I am without coffee yet and upset. I hope my post makes sense.

 

That's why I asked for some examples to look at, because it sounded like both posters who mentioned pricing were talking about common, lower grade books, not consignments.

 

I sent a PM to explain my post. It wasn't a negative against MCS. When I purchase comics, I check a variety of sources and do price checking. I mainly concentrate how has the most for shipping at the best prices since I am a bulk purchaser.

 

It wasn't taken maliciously, and I appreciated the info and feedback you provided. I only replied because we do try to be very competitive on price (balanced with keeping books in stock in the first place). If anyone has concerns about our pricing on something I want to look into it and see if we're legitimately priced higher than the market, or if our pricing is driven by the market.

 

Here's one of the examples that was mentioned to me: for Legion of Super-Heroes in the 31st Century, why are some issues $6-8 rather than $2-3?

 

http://www.mycomicshop.com/search?TID=702371

 

I looked at issue #19 where we have two copies for sale, a VF for $8 and a VF+ for $8.49.

 

We've sold 5 NM copies in the past few months at between $8 and $10. Mile High has that issue in stock for $32.40 in VF or $45 in NM.

 

On eBay, the only copies for sale are the ones from us and Mile High. It's not in stock at Midtown, Newkadia, Comic Collector Live, or Atomic Avenue.

 

My guess would be that there were fewer copies printed of the later issues, #19, and #20, and thus they're harder to find. People who read that title want to read/collect the whole run, but since there are fewer copies available of that issue, the limited supply pushes the price up.

 

Or maybe the print run's exactly the same, I have no idea. Either way, the pricing is working for us: we're selling multiple copies a year, our price is high enough to get additional copies offered back to us for sale (which might not be the case if we were selling it at only $2-3), and our price is 75% cheaper than the only other seller I could find online who has this book in stock, Mile High.

[mycomicshop]

Please accept my apology. My response to you here wasn't intended to be viewed as an attack or anything remotely negative, but I should have asked you in PM before bringing my reply back here--I'm sorry. I posted the info publicly because I thought it was non-controversial and didn't think you would mind continuing the discussion in the thread where the topic was originally raised. I didn't quote any of your PM--I posted some info about a single issue from one title that you mentioned.

 

I only singled out that one issue because that was the most specific example you mentioned and therefore the easiest to examine. I wasn't trying to criticize you or invalidate your opinion or anything--just make the point that from our POV, that one issue seems to be priced to what we perceive to be the market level, and we're still priced well relative to any other dealer who has the same issue in stock.

 

I hope you'll accept my apology. Lesson learned.

[nocutename]

I just PM you again. To take a niche market item and build a case around that is not conductive to a discussion. It is stating I have something that is hard to find. You purposely ignored the actual common issues and the reason for my post.

[ttfitz]

Bold so that Conan doesn't skip this:

 

Personally, I find this very unsettling that you would take private email to you and publicly post part of it. You could of taken this to me via PM first. Nothing is truly confidential but it still has a feeling of being violated. Is this how you conduct your business? Is all my shopping and trade history with MCS going to be put out for all to see? Seriously, will rethink about using your service ever again.

 

Maybe I should just post my full PM. Geez, this is why I stopped *helping* people. You just seem to get attacked over stupid stuff. A few months of lurking around here and posting only a handful of times, the same feeling of viciousness returns. Wow, just when I thought this place has turned around.

 

I just woke up to read this thread. I am without coffee yet and upset. I hope my post makes sense.

 

This seems like a serious overreaction to me. it's good that Conan apologized, since it has upset you, but if it was me I would have been scratching my head over it, too. He investigated one item that you mentioned to him when he asked for examples - and didn't even say it was mentioned by you specifically, I didn't realize it was until your post - and explained what he found. How that violates some trust in the fashion you are talking totally escapes me. It certainly wasn't an "attack" or in the least "vicious."

[Batman1fan]

I do 99% of my online comic shopping in two places:

1) Here on the boards

2) EBay

The boards are by far my #1 favorite place place to buy!

[shadroch]

Bold so that Conan doesn't skip this:

 

Personally, I find this very unsettling that you would take private email to you and publicly post part of it. You could of taken this to me via PM first. Nothing is truly confidential but it still has a feeling of being violated. Is this how you conduct your business? Is all my shopping and trade history with MCS going to be put out for all to see? Seriously, will rethink about using your service ever again.

 

Maybe I should just post my full PM. Geez, this is why I stopped *helping* people. You just seem to get attacked over stupid stuff. A few months of lurking around here and posting only a handful of times, the same feeling of viciousness returns. Wow, just when I thought this place has turned around.

 

I just woke up to read this thread. I am without coffee yet and upset. I hope my post makes sense.

 

This seems like a serious overreaction to me. it's good that Conan apologized, since it has upset you, but if it was me I would have been scratching my head over it, too. He investigated one item that you mentioned to him when he asked for examples - and didn't even say it was mentioned by you specifically, I didn't realize it was until your post - and explained what he found. How that violates some trust in the fashion you are talking totally escapes me. It certainly wasn't an "attack" or in the least "vicious."

 

 

Why respond to an open request for examples if you are going to get upset when he uses the example? He didn't id the person , simply took the example he was given and offered the reasoning behind it. I fail to see the violation, and if a person is going to get so upset over it, perhaps its best not to deal with them.

[oakman29]

You guys are sure funny sometimes,and can argue over the silliest things.

I don't like to participate in things like this anymore,because it gets peoples panties in a tizzy.

Relax all,at least it's not another "pressing thread" or " what kind of scanner do I use " thread.

[nocutename]

I do not mesh well with this forum and that is why I stayed away for so long. Sorry that no one else feels like something PM'd is private. If I wanted to have an open discussion I would have posted in the thread.

 

Why didn't I, I didn't want to have an prolonged discussion with posters that have vastly different opinions than myself.

 

Mycomicshop wasn't the original poster so why take the thread over pushing their store. Why take something discussed in private and post it here when it really has no bearing on the thread in the first place.

 

Does this happen to anyone else on this board? I get upset at this stupid . It bothers me when I tell someone something in private and it is shared with the community at large.

 

For the record Conan, your site isn't the only one that has that comic. You apologized so I will drop this but you will not be seeing my business anytime soon or ever. This has made me lose faith in your business practices. Is that over the top? Maybe but I get to say were my dollars are spent.

 

 

[PBK78]

For full runs, depending on year I use mycomicshop. For '80's and '90's stuff the price is fair and the condition is pretty good. I've purchased a few hundred books from them and less than 5 books had damage worth caring about. Their customer service is pretty solid though and will hear you out.

 

The comic shops by me don't have a strong back issue catalogue so it's mostly online. Milehigh is worth a look too, their prices tend to be higher but again I've enjoyed buying from them.

[FineCollector]

For the record Conan, your site isn't the only one that has that comic. You apologized so I will drop this but you will not be seeing my business anytime soon or ever. This has made me lose faith in your business practices. Is that over the top? Maybe but I get to say were my dollars are spent.

 

Never purchased from Mycomicshop before, but I think I'll be inquiring about bulk shipping rates to Canada before picking up your slack