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Tales from the Comic Box: Rookie Adventures in Buying/Selling & Setting Up at Shows

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Wall-Crawler

15,105 views

Adventures and musings about Buying, Selling and setting up at Conventions and Shows

I participated in my first ever show last October. You can read about it here: http://boards.collectors-society.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=8903742#Post8903742

I was pleased with my sales, it was an excellent learning experience and most importantly, I had a great time. I must have did "ok" as I was invited back by the show organizers.

In my town, there use to be a larger two day Antique Show, but with the sale of the local Legion (where that event was held), the Antique Show organizers asked the organizers of the Collectibles Show to "take over"...I think this is a good thing, merging the two shows.

The first show under the new 'brand' is scheduled for Sunday, April 17th, 2016. Moving forward, the plan is to have a regular two day show in October.

For as long as there is some degree of interest I will share my experiences, good and bad. I also look forward to any new comments and tips from more seasoned sellers. Thanks for your interest!

Thanks for reading!

To see old comments for this Journal entry, click here. New comments can be added below.

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193 Comments


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On 9/26/2020 at 1:55 PM, Wall-Crawler said:

I have been waiting for a recent CCS/CGC submission status to change, fast tracked and nothing so I emailed as it has been a few weeks out.  

I was told by a CSR that they will forward my information to their "loopers" to try to get my invoice out. Are they being funny? Going to travel back in time to speed things up?

(:

 

 

Ok, Frustrated. That one CSR did nothing, apparently. 

I emailed this week and found out that, for whatever reason my CCS Fast Track sub was not placed in the Fast Track stream so had been SITTING there with CCS. Sigh. I use CCS maybe once a year...This may change that considering the TAT. Lots of different options.  Books were sitting since July 27, 2020.  Now still have to be pressed and graded and shipped.

I should have had them all back by now...

:censored:

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Buying Update:

Buying wise, 2020 is proving to be a very good year! To date I have:

  • bought a UF #4, 1st Miles Morales Voldemort 9.8 and flipped for a VERY nice profit, 
  • bought a very nice SPAWN collection and sold 1/3 of the collection so far (lots of low print run books) for a very nice profit,
  • bought a small Star Wars Clone Wars lot that had two copies of 1st Ahsoka Tango (both are currently with CGC),
  • bought a nice original owner Golden Age collection with lots of Canadian Editions, mostly Western, War and early Classics and Dell painted covers that I am still processing, and

I just bought a near complete set of Star Wars Legacy and Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic. A few doubles of some. A very tight short box worth of Dark Horse SW comics!  Now I need to find a nice SA haul of DC and Marvel 1st appearances...Dare to dream...

Star Wars: Legacy Vol.1 Dark Horse

0.5 x2  

1 1st print 

4

5x2

6x2

8x2

9x2

10

11x2

12x2

13x2

14x2

15x2

16

17x2

18x2

19x2

20x2

25x2

26x2

28x2

29x2

30x2

31x2

34x2

36x2

37

40x2

41x2

43x2

46x3

47

48x2

49x2

50x4

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic Vol.1 Dark Horse

5

6x2 (1st Appearance of Haazen - Cameo of Rohlan Dyre) 

9x2 ( 1st Appearance of Darth Revan)

10x2

11

13x2

14x2

15x2

16x2

17x2

18x2

19x2

20x2

21x2

22x2 (1st Appearance of Mission Vao)

24x2

25x2 (1st Appearance of Celeste Morne)

30x2

31x2 (1st Appearance of Malak) 

33x2

34x2

35x2

36x2

39x2

45x2

46x2

47x2

48x2 (1st Appearance Dmagol) 

49x2

50x2 

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic Handbook 

1x2

Now my task is to go through and see if there are any other modern SW keys from here that are picking up steam.  If anyone has some insight, would appreciate it. Note: The two copies of KOTOR #9 and Star Wars Legacy #1 will be going to CGC. Sample pics from collection:

20201013_134823.jpg

20201013_134855.jpg

Edited by Wall-Crawler
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On 10/13/2020 at 2:09 PM, Wall-Crawler said:

Buying Update:

Buying wise, 2020 is proving to be a very good year! To date I have:

  • bought a UF #4, 1st Miles Morales Voldemort 9.8 and flipped for a VERY nice profit, 
  • bought a very nice SPAWN collection and sold 1/3 of the collection so far (lots of low print run books) for a very nice profit,
  • bought a small Star Wars Clone Wars lot that had two copies of 1st Ahsoka Tango (both are currently with CGC),
  • bought a nice original owner Golden Age collection with lots of Canadian Editions, mostly Western, War and early Classics and Dell painted covers that I am still processing, and

I just bought a near complete set of Star Wars Legacy and Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic. A few doubles of some. A very tight short box worth of Dark Horse SW comics!  Now I need to find a nice SA haul of DC and Marvel 1st appearances...Dare to dream...

