Help me help you!14694

Originally Posted by Sebastsk8
I like the new cases, and obviously cant complain about the pricing or turnaround.

The only things I like more about CGC would be the custom labels(although they could maybe be done a little differently, but it's a fun addition), and I do like their label design a little better(font, print placement etc).

The other thing which generally probably just comes with time and size of the company would be exclusive signings. Especially during covid, CGC seems to have had a ton, and even more with shops that participate in their witnessed sig program that had signings. The only thing I see they do that could be done better is grouping artists/writers. A perfect example is Michael zeck, john beatty and jim shooter who do a good bit of group signings for secret wars 8. I know the logistics of some of that could be difficult, but I would jump at the chance to get something like mcfarlane, michelinie, milgrom and bagley for a group signing opportunity(I'm a venom/carnage junkie, but you get my point).

Originally Posted by xkonk
Things I like:
The ease of submitting

The quality of the grading and slab

The simplicity of the label

The lack of attempting to squeeze every dollar possible out of the process

Things that should be better:
Customer service response time/rate (when I get a response it's great, it's a question of if/when)

Clarity of submission status (where exactly are my books in the process? with full recognition that large amounts of time are "sitting around"

Clarity of pricing (with options like press screen, for example, it's often impossible to tell which books have been pressed because you just get billed with no marker as to what happened)

On behalf of our neighbors to the North, you have to do something for Canada. The border closing is beyond CBCS' control, of course, but the wait times for shipping, unclear differences between direct and Canadian submissions, and so on have led to a lot of valid complaints in various threads

Things that could be better:
I personally like the label but apparently others don't

It's been a while, but when I've been at cons with CBCS the table has been understaffed. It was hard to get someone to come with me to witness signatures

You have to magically make CBCS slabs auction for as much or more than CGC slabs so that we stop getting threads locked over arguments that go around in circles

Originally Posted by dielinfinite
@sborock

1) I think my foremost change has to be improvements with customer service. I won’t beat a dead horse on this one but I think getting a response within 24-48 hours is not an unreasonable expectation.

2) Related to the first. Internal communication needs to be improved. I’ve had instances where I would get a response, sometimes even from Darryl that a request or change to my order has been acknowledged and notated on the order only for that very change to have been missed when the books actually go into production.

3) Possibly related to number 2. This past year I have been doing a lot of mail-in sketch cover commissions. Typically the idea is to include all the CBCS paperwork with the sketch cover so that the artist has as little to fuss around with as possible. Unfortunately it often means having to put in a placeholder date for the signature/sketch. These can turn out to be way off of the actual completion date. I think current policy is to go with the date of the invoice which makes little sense to me since the artist has to include a signed CBCS form where they attest to the date completed. Shouldn’t CBCS go by that date in cases of mail-ins? Getting dates corrected is one of the issues I was referring to in number 2 above.

4) I think CBCS should consider eliminating the ART label and expanding the slab-only tier. As it is, slab-only seems incredibly similar to the Art Label in that they are both ungraded, however Art labels are included in the population report while slab-only are not. It is also extremely strange that Slab-Only is exclusively for verified signature books. If the Slab-only option could be used for unsigned, witnessed, and verified books then you could simplify things by removing a redundant option.

5) The My Comics section of our dashboard should be expanded. This may essentially be a registry but we should be able to add and remove books from this section as we buy and sell books that we may not have had slabbed ourselves. Of course we should still retain an order history but the My Comics section feels more like a collection showcase. Maybe allow us to add scans to the grader’s notes pages. This might require some moderation to ensure that the book in the scan has the correct serial number.


6) The dashboard options should be expanded to allow users to do some simple maintenance and review procedures so we don’t have to contact Customer service with minor things. Specifically things like cancelling orders, adding and removing books from invoices, or adding and removing signatures. These could also be implemented as order update requests that need to be confirmed internally.

This should also include estimated turnarounds specific to our orders and ability for CBCS to post alerts of delays or issues globally throughout the Company or specific to our orders. For example, if there is a delay specifically for pressing there could be a notice on my dashboard alerting me of the delay and allowing me to cancel or request to cancel my pressing if I would rather not wait.

The order tracking should also be expanded to include pressing progress (this may already be implemented) and progress on mail in signature opportunities

An interesting and unique option would be to allow us to add an incoming tracking number. I assume CBCS might scan their packages before they are formally unboxed and received. This could be toed to the incoming tracking number we shared so that we can know the package has been received even if it will be some time before they are unpacked.


7) I wouldn’t mind seeing the forums switch to a more fully-featured message board platform that can support sub-forums, each with their own specific sticky posts to better organize topics to our interests.


I might come up with some more if I think on it but these are the ones on my mind at the moment.

Originally Posted by Ploppy
CBCS needs a real chatboard. This one is just sad.

Originally Posted by Joosh
Great things about CBCS:

The forum is friendly and well moderated in my experience.

The free graders notes are fantastic.

In my experience looking at hundreds of slabbed books, I trust CBCS grades more than any other, especially for expensive 9.8 moderns.

CBCS holders have no newton rings. I've never seen one anyways. I also haven't seen any puddling, creep engine, or loose book issues.

CBCS President is a reachable human who actually enjoys talking to customers and helps them.