25 Years Ago9866
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X51 private msg quote post Address this user | |
This happened roughly 25 years ago. |
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 I hear their hourly rate is outrageous!
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sportshort private msg quote post Address this user | |
Quote:Originally Posted by X51 How many millions of people saw their "retirement" go down the drain when Supes came back from the dead? |
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Collector
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X51 private msg quote post Address this user | |
My niece and my dad who did not collect comics wanted a set of the comic story-line after the issue had come out. I explained that it was not worth it and that even I did not want a set. I assured them that it was overproduced and it was not a great investment. I had to check the newsstand everyday to find a copy at cover price. Eventually a store manager sold me a black bagged copy at cover price that they had stashed behind the counter. As a result of them pleading for a set, I ended up buying about 5 copies of the newsstand version. I knew there would be less of them and the price had already escalated on the direct market version. I figured it was a reasonably safe investment by that time.  |
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Collector
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X51 private msg quote post Address this user | |
Later when they brought him back, I don't think I bought any of those. Many years later I did buy a box set of them because I thought it was a neat package that you don't see too often.  |
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 Collector
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moodswing private msg quote post Address this user | |
Got my 5. That is right when I actually started really collecting...what a horrible time  |
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| Post 5 • IP flag post | ||
 Why just the women? I like bears.
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Gaard private msg quote post Address this user | |
| I bought it when it came out. Not for investment purposes, but for curiosity's sake. I remember how chic it was for collectors to roll their eyes and tell you how stupid it was to buy it, but as a comic collector, how can you not want to read it? | ||
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Collector
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X51 private msg quote post Address this user | |
Quote:Originally Posted by Gaard I didn't want to read it because I knew he was coming back and that it was a marketing ploy. I was hoping they'd really kill him since I'm not a DC comics fan. |
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 Collector
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michaelekrupp private msg quote post Address this user | |
| I think the whole thing is a classic example of how both publishers and retailers mishandled the influx of new readers that were pouring into the hobby in the early ‘90s. At that point comic book collecting had become a very trendy thing to do and there was unprecedented interest from the general public. Rather than using this interest to build lifelong comic book readers, both publishers and retailers went for the fast buck. The publishers by using gimmicks such as multiple covers on the same comic and polybags with different trading cards but the same comic, and retailers selling months old back issues for many times the cover price. Do you think that the kid who blew his entire allowance on multiples of X-Force #1 or the adult who set out $75 for the black bagged death of Superman issue became lifelong comic book readers? It wasn’t long before that unprecedented interest in comics ended up with the bottom falling out of the entire industry as people realized they were being had. Both publishers and retailers ended up paying a heavy price for their greed. It still sticks in my craw all these years later. | ||
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 Masculinity takes a holiday.
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EbayMafia private msg quote post Address this user | |
Quote:Originally Posted by michaelekrupp I have to politely disagree with some of this. Being a young comic book enthusiast in the 80's was an awkward thing. I didn't really want my fellow students to know that I had a comic book collection...it wasn't generally accepted in the way that having a baseball card collection would have been. Now comic conventions are filled to capacity, comic movies are major blockbusters, t.v. shows are everywhere and my teenage son has no problem with his friends knowing that dad owns thousands of comic books. Certainly there were mis-steps and the industry may not have turned the publicity into life-long comic book buyers after Death of Superman, but it may have been an important stepping stone in paving the way and growing the audience for the MCU. I do believe the ends has justified the means. Today comic book inspired entertainment is a huge part of the overall entertainment industry...far greater than I ever could have imagined in 1985. |
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X51 private msg quote post Address this user | |
Quote:Originally Posted by michaelekrupp Yes. When you print 4 million copies of something, the cost to print a single issue drops unbelievably. They made more profit per book and made no effort to pass along the savings. |
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X51 private msg quote post Address this user | |
Quote:Originally Posted by EbaySeller Marvel's cinematic success is because they quit making campy movies and started taking the stories seriously. The public had almost 40 years of familiarity and/or awareness of the Marvel characters by the time they started treating them seriously. Greed is definitely what killed comic sales in the 90's. Everything was hyped as being the next hot collectible. Fans figured out they'd been lied to. |
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| Post 11 • IP flag post | ||
 PLOD
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theCapraAegagrus private msg quote post Address this user | |
| I love the Death of Superman series. I have a Superman Vol. 2 #75 graded 9.8 and signed by Jurgens. I think it was the 5th graded book that I ever bought.  |
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I hear their hourly rate is outrageous!
