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Marvel October 1999 ~ February 2000 US Newsstand Price Variants
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381 posts in this topic

12 hours ago, RockMyAmadeus said:

That can't be true, because they weren't discovered until 1998. "Eminent experts" say so (I must keep things anonymous, so I'm not accused of "cyber bullying", you see, and thrown off the boards yet again.)

Rock, Rock, Rock, Rock,  Rock!

Just be kind and play the ball, not the man, and all this moderation nonsense will go away!

Now, I summoned you here because I've seen you post knowledgeably in this area. What do you think of what I've posted so far?

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11 hours ago, Lazyboy said:

Back to the actual topic.

Marvel's top 15 selling Direct titles at the time, in order, were:

  1. Uncanny X-Men
  2. X-Men
  3. Wolverine
  4. Avengers
  5. Amazing Spider-Man
  6. Fantastic Four
  7. Peter Parker: Spider-Man
  8. Thor
  9. Captain America
  10. Iron Man
  11. Mutant X
  12. Generation X
  13. X-Force
  14. Cable
  15. Hulk

The titles in bold are the ones that we currently know have Newsstand price variants.

Combined with my post from a few days ago and @Marwood & I's table of confirmed issues, there should be enough info in this thread to help people search for "missing" issues. If anyone actually cares, that is.

Good. I think you care Lazyboy. Go find em boy, go find em (thumbsu

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5 hours ago, Marwood & I said:

Good. I think you care Lazyboy. Go find em boy, go find em (thumbsu

So just those five months? I flipped through a shops stock and there were only direct editions for those books, but I have to start to understand what numbers I'm looking for.

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31 minutes ago, FlyingDonut said:

So just those five months? I flipped through a shops stock and there were only direct editions for those books, but I have to start to understand what numbers I'm looking for.

So far, yes, just those 5 months in the thread title. I'm sure you know this already, but this site will tell you the books cover dated for each of the 5 months:

http://www.dcindexes.com/features/newsstand.php?type=cover&month=10&year=1999&publisher=marvel&sort=alpha&checklist=null

The above are the October books and you can click along for the November to February books. As I pontificated earlier in the thread, there could be as many as 450 eligible books, but actual numbers are likely to be much less if not all titles had newsstand copies made (as seems to be the case).

It would be great if you could just find some of the 'missing' books on this chart I did for the titles where a $2.29 or $2.49 copy has been found. Green means I have evidence, yellow means no variant likely (due to being a double size issue) and white means no copy yet found:

5a30144d2b3b8_picchart.thumb.PNG.b744ea1f896ca5fc0a9319b1fa163120.PNG

 

Find us some whites!

Good luck, and do report back (thumbsu

 

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7 hours ago, Marwood & I said:

Good. I think you care Lazyboy. Go find em boy, go find em (thumbsu

They are old enough now that there should be copies available on the secondary market, but since the evidence suggests they were distributed only in the U.S., it's pretty unlikely that I would find any locally. I can look at images online, but so can anybody else.

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5 minutes ago, Lazyboy said:

They are old enough now that there should be copies available on the secondary market, but since the evidence suggests they were distributed only in the U.S., it's pretty unlikely that I would find any locally. I can look at images online, but so can anybody else.

I found 18 that way. Go find me some more. I'm doing all the bloody work around here.

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This collecting thing is a funny old game, isn't it. I got a Spidey #13 $2.49 variant in the post today. Spotted it on eBay. And another parcel is on it's way which may have a variant surprise or two in it, if my instincts were right. I don't know why though, as I don't collect these anymore. 

Buy em, sell em, buy em, sell em. It never leaves you does it hm

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Hello. I'm sitting in Michael Delia half way through my weekly 5 hour round trip to see my Mum and Dad.  The new albums from Squeeze and Mozz are perfect company on the way and who can resist a Ronnie Bag of Doom as the sun comes up:

20171222_082629.thumb.jpg.fbd54a8f7bd65dd9edc94170481d0885.jpg

Nice. 

A quick check on my phone and what do I  see but....

23 hours ago, FlyingDonut said:

Cable 73 $2.49: 

s-l1600.jpg

This looks like the one I already posted FD. Go find me another (thumbsu

18 hours ago, SammyBComics said:

My Contribution

Fantastic Four #26

$2.29 Cover Price

FF26.gif

IMG_0330.jpg

Whey-hey! A new one! 

Well done SammyB. That makes 19 now.  I'll update the chart tomorrow.  Can't do it on my phone you know. Find me more :headbang:

The open road beckons, to the girl from Tel Aviv (who wouldn't kneel)...

Edited by Marwood & I
:-(
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14 hours ago, SammyBComics said:

My Contribution

Fantastic Four #26

$2.29 Cover Price

Thanks again SammyBC - I've added your FF #26 $2.29 and we now have 19 confirmed variants: :headbang:

5a3d609d7e6a9_22dec.thumb.PNG.9c87e3b46ffb79fdd76ac1b15c3cfff5.PNG

 

2 hours ago, FlyingDonut said:

I think - and this is purely 100% anecdotal - that the $2.29s are harder to find than the $2.49s. There are some $2.49 FFs, for example, on sale at Milehigh.

Out of the 19 found so far, 8 are $2.29 FD. Milehigh has certainly caught on to them - I got a few images from Chuck's residence :headbang:

 

1 hour ago, PeterPark said:

I have only pursued the amazing spider-man issues but have been doing that for a few years. I may throw my hat in and see what I can find...

