Back issue road trip report! (part 2 added)

[october]

I like reading reports from other people on their convention experiences, so I thought I would put one together for once. I decided to write this up after the fact, so unfortunately I didn't take any pics while I was on the road. It probably won't be too entertaining, but the books are cool. Enjoy!

 

Prologue:

 

A few months ago I decided that I should try buying at more conventions than usual this year. I have a nine month old now, so free days are few and far between, but my wife agreed to pick up my slack while I was gone. I'd also been in contact with a guy who bought comics extensively in the 1990's as an investment and had decided it was time to start selling. Though it was probably way too aggressive, I opted to roll it all together this past weekend by doing the Indy Comic Con and then going to check out the collection.

 

 

Day 1 (Thursday):

 

Took the day off work (obviously) and woke up at the crack of 4 am. Pretty brutal, but I had to get on the road early since it's a 4.5 hour trip from Nashville to Indy and I would lose an hour on the way up to boot. I had a retailer badge, and I wanted to get in early during setup to beat the crowds and get first crack at things. I figured I could check into the hotel and get into the show by 11 or 12 Indy time.

 

On the way out of town I grabbed a bag of grease from McDonald's and got on the road. The drive was uneventful and I reached the hotel by 11 or so. I checked in, headed down to the convention and ended up being.....the second person in the hall. You never know about setup though. Sometimes it starts early, sometimes nobody shows til later. Went back to the hotel, then back to the con an hour and a half later. Four people! Progress! Back to the hotel.

 

Finally, around 2 or 3, people started setting up. I helped Dale get his booth together for awhile and did some shopping at a dealer named Mark's booth. I'd bought from him in the past, and his prices are fair. He also manages to have some offbeat stuff, so I was happy to get some earlyish Mystery in Space issues, some early silver romance, and some pre-code horror. Bought maybe one or two other books that day, and was beat from being too stupid to sleep in, so headed back to the room around 6. Tupenny, Dale, Theagenes, and I went to dinner at an Italian restaurant where we discussed Florida citrus parasites, the state of modern politics, and the market for early bedsheet pulps. Overly stimulated by these heady topics (and the two Zombie Dusts I drank) I watched TV for awhile before dropping off.

 

 

Day 2 (Friday):

 

Woke up at 5! No reason. It sucked.

 

Ate breakfast with Dale at the hotel and walked over to the hall. Wandered the rest of the hall looking for weekend warrior type dealers who may not keep up with the trends. Ham and eggers are the best bet for deals, though big national dealers can also be great if you get to them when they have just gotten fresh stock. Buying was just ok. Picked up a JIM 85 and a Batman Adventures 12 from a guy with 50 drek boxes. Bought a Strange Adventures from Dale that I had been looking forever for. The weird one with the alien snowmen shooting lasers out of their eyes. Badass cover. Picked up some other random books, then got lucky and snagged two high grade LB Cole Jungle covers for a nice price. The hall exhausted, it was time to be on my way.

 

Being only noon, what would I do for the rest of the day? Stop at some stores on my way back to Nashville? Why not? I tell myself that I am not addicted and can stop anytime, then plug the closest shop in the GPS.

 

Shop 1: bust. Next.

 

Shop 2: Chew 1 first print for $35? Yes please. That covers gas and food right there. NM Killing Joke for $35? Sure. Pile of other hot moderns that I don't care about for 25-50% off market? Will do.

 

Home. Bed.

 

 

Day 3 (Saturday):

 

4 am! Again! Redeye flights at 6 am always sound like a fine idea when you are booking them. I got to the airport, staggered through security, boarded the plane and slipped into a uneasy and semi-conscious sleep until touchdown in Philly. After picking up my rental car and miserably failing the Philadelphia Turnpike intelligence test (I used the Easy Pass, then tried to pay cash on the other end) I found my hotel and ate a chicken sandwich at a place across the street. The thing was enormous, and the ridiculous size proved to be a theme that weekend. Are all sandwiches that huge out there? Not complaining, because it was awesome, just surprised.

 

After lunch I headed to the collector's (investor really) house. We had talked on the phone many times, and done some large deals, but I am always apprehensive when going to a guy's house I haven't met before. Visions of Craigslist axe murderers dancing in my head, I rang the doorbell.

 

His buddy answered and we went upstairs to meet the owner. "Dave" the owner, as I will call him, had just retired. I'd already talked to him on the phone a bunch of times, so I already knew that he was a super nice guy and that we shared a lot of common interests. He had operated several businesses in the course of his career and had also bought a lot of collectibles during that time. These were purchased as an investment and he bought vintage and new books during the 1990's in equal measure. Despite some shaky grading (and undisclosed resto) during that time, he did really well on the older books. On the modern multiple....much more mixed results. Some nice hits, a lot of misses. In any case, there was a lot of stuff to go through so I dove right in. I spent the next eight hours going through boxes and making piles. Golden age, silver age, bronze age, modern age. Piles and piles of stuff. The kicker? None of it was priced yet. I took it on faith that we could close a deal on Sunday and headed back to the hotel.

 

After three days of staring at comics, I literally saw them when I closed my eyes. I was also a little nauseous. The meter was edging close to back issue overload.

 

 

Day 4 (Sunday):

 

I arrived back to the house in the late morning and we headed down to the basement to look at the modern hoard. Whoa. Huge pile of boxes under a tarp at the bottom of the stairs. What's that? Oh, just 1000 Beta tapes from his closed video store! I think I had more fun going through those than I did the moderns. The 80's were the golden age for video box art, and I found some gems that he let me keep. C.H.U.D, The Dungeonmaster, and Creepshow 2 safely stowed in the side pockets of my backpack, I hit the modern boxes.