Star Wars: Legacy Vol.1 Dark Horse

0.5 x2  

1 1st print 

4

5x2

6x2

8x2

9x2

10

11x2

12x2

13x2

14x2

15x2

16

17x2

18x2

19x2

20x2

25x2

26x2

28x2

29x2

30x2

31x2

34x2

36x2

37

40x2

41x2

43x2

46x3

47

48x2

49x2

50x4

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic Vol.1 Dark Horse

5

6x2 (1st Appearance of Haazen - Cameo of Rohlan Dyre) 

9x2 ( 1st Appearance of Darth Revan)

10x2

11

13x2

14x2

15x2

16x2

17x2

18x2

19x2

20x2

21x2

22x2 (1st Appearance of Mission Vao)

24x2

25x2 (1st Appearance of Celeste Morne)

30x2

31x2 (1st Appearance of Malak) 

33x2

34x2

35x2

36x2

39x2

45x2

46x2

47x2

48x2 (1st Appearance Dmagol) 

49x2

50x2 

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic Handbook 

1x2

Now my task is to go through and see if there are any other modern SW keys from here that are picking up steam.  If anyone has some insight, would appreciate it. Note: The two copies of KOTOR #9 and Star Wars Legacy #1 will be going to CGC. Sample pics from collection:

20201013_134823.jpg

20201013_134855.jpg

Selling either of the #9 or #31 first revan/malak?

Edited by Nightwingsbutler
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3 hours ago, Wall-Crawler said:
7 hours ago, Nightwingsbutler said:

Selling either of the #9 or #31 first revan/malak?

Yep...When back from CGC!

Nice results on the Clone Wars #1s.  This little collection could be a gold mine.

 

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10 hours ago, thehumantorch said:

Nice results on the Clone Wars #1s.  This little collection could be a gold mine.

 

Thanks and for sure...If I am able to sell them 😉!

I'm quite happy with the past few little deals for sure.

...Sometimes little deals are the best low bulk, decent returns!

 

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4 hours ago, Wall-Crawler said:

Thanks and for sure...If I am able to sell them 😉!

I'm quite happy with the past few little deals for sure.

...Sometimes little deals are the best low bulk, decent returns!

 

Agreed.  We've bought quite a few small collections and they add up.

 

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On 10/31/2020 at 10:57 PM, thehumantorch said:

Nice results on the Clone Wars #1s.  This little collection could be a gold mine.

 

Thanks and for sure...If I am able to sell them 😉!

I'm quite happy with the past few little deals for sure.

...Sometimes little deals are the best low bulk, decent returns!

 

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Love your latest haul mate... As I was saying in that other comms channel, I have no idea why Spider Gwen #0 2nd printing has gone full Hansel...  I can’t find any info on this from a couple of the sources that I have been relying on recently (keycollectorcomics.com and GoCollect.com)... what’s the goss? 

source.gif

 

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10 hours ago, Arkham said:

Love your latest haul mate... As I was saying in that other comms channel, I have no idea why Spider Gwen #0 2nd printing has gone full Hansel...  I can’t find any info on this from a couple of the sources that I have been relying on recently (keycollectorcomics.com and GoCollect.com)... what’s the goss? 

source.gif

 

I wasn't really aware myself...I think Spider-Gwen has a following and that it is a super low print run (apparently) with some new content, but I don't pretend to understand ALL the intricacies of the modern collector!

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On 11/3/2020 at 10:18 AM, Wall-Crawler said:

Another small but mighty buy!

 

20201103_100400.jpg

20201103_100437.jpg

Might be interested in those spawns!

That Tec Jacket has taken off, sold a VF copy for $35 in July.  :P     It took a long time to sell too.....