Dive in PeterPark, dive in! :headbang:

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:headbang: 20 confirmed variants :headbang: 

I found another:

5a3e5c1317d75_Thor17Nov19992_29.thumb.jpg.ba3a72fb41068110c373b484fa05cad1.jpg

 

He's a $2.29 November 1999 copy...

5a3e5c3ac49a2_Thor17Nov19992_29b.jpg.db043046da91fd08a751019f25f580db.jpg

 

...and makes the 'known copy' chart look like this:

23_12_17.thumb.PNG.39b65772aecd2ec6d2b1d0997b28634d.PNG

 

I also managed to snag this Spidey on an eBay impulse - we already know about it but I may now have to go for the Spidey set again, having sold them all many moons ago:

13.thumb.jpg.126676041b106346161142c4806fb5df.jpg  13b.jpg.b89466d583c6b73d7e542de890c6cf70.jpg

 

I mentioned earlier that Mile High Comics had cottoned on to the existence of these price variants, and they list them as '$2.29' or '$2.49' Newsstand copies when they spot them. I used to order a lot from Mile High back in the day when the codeword sales made the reasonable priced books worth getting. I found they would often make mistakes when they sent the books and often would send you variants in error. So I thought I'd try my luck again and ordered 4 books of which only one was noted as a '$2.29' copy. Here are the bags:

mh.jpg.176f48cd20a32bf02b43cb0784c9019a.jpg

 

So I should have received one Thor 17 price variant and 3 Fantastic Four regular $1.99 newsstands. You've seen the Thor 17 above - here are the 3 Fantastic Fours:

23.thumb.jpg.eaeb95ecc093672880cbedab423c9122.jpg 24.thumb.jpg.0b16638c1eb989212c36ca73f5a977af.jpg 1.thumb.jpg.dffc895d72dcb82b17776073071ca7e8.jpg

 

My instincts were right - 23 and 24 are both $2.49 variants :headbang::headbang::

23b.jpg.a754a6b6dd75c14545f7b50f1280528a.jpg   24b.jpg.a5320d77a2284c1e99e801c674b620bf.jpg

 

'Mistakes' in your favour are always cool aren't they :grin:

I invited Rock of MyAmadeus fame to chip in some posts back but he declined and decided to play silly beggars as usual. The world's against him you know. I saw him post on another site that these copies may be intended for the Canadian market. I was hoing he'd elaborate on that here. If we look again at the Thor #17 we see that the cover price clearly states $2.29 US:

5a3e5c3ac49a2_Thor17Nov19992_29b.jpg.db043046da91fd08a751019f25f580db.jpg

 

Inside, the indicia says 'Price $1.99 in the US and $2.99 in Canada':

2.thumb.jpg.f85a87e5dde3fb04cbe7ab65078cf1fe.jpg

 

So I don't see how these price variants can be anything to do with Canadian pricing. Maybe Rocky will have a change of pants heart and join the debate ( @RockMyAmadeus ), but until then it remains my view that they are US market testers.

Anyway, for someone who no longer collects them, I now have 4 copies. All in the name of research of course, but if @Lazyboy is right I should be able to sell them to a dork discerning collector for at least one meelion dollars at some point :D

 

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7 minutes ago, Marwood & I said:

mentioned earlier that Mile High Comics had cottoned on to the existence of these price variants, and they list them as '$2.29' or '$2.49' Newsstand copies when they spot them. I used to order a lot from Mile High back in the day when the codeword sales made the reasonable priced books worth getting. I found they would often make mistakes when they sent the books and often would send you variants in error. So I thought I'd try my luck again and ordered 4 books of which only one was noted as a '$2.29' copy. Here are the bags:

Brilliant strategy Sir !!

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9 minutes ago, Lazyboy said:

We already covered that at the start of page 3. :baiting:

Did we? Well, nobody else reads my threads so I don't see why I should have to!

Seriously, I know - I was just trying to lure the Rocky Horror Show in.  I'd like to hear what he has to say about it all.

Kind of you to find the fault line though. I will wear my Fan Club badge with pride :cloud9:

Spoiler

lb.PNG.ce89d64a738fa11d658c1c3d170da5a6.PNG

                                                                                          :baiting:

 

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Is it possible there were just different markets that were deemed to be accepting of a higher price? The book market theory works for one price variant but it seems all these books have two. And then prices across the board were made to be 2.25, correct? Is this a test market price variant failure? The market didn't support an increase in price that is that large. I would have to check but at this time the direct editions were all 1.99 as well, right?

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1 hour ago, PeterPark said:

Is it possible there were just different markets that were deemed to be accepting of a higher price? The book market theory works for one price variant but it seems all these books have two. And then prices across the board were made to be 2.25, correct? Is this a test market price variant failure? The market didn't support an increase in price that is that large. I would have to check but at this time the direct editions were all 1.99 as well, right?

Regular sized direct editions were all $1.99, yes. Test market pricing is the only logical theory I can see. Unlike the 30/35 cent experiments though, they doubled up to see if people would buy at one or both higher prices. What is odd to me is that they then muddied the waters with a raft of $2.99 double sized issues slap bang in the middle of the experiment. Why would you do that if you were tracking the take up of higher priced regular issues?

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19 hours ago, Marwood & I said:

Regular sized direct editions were all $1.99, yes. Test market pricing is the only logical theory I can see. Unlike the 30/35 cent experiments though, they doubled up to see if people would buy at one or both higher prices. What is odd to me is that they then muddied the waters with a raft of $2.99 double sized issues slap bang in the middle of the experiment. Why would you do that if you were tracking the take up of higher priced regular issues?

Eeets a mystery, is for sure!

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