The cgc to start charging dealers an annual membership fee of $199.16658

Originally Posted by Transplant
Why do it? 1 answer. It gets a dealer used to paying "something" for the privilege of being a dealer. Next year or the year after, when it's time to renew that dealer fee, who knows what the prices will be. And oh, by the way, read that dealer agreement again.

Anything disparaging CGC is grounds to be terminated as a dealer.

Originally Posted by IronMan
@CFP_Comics
@BigRedOne1944

Parts of what you both say I agree with and parts not so much. But overall both posts seem to lack some perspective or nuance.

CBCS has already had a large increase in submissions. A lot of that starting summer of 2021 after CGC's price increases and their TAT's through the roof.

I'm not on discussion boards to promote my own business of cleaning and pressing comics so I never mention it. But I need to bring it up here. Since June of 2021, I had two of my four dealer accounts (that is store owners I press books for) start using CBCS almost entirely. Leaving CGC. One remains brand loyal to CGC and one is like me - uses whomever seems best for whatever being sent in and the circumstances/needs of the moment.

I'm just one little niche in huge market, but since June of 2021 I sent - in total - nearly as many clients books to CBCS as CGC. A 40/60 split. That is a huge increase for CBCS from years before. Despite my overall number of books pressed and sent to grading companies be much more in 2021 than 2020, I sent fewer books to CGC in 2021 than 2020.

Of course CBCS's TAT have increased to close to what CGC is at - on their LEAST EXPENSIVE tiers. But one of the two dealers that switched to CBCS lives by "time is money" mantra. He doesn't use the least expensive tiers ever. And CBCS absolutely DOMINATES CGC on the faster, more expensive tiers. Right now the only CGC tier that gets someone their books back in a month or less is walkthrough at $150 a book retail. CBCS can do that with multiple different tiers starting at $50 retail for 1975 and later books and $58 for pre 1975 books.

The sky is not falling for CGC - this $199 dealer account annual charge and a second price increase in less than a year will not cause a mass exodus of dealers and submissions leaving CGC. But CGC and those saying this will not change anything are also not fully grounded in reality. A small price increase by CGC and opportunity to get books back quickly from CBCS already drove a bunch of business CBCS's way. This will just add to that trend. It is - as I have said before - not an all or nothing, switch or stay situation. This WILL lead to more people giving CBCS a try and perhaps liking the experience and final product.

And at the risk of harping on a single point, IMHO CGC underestimates the role of dealers as influencers. For 20+ years, CGC seemed to believe their association with dealers was beneficial to CGC. Now CGC appears to believe that it is dealers that mostly benefit from their association with CGC. A lot of people ask me about which grading company. When people walk into the stores of the two dealers that have switched to CBCS and see LOTS of CBCS comics out for sale, that has an influence. That CBCS is just like CGC. Maybe better since the comic shop they use has so many now.

Even small gains in market share have the potential for big changes in how CBCS is viewed. People think of CGC as #1 because on eBay that is what most of the graded books for sale are. But if CBCS becomes more commonly seen, people's views may well change.

I believe this may well be - or turn into - a situation best described by the text on your car's rear view mirrors. "Objects in mirror are closer than they appear"

Originally Posted by CFP_Comics


If we are talking empirical data, I just dropped off about 2,500 books to CGC. In that same time period I mailed out 37 to CBCS. I had one customer previous to that ask me to send his magazines to CBCS instead of CGC. I am not seeing any kind of meaningful shift in where books are submitted despite listing that I submit to both companies on my website. It may happen, but it is not happening ATM.

Originally Posted by CFP_Comics
If we are talking empirical data, I just dropped off about 2,500 books to CGC. In that same time period I mailed out 37 to CBCS. I had one customer previous to that ask me to send his magazines to CBCS instead of CGC. I am not seeing any kind of meaningful shift in where books are submitted despite listing that I submit to both companies on my website. It may happen, but it is not happening ATM.

Originally Posted by DrWatson
Quote:

Originally Posted by CFP_Comics
If we are talking empirical data, I just dropped off about 2,500 books to CGC. In that same time period I mailed out 37 to CBCS. I had one customer previous to that ask me to send his magazines to CBCS instead of CGC. I am not seeing any kind of meaningful shift in where books are submitted despite listing that I submit to both companies on my website. It may happen, but it is not happening ATM.

It stands to reason that you press more books that end up being graded by the cgc versus CBCS. Why wouldn't it? The fact that you hand carry the books to the cgc versus mailing them out to CBCS would also be a contributing factor in those numbers. When CBCS was based in Florida, I would guess that you hand delivered more books to CBCS than you are currently mailing out to Texas.