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On 10/30/2020 at 2:53 PM, Wall-Crawler said:

Batch from CGC arrived including those Clone Wars #1's I picked up a little bit ago...First Ahsoka Tano double threat!

Star Wars .jpg

Star Wars - The Clone Wars.jpg

These sold in a flash!

And slowly trying to ramp up my eBay store for the holidays...We shall see how much I can post there...

Edited by Wall-Crawler
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Wheels keep on turning...Approached by customer on my Facebook Page to see if I do trades as he wanted my BA #12 CGC 9.6 - I normally don't like to  but customer wanted the book and was not a seller so in exchange for the BA #12 CGC 9.6, I got these two books...

20201122_185117.jpg

20201122_185057.jpg

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2020 keeps rolling! Picked up another small lot of books from a collector contact of mine looking for some quick holiday cash. Not huge but a fun lot!

DMZ #1 x 2 both going to CGC

DMZ lot nearly two complete sets

DMZ Show incoming or something 😂

Hulk and She-Hulk mini lot other common She Hulk not pictured.

Thor #2 x 2

Spawn #1 newsstand x 6 all high grade some going to CGC

...I have one other Star Wars focused lot at CGC now which includes two copies of Knights of the Old Republic #9.

20201209_100819.jpg

20201209_100733.jpg

20201209_100856.jpg

20201209_102854.jpg

20201209_101350.jpg

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Nice pickup!! 

It's completely outside my focus, but I'm pretty interested in one of your Spawns when you start flipping buddy.

I only flipped mine because it was CBCS and not CGC and that made me go like this whenever I saw it in my collection: 

giphy.gif

Edited by Arkham
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On 12/9/2020 at 5:11 PM, Arkham said:

Nice pickup!! 

It's completely outside my focus, but I'm pretty interested in one of your Spawns when you start flipping buddy.

I only flipped mine because it was CBCS and not CGC and that made me go like this whenever I saw it in my collection: 

giphy.gif

Sorry, thought I had replied. For sure, when I sub these to CGC and get them back, will let you know.

I definitely lucked out with the two Thor #2's...Those are going to CGC for sure...Christian Bale as God-Butcher and I have two first apps! Might have to fast track those ones LOL.

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Warning for my "millions" of followers :bigsmile:

I haven't had a buyer back out in awhile but this one is interesting. I had the book packed and was going to ship this morning. Refunded. Blocked. And Moving On. For sale on the boards if anyone interested LOL.

 

Venom.JPG

Venom3.JPG

Edited by Wall-Crawler
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12 hours ago, Wall-Crawler said:

Warning for my "millions" of followers :bigsmile:

I haven't had a buyer back out in awhile but this one is interesting. I had the book packed and was going to ship this morning. Refunded. Blocked. And Moving On. For sale on the boards if anyone interested LOL.

 

Venom.JPG

Venom3.JPG

Ugh, at least you hadn't shipped yet.

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12 hours ago, thehumantorch said:

Ugh, at least you hadn't shipped yet.

100%

I screwed up though...The guy asked for a return...I should have made him send a cancellation request instead as a return is a knock on my account and a cancel is a knock on him. And that is what he was actually doing, cancelling.

Now I have to call eBay...Not that it will impact my standing too much, but I still don't want it reflected on my seller account, but I want them to know he cancelled on me...

Lesson learned.

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First Collection Purchase of 2021 Completed.

Again, nothing major but it is a nice collection of modern, low print run horror comics and completely done via email/FB messaging.  This is the same source as the Spawn and Star Wars and other recent books (except the GA ones). I was not super keen on these books,  but the price was right and I want the seller to know he can keep coming to me as well; I want to maintain that quick "comics for cash" relationship. I'll post a few pics when they arrive.

Edited by Wall-Crawler
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Another round of books are back from some of the collections I recently picked up...Star Wars heavy but not too shabby! I am prepping another lot to go to CGC and oh yeah, picked up another 20 book lot! Pics on that one later...

 

20210220_084108.jpg

20210219_212337.jpg

20210219_212430.jpg

20210219_212514.jpg

20210219_212716.jpg

20210220_084152.jpg

20210220_084258.jpg

20210220_084354.jpg

20210220_084430.jpg

20210220_084506.jpg

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