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sportshort private msg quote post Address this user | |
Quote:Originally Posted by theCapraAegagrus I agree, I know I didn’t sound like I was happy with the investment part of the book but I did love the story. It was what brought me DC in the first place. Still “Make mine Marvel. |
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Doc_Cop private msg quote post Address this user | |
| Have to agree with Michaelekrupp. Being the owner of a LCS at the time I sold out of 400 books in the first hour of opening my doors that day. People who had never stepped foot in my store were buying this issue. Just like the stock market, comics are news driven. At that time Marvel had gone public and in order to raise their stock price and keep investors happy, the price of a standard issue had gone from .75 cents to $1.25 the largest jump (percentage wise) ever in the industry. Additionally, instead of paying 50% of the cover price in the direct market, comic distributors were now charging 60% of the cover prices making it more difficult to order for the LCS owners. Specialty covers were common and becoming more and more expensive for the average comic reader. The pull lists were shrinking and the market had finally went bust. I am thrilled to be back into collecting my bronze and silver age and am very cautious when buying new books. Nuff said. | ||
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Wraith private msg quote post Address this user | |
| I thoroughly enjoyed death and return of superman | ||
| Post 15 • IP flag post | ||
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I hear their hourly rate is outrageous!
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sportshort private msg quote post Address this user | |
| @X51 "Yes. When you print 4 million copies of something, the cost to print a single issue drops unbelievably. They made more profit per book and made no effort to pass along the savings." Greed, Yes. Comic book stores were so greedy in the 90's that currently released books were marked up on the day of release so I couldn't afford to buy these books. Unfortunately I am seeing the same thing today. (I previously posted this on another thread) Last week I saw a currently released book for sale for about 40 dollars. it was crazy and I refuse to have any part in that nonsense so I will not be going back to that comic book store because it cares more about the quick buck than it does in growing the hobby. when i was a kid 10 comics were $2.50 and now they're over 40 dollars, I couldn't afford $2.50 back then, what kid can afford 40 dollars now. It's gone insane. |
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 Beaten by boat oars
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Studley_Dudley private msg quote post Address this user | |
Quote:Originally Posted by sportshort Batman Damned #1 comes to mind. I couldn't justify $40 the day after release. I ran into this The Love She Offered #1 too. Bunch of hillbillies trying to sell it for $20+ right after it came out. My patience with some of the shenanigans runs real thin. I have to set up pull lists now for everything and hope the book doesn't suck. |
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I hear their hourly rate is outrageous!
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sportshort private msg quote post Address this user | |
Quote:Originally Posted by Studley_Dudley That sucks that you have to do preventative spending, so you don't miss out or pay through the nose. |
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| Post 18 • IP flag post | ||
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CatCovers private msg quote post Address this user | |
| One of the reasons I got out of the hobby for a while in the mid to late '90s. My LCS shut down and the only other option was a local chain that seemed to delight in finding ways to screw its customers. Books that were expected to be hot never touched the shelves - they got bagged and priced at $10 or more as soon as they arrived. Back issues were often regraded and repriced at the register. | ||
| Post 19 • IP flag post | ||
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X51 private msg quote post Address this user | |
Quote:Originally Posted by sportshort The comic shops were in a bind because the hype was so intense. They hype fed itself. A store might order double what they expected to sell and still sell out due to speculators. They couldn't restock because the distributor sold out also. This meant they had to buy back comics from their customers. A customer wasn't going to buy a comic and sell it for a loss the same day. This meant stores had to buy it back at cover price and mark it up 30%-40% immediately or they weren't meeting customer demand and making a profit. Many stores held back books that were going to sell out of just so they wouldn't have to gouge everyone too badly. The stores aren't fully to blame for the greed. The real problem is that everyone believed the hype and kept demanding the issues they wanted even though they were highly overpriced. Supply started exceeding demand and the bubble collapsed. Speculators quit speculating and everyone discovered that there wasn't as many customers as they thought there were. Another problem was that everyone wanted to start their comic book business and stores started having to compete with their customers to sell comics. |
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| Post 20 • IP flag post | ||
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I hear their hourly rate is outrageous!
