it sounds like the sky is falling...

While my position on the $5 per invoice fee hasn't changed; that is I am still upset about it and I still think it is a poor business decision as it weighs unfairly on the small collector that cannot afford to submit 30 books on an invoice; I am surprised by the passion that it has stirred in others.

In review, I submitted ten invoices this year - two coupon submissions, one signature series, on silver age, and six modern. I have no idea if the $5 charge will apply to coupon submissions or not and I'm not going to pop over an look in the middle of my journal, so I am going to assume, right or wrong, that it does/will apply to my next coupon submission - and I will have another. For when my membership expires next September, I will renew again. So let's consider the effect of the $50 I would have had to spend extra had my 2011 submission been submitted under the 2012 guidelines:

I would have had one less submission of modern books.

That's it. I would have spent that same money at CGC, not more, not much less - because I have a hard budget for comics, and a portion of that budget is for CGC - a specific hard budget, not a flexable one. And 2011 represents the year I sent in the most submissions - I think I did five or six in 2010, and only four in 2009...I just don't submit that much stuff myself.

As for the increase in actual grading and encapsulation costs: I guess I would have to had sent in two fewer books in those nine remaining submissions to cover that additional cost. All told - I would have ended up with seven fewer CGC graded books in my collection.

But - with an increase in all the grading costs - that 10% discount is worth more, right? See, there is a silver lining.

Would I like CGC to reconsider the idea of the $5 fee? Sure. Am I going to go away if they don't? No.

Are they going to get more money from me than they would anyway? No.

But are they going to do less work for the same money? Yeah, they are.

Happy Hunting

Oh, and Merry Christmas!

Lee