I think this goes in Cafe Society, because I want to hear from comic book fans, but if it goes somewhere else, mods please feel free to move it.
I have a bunch of comic books that I want to sell. Limiting factors:
They are mostly from the mid to late 80s, which makes them the least sought after category of comic books.
There are more than I want to sit down and grade/list individually.
There are none that are particularly rare or valuable.
I want to put as little time and effort into this as possible. I’m also not looking to make a lot of money off this, but it seems that selling them would be better than just throwing them away, the other realistic option.
I found a website - webuycomics.com, which is essentially Lone Star Comics in Arlington, TX. This seems to be the best deal I have seen online. Does anyone have any experience with them? Any better ideas?
80s comics aren’t as worthless as you think. Lotsa good stuff coming out then in the wake of X-MEN, TEEN TITANS, WATCHMEN, DARK KNIGHT RETURNS, LOVE AND ROCKETS, etc… it’s the early to mid 90s speculator boom crap that’s iffy.
First, inventory the titles and issues you have to sell. Then take digital pictures.
You could try parcelling them up in lots of 20 or so by title, character or creator and selling them “as is” on craigslist, amazon.com’s Marketplace or eBay.
Or if you’re really not disposed to making money off them: head down to your local children’s hospital and donate age-appropriate content to convalescing paitents.
Comics from the mid-to-late '80s will at least have some demand now, particularly DC and independent stuff that hasn’t been collected in trade paperbacks, or things that became more popular later on, due to word of mouth and good reviews. You might have some worthwhile comics in your collection and not even know it. I wish you could make a list – I’m looking for Suicide Squad #28 to the end of the run, and the 1988 Deadshot 4-issue miniseries, if you have those by any chance.
Just so you know, comics from the early ‘90s are far and away the most over-printed (most common) and the most devalued, since speculators killed the hobby around then. All those once-hyped books from Image and Valiant Comics and low-quality DC and Marvel stuff from when they tried to flood the market with crummy "collectors’ items" now take up space in 10-for-a-dollar bins in comic shops across the country, and the people who bought them at full price back in the day (like me) feel stupid.
$2 a piece? Oh, that’s rich, Bosda. I buy a lot of back issues from the 70’s and 80’s. I might pay that much for an individual back issue I need to fill a hole, but if I’m looking for a lot, I balk at more than 30 cents each. Like TV shows on DVD, comics are now moving to the evergreen format of TPB with both new and older material coming out in trade every month. So if you want to sell, you’ve got to give a good price, because if you don’t, your buyers will just go to the comics store instead – there’s always more worthwhile product available than anyone has money to buy.
Yeah, you won’t get $2 apiece unless you have THAT ONE ISSUE that someone needs to fill a gap in their collection that’s eluded them for years. In this age of eBay where in the last month I got Suicide Squad #1-27 for $10 and change and close to 40 issues of the Question for under $15 (not to brag… okay, maybe a little), you’re just asking way too much.
It all depends what you have, though. You could have comics that are legitimately worth $10 or even $20, and some that you couldn’t move at 10-for-a-dollar. But you’ll have a better chance asking $1 or 50 cents each than $2 each.
What i did, was go to eBay and look at all the completed auctions for my item and used that to gauge what I could expect to receive. It just gave me a base to start with and to dispel any delusions I had of what things are worth.
Thanks, everyone, for your feedback. I really don’t expect them to be worth much, that’s why I don’t want to put a lot of time into grading them all and putting them up for sale individually. The idea of selling them in runs on eBay might work, as well as checking to see what people are actually paying.
The site I found had a list of things they were looking for. I really doubt I have any, but if I do, I’ll sell them there.
I’m trying to move, and the issue is more that I can’t see paying to ship them somewhere when I haven’t read any of them in years than that I think I’m going to make money on this. In fact, for years I’ve been giving them away at Halloween, so I don’t really have a lot of age appropriate ones left to go to the Children’s Hospital.
And, BBVL, sorry, I know for a fact I don’t have those.
If I saw an ad like that in the classifieds, I wouldn’t investigate if they were priced at more than a dime a piece. Not because I wouldn’t be willing to pay 50c for some of what you’ve got, but I certainly wouldn’t be willing to pay that much for just anything.
Now, if you listed actual issues somewhere (eBay, let’s say), I’d be willing to spend more because I’d know what I was getting. I’d pay three bucks for a couple specific copies of Man-Thing, for instance. But “Comics 70s to 90s”? That describes a universe of tens of thousands of items. Of those tens of thousands, there’s maybe a hundred I think are worth $2 to me (ignoring for a moment those that are worth much, much more). Maybe another few hundred that I think are worth 30 cents a pop. Unless I know that the group you’ve got (you don’t specify how many pieces) includes those few hundred out of all the scores or thousands it might include, there’s no incentive for me to take time out of my day to even call you to find out more info.
Oh, and “fair”? There’s no such thing as fair. There’s only what someone will pay and what you will accept.
The way to sell comics if you want to get rid of them is to gather all the comics you’ve got from a specific title into a lot, list it on eBay, and write that you’ll ship media mail. If you want to maximize your profit, you’ve got to research which comics are worth anything, cherry pick those out and sell them separately for a few bucks (or more if you’ve got really good stuff), and then sell the rest in lots of 10-20 comics each. That will take a lot more time and unless you’ve got some real gems I wouldn’t expect you to make a ton more money on the deal.