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sportshort private msg quote post Address this user | |
Quote:Originally Posted by CatCovers Ditto! |
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| Post 21 • IP flag post | ||
 Please continue to ignore anything I post.
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southerncross private msg quote post Address this user | |
| In the 90s I stopped collecting. I remember buying two copies of x-force 1. One to read and one to keep sealed. At the register a customer had bought fifty copies of issue 1. Couldn't believe it. Probably still had them. The gimmick covers were a novelty to start with then become tiresome. The popular characters like wolverine and punisher were appearing in guest appearances in other characters books every month. Then marvel had a bright idea. Publish x-man 2 weeks earlier then the standard issue with better page quality and a bigger cover price to match. Fans of the x-man were not going to wait a extra 2 weeks for the cheaper regular copy so they bought the earlier expansive one. So marvel thought well the fans have spoken. Dropped the cheap newspaper print book and just had the more expansive one. Then rolled out the more expansive comics across all their titles. That's when I said I'm out. And only got back into collecting in 2005. |
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michaelekrupp private msg quote post Address this user | |
| @EbaySeller My memories of that time period are a little different than yours. Having attended the Motor City Comic Con nearly every year since its inception I can say for certain that the biggest years by far were the boom years of the early ‘90s. Attendance (dealers and fans)was much more than it is nowadays. There was also a lot of media attention at that time, with stories along the lines of “that comic that your mom threw away is now worth a thousand dollars” appearing regularly in the press. Comics came to be seen by the general public as something valuable, which retailers were quick to reinforce. Yes, perhaps the fans bear some blame for the whole mess as well. After all, who is more responsible, the guy who put last months back issue on the wall for $20 or the guy who walked in, said “okay” and opened his wallet. Both sides bear some responsibility there, but the practice clearly proved to be shortsighted on the part of retailers. I agree with you that the proliferation of comic book movies, something that began long after the market implosion of the mid 90’s, is bringing attention back to the medium. Many of the people I now see at the Con are there to meet the tv/ movie celebrities and many of the people there buying comics are asking for material related to the latest comic book movie. Unfortunately, as others on this thread have noted, we are again seeing predatory pricing practices on the newest “hot” issues relating to these items. While I certainly hope that history doesn’t repeat itself, it likely will, although the industry doesn’t have near as far to fall this time. | ||
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X51 private msg quote post Address this user | |
| In the late 90's I used to run into a lot of people that quit collecting around 1994. Many of them got fed up with the hype and the gimmicks. Most of them left and thought they were the only ones tired of it all. They didn't realize a large number of people made the same choice at the same time. | ||
| Post 24 • IP flag post | ||
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Darkseid_of_town private msg quote post Address this user | |
| I remember the store I bought from had sold out several times over before it came out and unless you had pre-ordered they were charging 50 dollars a copy the day it hit the market. My friend owned a small comic stand at the flea market and reserved me two at cover.....gave my second copy to a woman I was friends with who wanted one for her son, and would have missed out otherwise. Never bothered with the entire reign of superman and return storylines....this was one of the triggers that helped me leave the hobby |
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Maritimer private msg quote post Address this user | |
| I 'took a break' from comics in 1995 although not from all the speculating and gimmicks that were going on. I was tired of reading basically the same stories I had read in the 60's and 70's. It just seemed at the time DC and Marvel were regurgitating much of their previous material. I returned to the hobby in 1999 when Abnett, Lanning and Coipel were working on Legion Lost. That was a good story. I sort of left again in 2012, having given the New 52 a chance and being sorely disappointed when I realized DC had thrown away my two favourite franchises, the Legion of Super-Heroes and the JSA. Rebirth brought me back again but I have a feeling I'm going to be really let down by Mr. Bendis when he relaunches the LSH. I'll have to wait and see about the JSA. I mailed out my latest submission today to CBCS Canada, Adventure Comics #300, Forever People #1, New Teen Titans #2 and Crisis On Infinite Earths #1. No pressing and no signatures, just a test drive to see what I get. I'm not expecting any 9.8's but I put a range on each one so it will be interesting to see how close I am. |
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 I live in RI and Rhode Islanders eat chili with beans.
