"Speculating" in the age of second printings

[CBT]

In fairness though, with a lower supply, there's going to be less bags being held when the musical comics game comes to an end than there were in the 90's. Granted, they're 4X the price at even cover than they were back in the 90's, but still... folks holding fewer bags, even at higher prices, could cushion the blow.

 

I agree it will happen differently this time.

 

I think the bags are less in number, but greater in size. Last time it was brick and mortar stores that got lit up, this time it will be online pseudo-dealers and ebay stores. The brick and mortar stores are much more established and diversified. They should be able to weather the storm, especially ones who already limit quantity per customers.

 

Wholesale type places like DCBS could see extremely large drop in their sales, and I am sure every store will see some decline in overall sales.

 

Third party grading companies will probably take a massive hit too, wouldn't surprise me if it was like 25-40% decline in subs type hit.

 

[Lpgk]

the ASM regular is way more desirable than the Chromium. It's much harder to find in high grade

[Lpgk]

I just found an Xmen 11 Pressman second print in a run I bought recently. I had a feeling it was worth something as I have never seen a Pressman in the wild before.

 

I was shocked looking up how much some of those issues are. But I guess compared to the bloated print runs of the 90s, these are pretty scarce considering.

 

[the blob]

as things stand this has been going on for years now though. which variants from 4 years ago have held up? frankly i don't get that market. if nobody cares about the underlying book, the 2d printing or variant isn't going to hold up price-wise either unless that variant cover is really special/iconic.

[rjrjr]

Then we had inflated print runs based on falsely high demand. Now the companies print runs are much tighter and are closer ro actual demand, with the wrinkle over hyping small run variants.

 

If only this were true. Unfortunately, variants have tremendously skewed what "actual demand" is. Is it closer today than it was during the last bubble? Absolutely. But, is the number of actual readers smaller than the top 300 lists show? Also absolutely.

[rjrjr]

In fairness though, with a lower supply, there's going to be less bags being held when the musical comics game comes to an end than there were in the 90's. Granted, they're 4X the price at even cover than they were back in the 90's, but still... folks holding fewer bags, even at higher prices, could cushion the blow.

 

I agree it will happen differently this time.

 

I think the bags are less in number, but greater in size. Last time it was brick and mortar stores that got lit up, this time it will be online pseudo-dealers and ebay stores. The brick and mortar stores are much more established and diversified. They should be able to weather the storm, especially ones who already limit quantity per customers.

 

Wholesale type places like DCBS could see extremely large drop in their sales, and I am sure every store will see some decline in overall sales.

 

Third party grading companies will probably take a massive hit too, wouldn't surprise me if it was like 25-40% decline in subs type hit.

 

If you have been reading Mile High Comics newsletters, you'll know that they are greatly relying on variants for sales. They have been doing a massive push of trying to sell their variants and talking up the value of those variants. I'm not so sure brick and mortar stores (like MHC) are going to be immune to a decline in sales.

[rjrjr]

as things stand this has been going on for years now though. which variants from 4 years ago have held up? frankly i don't get that market. if nobody cares about the underlying book, the 2d printing or variant isn't going to hold up price-wise either unless that variant cover is really special/iconic.

 

+1000

 

And that has been the reality of the variant market.

[mysterio]

In fairness though, with a lower supply, there's going to be less bags being held when the musical comics game comes to an end than there were in the 90's. Granted, they're 4X the price at even cover than they were back in the 90's, but still... folks holding fewer bags, even at higher prices, could cushion the blow.

 

I agree it will happen differently this time.

 

I think the bags are less in number, but greater in size. Last time it was brick and mortar stores that got lit up, this time it will be online pseudo-dealers and ebay stores. The brick and mortar stores are much more established and diversified. They should be able to weather the storm, especially ones who already limit quantity per customers.

 

Wholesale type places like DCBS could see extremely large drop in their sales, and I am sure every store will see some decline in overall sales.

 

Third party grading companies will probably take a massive hit too, wouldn't surprise me if it was like 25-40% decline in subs type hit.

 

 

 

If you have been reading Mile High Comics newsletters, you'll know that they are greatly relying on variants for sales. They have been doing a massive push of trying to sell their variants and talking up the value of those variants. I'm not so sure brick and mortar stores (like MHC) are going to be immune to a decline in sales.

