Market is Insane 5 5

[october]

46 minutes ago, Bookery said:

While never exactly "hot", I used to have a fair number of Classics collectors.  And in each case, they ONLY collected Classics.  Some wanted only 1sts, a couple wanted every variation.  But they sold slowly but steadily.  But all of these collectors were older gentlemen.  I think one actually completed his collection.  The others drifted away (or passed away I'm afraid).  At any rate... I have no local collectors for them at all anymore.  I even had a greater number of collectors for media-westerns... Roy Rogers, Gene Autry, Lone Ranger, etc.  They are all gone too.  I used to get about $75 (minimum) for any original B-western movie one-sheet (nothing special... just basic movies).  Now, if they sell it all, it would be for under $20.  When I opened the business in 1984... Tarzan comics were still pretty popular... I sold a lot.  Today, nobody ever asks about them.  This isn't a complaint btw... it's just the way of things.  Every generation has different things they hold dear.

Unfortunately... my rule of 75 counts days, not years.  If it's over 75 days old... I've probably forgotten about it.  If I made this same post 11 weeks ago... I apologize.

Your examples are interesting, but these seem like long term secular declines....not crashes. Interest in many things wax and wane over the decades, but I am far more concerned with how prices will move in the next five years than I am the performance of something like your Tarzan example. I was barely out of diapers in 1984.

If your time horizon is a 30-40 years, I don't I think you will find many people with a positive outlook for the comic market.

[Mercury Man]

3 hours ago, Karl Liebl said:

Who knows?  When is the last time you have seen a kid collecting stamps?

Or model trains.  There is a hobby on death's door. 

[FlyingDonut]

1 hour ago, Bookery said:

While never exactly "hot", I used to have a fair number of Classics collectors.  And in each case, they ONLY collected Classics.  Some wanted only 1sts, a couple wanted every variation.  But they sold slowly but steadily.  But all of these collectors were older gentlemen.  I think one actually completed his collection.  The others drifted away (or passed away I'm afraid).  At any rate... I have no local collectors for them at all anymore.  I even had a greater number of collectors for media-westerns... Roy Rogers, Gene Autry, Lone Ranger, etc.  They are all gone too.  I used to get about $75 (minimum) for any original B-western movie one-sheet (nothing special... just basic movies).  Now, if they sell it all, it would be for under $20.  When I opened the business in 1984... Tarzan comics were still pretty popular... I sold a lot.  Today, nobody ever asks about them.  This isn't a complaint btw... it's just the way of things.  Every generation has different things they hold dear.

Unfortunately... my rule of 75 counts days, not years.  If it's over 75 days old... I've probably forgotten about it.  If I made this same post 11 weeks ago... I apologize.

100% in agreement with the above. What was the most valuable comic in the first Overstreet Price Guide? Feature Book 26. It is worth - probably in actual dollars, not inflation adjusted - the same now as it was in 1970.

[theCapraAegagrus]

16 hours ago, 1Cool said:

Those of use that have been around long enough to remember the first few years of CGC are not really phased by the multiples people are currently paying for 9.8 vs 9.6 vs 9.4.  Right after CGC started it was a mad dash to get the single highest 9.8 and people paid nose bleed prices at the time.  People will always compete for the highest or ultra high grade copies especially if they are registry competitors.  The current market is crazy for a ton of other reasons but paying nose bleed prices for 9.8s is definitely not new.  I personally don't see the sense in it and I'm a bit worried if the future will bode well for those stockpiling 9.8 books at premium pries but everyone is free to buy what they like and people will continue to grade books in hopes of filling that niche. 

I didn't really consider "registry competition". Is that really a thing..?

[theCapraAegagrus]

16 hours ago, VintageComics said:

But you're reading into my intentions (incorrectly, may I add).

I simply asked if you were new to comics with no other qualifiers, teasing or anything else so you immediately went on the defensive.

Anyway, my intent was to ask you how long you've been in comics but you've gotten your back up about it so there's not much point in further discussion. No big deal.