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esaravo private msg quote post Address this user | |
| I can definitely relate to most of your stories. Here’s mine. I started buying comics from newsstands as a kid around 1967/1968. At first, I only bought DC’s and the cover price was 12 cents (although about a year or so later, they went up to 15 cents). I didn’t bother with Marvels until around 1975, when I started going to comic book shows to buy back issues. I was pretty much buying almost every new comic I could afford by the early 1980’s. But cover prices kept increasing, and by the mid-1980’s I started losing interest. I got married in 1986, and by the late 1980’s, I was pretty much done with comics. Marvel’s ridiculous overproduction of Spider-Man #1 in 1990 and X-Men #1 in 1991 told me it was definitely time to quit. I sold off a few things (regrets, I’ve had a few), but luckily kept most of my collection. The last books I remember buying in the 1990’s were Spawn #1-4 from a dealer (and I probably paid more than they are worth now). I don’t even own a Superman #75! After lying dormant for many years, my collecting urge returned with a vengeance around 5 years ago. Although I have had some lapses, like when I bought a bunch of DC’s New 52 crap, I have tried to set goals and keep my focus on only a few things (instead of trying to have EVERYTHING). I still see too many shiny things that tempt me (I am only human!), but hope I am actually reducing the number of comics I own. | ||
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Masculinity takes a holiday.
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EbayMafia private msg quote post Address this user | |
| Pricing is a function of supply and demand. It's not a moral issue, particularly in something as discretionary as comic books. When a LCS dealer commits to buy 100 issues of a comic the only people they owe anything to are the regular customers who have also made a commitment through the Pull List. Beyond that they should be selling the books for whatever the market will pay. If they are selling for $3.95 when the market is $40, someone who has never supported their shop before is likely to walk in and buy all remaining issues. The LCS has more justification than anyone for getting full current market value for the speculation books, they make the commitment and they pay the overhead to keep the shop open. Bubbles in general are almost exclusively caused by buyers. Very rarely is a bubble the result of suppliers intentionally restricting inventory. | ||
| Post 28 • IP flag post | ||
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I hear their hourly rate is outrageous!
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sportshort private msg quote post Address this user | |
Quote:Originally Posted by EbaySeller you are correct in what you say but none of that changes the fact that exorbitant pricing does not allow for new people, children mainly, to enter the hobby. until they grow up and have jobs of their own and generally speaking it's too late to introduce them to the hobby. Again, when comics where not only direct, no drug store raised their prices of popular books, they just ordered more so that they could make more money. I really do understand what you're saying but it only speed the comic hobby doom train along. |
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Beaten by boat oars
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Studley_Dudley private msg quote post Address this user | |
| I don't see many children entering the hobby, which is unfortunate. The MCU is so popular, yet it seems there are no kids heading to the stores with their grass cutting money to buy comics. These are just my own observations. I talk to shop owners and they say the same thing. Kids aren't buying comics. They see a ton of kids and families on Free Comic Book Day and that's the only time they see these folks until the next FCBD. | ||
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