 

The grading companies will definitely get hit, and hit hard. It seems to me that one can easily argue that CGC has contributed pretty significantly to the rise of this latest speculation era by adding so much value to UHG moderns and variants. Hopefully they can survive when it's time to tighten the belt (at least it should help TATs).

 

Mile High weathered the 90s implosion, so I suspect they'll be just fine after this one. Variants cost them little and have a HUGE markup. Their profits will suffer, but they've been there and done that.

 

I'd be more worried about Clink, Comic Connect, and others that have benefitted off of the hype and movie spec in earlier stuff. They'll suffer mightily in both profits and volume if prices on SA and Bronze correct.

[Kyle R.]

If you have been reading Mile High Comics newsletters, you'll know that they are greatly relying on variants for sales. They have been doing a massive push of trying to sell their variants and talking up the value of those variants. I'm not so sure brick and mortar stores (like MHC) are going to be immune to a decline in sales.

 

 

It's really sad that Chuck has been trying sooooo hard to sell those exclusive Star Wars variants, that in his Oct.23 newsletter he used scare tactics, saying " Whatever copies we have remaining of our #1 issue are almost certainly going be priced at $100 apiece on December 18th, with similar price increases anticipated on all of the other issues. Simply put, the Mile High Comics STAR WARS variant series is the only complete variant set ever produced by anyone besides Marvel, and we're now running out. "

 

 

[CBT]

as things stand this has been going on for years now though. which variants from 4 years ago have held up? frankly i don't get that market. if nobody cares about the underlying book, the 2d printing or variant isn't going to hold up price-wise either unless that variant cover is really special/iconic.

 

Agree 100%, except for the 4 years thing, I would say its been about 8-10 years, I see 04-06 as sort of the beginning of the current variant, alternate printing era

[CBT]

It's really sad that Chuck has been trying sooooo hard to sell those exclusive Star Wars variants, that in his Oct.23 newsletter he used scare tactics, saying " Whatever copies we have remaining of our #1 issue are almost certainly going be priced at $100 apiece on December 18th, with similar price increases anticipated on all of the other issues. Simply put, the Mile High Comics STAR WARS variant series is the only complete variant set ever produced by anyone besides Marvel, and we're now running out. "

 

Store variants are worthless imo. They will all be dollar bin stuff in the future. Getting together groups of retailers, hiring "name" artists directly, etc, have been good attempts at increasing their "legitimacy" and creating a better quality product.

 

But ultimately, its still a "homebrew" variant and will never have mass appeal to collectors. imo

[CBT]

The grading companies will definitely get hit, and hit hard. It seems to me that one can easily argue that CGC has contributed pretty significantly to the rise of this latest speculation era by adding so much value to UHG moderns and variants. Hopefully they can survive when it's time to tighten the belt (at least it should help TATs).

 

Mile High weathered the 90s implosion, so I suspect they'll be just fine after this one. Variants cost them little and have a HUGE markup. Their profits will suffer, but they've been there and done that.

 

I'd be more worried about Clink, Comic Connect, and others that have benefitted off of the hype and movie spec in earlier stuff. They'll suffer mightily in both profits and volume if prices on SA and Bronze correct.

 

+1 to everything said here

[rjrjr]

If you have been reading Mile High Comics newsletters, you'll know that they are greatly relying on variants for sales. They have been doing a massive push of trying to sell their variants and talking up the value of those variants. I'm not so sure brick and mortar stores (like MHC) are going to be immune to a decline in sales.

 

 

It's really sad that Chuck has been trying sooooo hard to sell those exclusive Star Wars variants, that in his Oct.23 newsletter he used scare tactics, saying " Whatever copies we have remaining of our #1 issue are almost certainly going be priced at $100 apiece on December 18th, with similar price increases anticipated on all of the other issues. Simply put, the Mile High Comics STAR WARS variant series is the only complete variant set ever produced by anyone besides Marvel, and we're now running out. "

 

 

What I find interesting is Mile High Comics has not sold out of these exclusives and the numbers they ordered are not any different than what other retailers have ordered for their exclusives. Did any retailer sell out of their Star Wars exclusives? Or is MHC's pricing the issue?

 

I'm sure we will know when MHC sell out as that will be a big deal in the newsletter.