And you into mine. Multiple times.

[comicdonna]

17 minutes ago, TwoPiece said:

I didn't really consider "registry competition". Is that really a thing..?

Not as much as it was 10 years ago.  

[Bookery]

10 hours ago, october said:

Your examples are interesting, but these seem like long term secular declines....not crashes.

You are correct... I used the term only as it was already employed in previous posts... but I addressed it initially in quotes.  Most markets recede rather than actually crash.  (However... manga is the exception... for us it did pretty much crash.  We went into one summer break selling about $1000 per week in manga issues as usual... and when school resumed in September, it was all but dead.  Apparently teenage girls spread the word it was no longer cool to collect manga, or something... but the speed of the collapse was astounding.  We currently sell $0 per week in manga).  Non-sports cards was another market that pretty much actually crashed (a long long time ago)... but it went from a major seller to virtually nothing in very short order.  I don't really count things like Beanie Babies, Garbage Pail Kids, etc.... these were clearly short-term fads right from the start. 

History is a great guide to the future.  But there is something going on right now that is pretty close to unprecedented.  Young people are no longer collecting anything.  People have always collected things in the past.  Cavemen probably collected shiny stones.  But today everything is downloaded and temporary (and dangerously fungible... texts, movies, speeches, etc., can be endlessly altered, edited, re-drawn, reworked to make it more popular, more PC, more politically advantageous, whatever... in a way that a tangible object cannot).  Bradbury worried books would be burned... instead they are simply... re-invented.

[theCapraAegagrus]

20 minutes ago, Bookery said:

...Non-sports cards was another market that pretty much actually crashed (a long long time ago)... but it went from a major seller to virtually nothing in very short order...

I remember in the 90's I had quite a few valuable hockey cards that become seemingly worthless at the turn of the 21st century.

[NoMan]

Have Chinese collectors had an impact on prices? I’m half joking (couple of years ago some guy in the long running SA AF 15  thread was convince once the Chinese collectors/investors showed up prices would suddenly spike and stay out of reach for most of us). 

Dealers?:  lots of Chinese callers snatching up books?

Edited June 6, 2019 by NoMan

[theCapraAegagrus]

6 minutes ago, NoMan said:

...(couple of years ago some guy in the long running SA AF 15  thread was convince once the Chinese collectors/investors showed up prices would suddenly spike and stay out of reach for most of us)...

Wtf?

[NoMan]

5 minutes ago, TwoPiece said:

Wtf?

Yeah. That’s the way I remembered it. Now my memory is starting to get hazy just speaking in general, but yeah this guy was really under the theory that the Chinese would carry this hobby into the future with big prices only getting bigger because, we’ll, became of the Chinese. Look on af 15 thread circa two years ago. 

oh yeah, SPIDEY WILL NEVER DIE was his rallying call. Good times. 

Edited June 6, 2019 by NoMan

[theCapraAegagrus]

Just now, NoMan said:

Yeah. That’s the way I remembered it. Now my memory is starting to get hazy just speaking in general, but yeah this guy was really under the theory that the Chinese would carry this hobby into the future with big prices only getting bigger. Look on af 15 thread circa two years ago. 

Is it as entertaining as Gabe or Swampi? I don't wanna waste my time on a boring read.

[DavidTheDavid]

3 hours ago, Bookery said:

You are correct... I used the term only as it was already employed in previous posts... but I addressed it initially in quotes.  Most markets recede rather than actually crash.  (However... manga is the exception... for us it did pretty much crash.  We went into one summer break selling about $1000 per week in manga issues as usual... and when school resumed in September, it was all but dead.  Apparently teenage girls spread the word it was no longer cool to collect manga, or something... but the speed of the collapse was astounding.  We currently sell $0 per week in manga).  Non-sports cards was another market that pretty much actually crashed (a long long time ago)... but it went from a major seller to virtually nothing in very short order.  I don't really count things like Beanie Babies, Garbage Pail Kids, etc.... these were clearly short-term fads right from the start. 