 

Damn. I forgot how much a longbox of unbagged moderns weighs. Sweat, dust, dead spiders, and a few copies of Deadpool 1 and Preacher 1 later, I called it quits on the basement.

 

Not it was game time. How would these be priced? To the moon? Through the roof? Bargain basement? We sat down to go book by book. Now, all of these had grades already on them, but the grades were 20-25 years old/stale. Standards had changed, and not all of these were graded that well to begin with. Luckily he understood this and was open to adjustments once I pointed out some of the defects. Things went really smoothly actually. Dave is a great guy to talk to, and our negotiations went really well. Not all of my offers were taken, but that's very understandable. We broke for lunch, enormous and very delicious cheese steaks, then finished up pricing. Money changed hands, books changed hands, and I spent a good 30 minutes trying to cram everything into the two bags I brought.

 

I headed out and caught my flight at 11. Home by 1 am. Very tired, but very happy.

 

 

Epilogue:

 

No work on Monday, so I went out to get more boards from the LCS. They had a new collection in, so naturally I had to do more buying. ASM 300, X-Men 101, Iron Fist 14....

 

More eBay books came in the mail, and some stuff from board members. It never ends! It took a few days to Mylar and catalog it all, but here they are. The fruits of my 4/5 day comic binge (and some eBay and boardie buys). This stuff is out there at nice prices if you have the patience to look.

 

Really happy to have picked up so many pre-hero books. They are not always easy to find, and I think they are undervalued in mid-grade. My favorite book is the All-Select 1 though, and that came from the boards.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Best stuff....

 

 

 

 

 

[jsilverjanet]

Great story.

 

I'm sending you a blank check today.

 

 

[1Cool]

Wow - that horde brought a tear to my eyes. Very nice batch of key books.

[thirdgreenham]

Thanks for the buying trip report! After reading everything, I stopped at the first picture and thought that was it. I was thinking....not bad, Andy, but not that great with all the effort you put into this.

 

...then I saw the other pics.

 

Nice!

[Jeffro.]

Nice haul. Strange Adventures 79

Every time I hear about someone getting a copy, I get green with envy

[Azkaban]

[Inhuman Fiend]

Incredible, nicely done Andy!

[FrankCastle]

Wow I love these posts! I wish I'd kept track of so many of my buys like this, and my memory is getting worse so I can't remember what book I bought where anymore! Thanks so much for sharing this!

Jay

[THB]

Sweet yiminy christmas!!

 

[Broke as a Joke]

When the kids grow up I would love to do these kind of trips. Thanks for the report.

[1Cool]

I've done a much reduced version of this (a long weekend of hitting a con and then 5 shops on the way back home) and it's a lot of work. You get to the point you just don't want to look at books but the next score gets you just enough of a boost to keep going.

[punksdropdirtysrh]

Very cool story bro. :thumbsup:

[the blob]

The description of what took place seems to have little resemblence to the awesome haul of sweet comic treasure I see in those pictures. Your trip to the collector/investor sounds like you just picked up a few books! You need to work on your superlatives and what not.

[Beastfeast]

I've done a much reduced version of this (a long weekend of hitting a con and then 5 shops on the way back home) and it's a lot of work. You get to the point you just don't want to look at books but the next score gets you just enough of a boost to keep going.

 

The worst is spending hours in a shop, digging through disorganized boxes - only continuing because you can smell the potential - and walking away with nothing. l've had a lot of LCS owners totally confused as to why I'd dig for 3 hours and leave with nothing.

[october]

The description of what took place seems to have little resemblence to the awesome haul of sweet comic treasure I see in those pictures. Your trip to the collector/investor sounds like you just picked up a few books! You need to work on your superlatives and what not.

 

 

I wanted the pics to speak for themselves.

[Bearcatcoach]

 

Finally, around 2 or 3, people started setting up. I helped Dale get his booth together for awhile and did some shopping at a dealer named Mark's booth. I'd bought from him in the past, and his prices are fair. He also manages to have some offbeat stuff, so I was happy to get some earlyish Mystery in Space issues, some early silver romance, and some pre-code horror.

 

 

Thank you for the purchases Andy....you were great to deal with! Feel free to stop by any major convention I am at....I am usually one of the most dealer friendly sellers to buy from.

 

Congrats on an awesome weekend of buying....you have a ton of great stuff in those pics!

[october]

 

Finally, around 2 or 3, people started setting up. I helped Dale get his booth together for awhile and did some shopping at a dealer named Mark's booth. I'd bought from him in the past, and his prices are fair. He also manages to have some offbeat stuff, so I was happy to get some earlyish Mystery in Space issues, some early silver romance, and some pre-code horror.

 

 

Thank you for the purchases Andy....you were great to deal with! Feel free to stop by any major convention I am at....I am usually one of the most dealer friendly sellers to buy from.

 

Congrats on an awesome weekend of buying....you have a ton of great stuff in those pics!

 

Hey Mark. Didn't know that you were a member. Thanks for the books!

[Gatchaman]

WOW!!!! Great hauls. I hope to be able to do this. someday.

[Red_Hood]

Great read/story and nice haul.

I like that you didn't paint it as a perfect rosy picture, although the outcome is rosy.

It's a lot of hard work and beating the bushes to finally settle a nice score.

Many times, people think this just falls in your lap and you're lucky but there's

a lot of time and money invested to get this type of end result.

[october]

Great read/story and nice haul.

I like that you didn't paint it as a perfect rosy picture, although the outcome is rosy.

It's a lot of hard work and beating the bushes to finally settle a nice score.

Many times, people think this just falls in your lap and you're lucky but there's

a lot of time and money invested to get this type of end result.

 

Very true. This took a decent amount of work.