History is a great guide to the future.  But there is something going on right now that is pretty close to unprecedented.  Young people are no longer collecting anything.  People have always collected things in the past.  Cavemen probably collected shiny stones.  But today everything is downloaded and temporary (and dangerously fungible... texts, movies, speeches, etc., can be endlessly altered, edited, re-drawn, reworked to make it more popular, more PC, more politically advantageous, whatever... in a way that a tangible object cannot).  Bradbury worried books would be burned... instead they are simply... re-invented.

Many collect digital goods now. We had cases filled with tapes, then cd's. Today, you either create a digital library or just pay a monthly subscription for as much music as you can get. Apple TV advertises, "Build Your Collection!" Gamers have game collections on Steam. People who play digital card games like Hearthstone collect those cards. I work in digital gaming, and we love when a completist comes along, someone who wants every card or item in a game. Skins, avatars, Kindle libraries: those are collectibles. There are even living digital card games now, with fixed quantities of certain cards. There's a digital card game built on the blockchain; these cards can be traded and have varying values. There are even digital collectibles that are simply like old trading cards not connected to any game, but built on the blockchain so that each copy is singular. Heck, lots of kids collect memes, storing thousands of them in computer folders.

I don't think that collecting impulse will ever die. It's just been massively disrupted as has everything else in our society.

Edited June 6, 2019 by DavidTheDavid

[NoMan]

3 minutes ago, TwoPiece said:

Is it as entertaining as Gabe or Swampi? I don't wanna waste my time on a boring read.

I find Swampie a bore. Don’t understand the interest he gets. 

Don’t/Cant remember Gabe. 

No this guy was genuine and interesting. He couldn’t or wouldn’t listen to anyone that AF15 might possibly slow down a bit from the madness of 2017. And it did and he disappeared. 

[1Cool]

12 minutes ago, NoMan said:

I find Swampie a bore. Don’t understand the interest he gets. 

Don’t/Cant remember Gabe. 

No this guy was genuine and interesting. He couldn’t or wouldn’t listen to anyone that AF15 might possibly slow down a bit from the madness of 2017. And it did and he disappeared. 

Can't remember Gabe?  You missed out on some great reading material.

[WolverineX]

14 hours ago, FlyingDonut said:

100% in agreement with the above. What was the most valuable comic in the first Overstreet Price Guide? Feature Book 26. It is worth - probably in actual dollars, not inflation adjusted - the same now as it was in 1970.

It was worth more than Action1?

[Hollywood1892]

On 6/4/2019 at 9:45 AM, TwoPiece said:

Why would you a buy a 9.8 Silver Age key for 5 figures, when you could get a 9.6 for $8k?

Why buy a 9.6 for $8k when you can get a 9.4 for < $4k?

The prices seemingly continue to cut in half for each grade below. Why the insanity? Especially when the line between grades 9.0 and above are so thin. What is wrong with you people!?

This is, of course, speaking to the graded-comic market and not the raw comic market. Is the raw market any more stable and reasonable?

This thread sounds eerily similar to a thread I made a few weeks back titled "What's happening to the hobby?"

[theCapraAegagrus]

Just now, Hollywood1892 said:

This thread sounds eerily similar to a thread I made a few weeks back titled "What's happening to the hobby?"

That's cute.

It isn't.

[NoMan]

1 hour ago, 1Cool said:

Can't remember Gabe?  You missed out on some great reading material.

Maybe. Was he the guy in the Journal threads that was gonna make a killing selling comics, lives with his parents, got fired from Subway, etc, etc, etc....

[theCapraAegagrus]

Just now, NoMan said:

Maybe. Was he the guy in the Journal threads that was gonna make a killing selling comics, lives with his parents, got fired from Subway, etc, etc, etc....

Yes.

His life goal is/was, "to be the next big thing making a million dollars selling comics".

He made like $250 "profit" in 5 years and had thousands in credit card debt.