ftlepore

You're welcome to avoid any healthy discussion that you don't enjoy.

But they aren't delivering outstanding results. That's the entire point of this thread. They're delivering mixed results depending on grader, year, and environment, apparently. If people have to literally stop submitting books to CGC during certain time periods due to fluctuations in grading, the quality is not consistent. I think most people here on the boards who have been around long enough can grade a book without 2 grade points (grading a 7.0 between a 6.0 and a 8.0, for example), so to imply CGC is doing outstanding work because they also get it within this range, rather than on the dot every time which is their singular job, feels incorrect is not really the standard that myself, or many others I would assume by this thread, are looking for. Not really conflating anything, thanks, but I guess also presuming your post is "informative" is also a really weird thing to do. If you're seriously alleging that "there's also a thing that happens to pages of paper. Most of us call it "aging" and "Pro Tip" weren't meant to be condescending, then I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree. For sure man, books age. Literally no one is disagreeing with you. But you're really oversimplifying for some reason, and not looking at the big picture, where four books that were graded within the last couple years as OW/W came back C/OW. Either all four of these books, in slabs, miraculously aged to cream in one year while being stored in boxes, or it's a grading issue that many others have experienced in this very thread. Not sure why we're leaning toward the first option here.

Oddly condescending response, but okay. If CGC stops caring about the market and their effect on it, then people are going to find alternatives. That's pretty simple. Once the company that EVERYONE uses as the market standard stops caring about the market, they're going to lose credibility and that's bad for business. I guess 2019 alone was a terrible year for this "aging" you mentioned, since that's when multiple of these 70 year old books "aged." I guess I was just coincidentally right on the cusp and 2020 was just The Year of Cream. 🤔

I think the main point here is that, when the industry is relying on consistency and quality, there should be consist light quality whenever you're grading books. I can't even imagine CGC grading books in multiple different environments with varying light quality. That seems extremely lazy and unprofessional.

I bit the bullet and wrote CGC a letter with my thoughts and complaints. At the end of the day, I'm still paying over $500 for a service that I don't feel the quality control was adequate on. I gave a good amount of examples and comparisons, so we'll see what they say.

So here's another interesting comparison. The 1st book is ASM #40. I sent this in to get CPR'd, and it didn't pass prescreen, so it was sent back. The 2nd book is the Avengers #8 that was just CPR'd and regraded at a lower grade (7.5 down to 7.0, and OW/W pages down to C/OW pages); you can see this one in my earlier photos. The ASM looks significantly worse than the Avengers copy, in terms of blemishes, issues, and coloration. The back is actually pretty "sooty" for lack of a better term. Yet, it's a grade higher and has a better page quality. In addition, I checked the details, and it was just recently graded on 10/25/2019, or barely a year ago, the same as a good number of the other books I submitted. These aren't books that were graded back in 2011 and had years to sit around and discolor. Additionally, it seems to me that the Avengers pages look significantly crisper and definitely not cream. My biggest issue is that I spent over $550 to get these nine books graded and shipped, only to have them go down in grade, and I'm almost at a point where I feel like this was a CGC error and I want to reach out to them about it. I just doubt it would do anything. I know everyone is saying to wait and resubmit when they're back to normal, but that's still another $550 process.

Great points, but how do we get them to notice is what I'm wondering. And how would we even know when a change took place?

That book looks pristine, and way higher than a 7.0. That definitely makes me a little suspicious of the current grades being handed out.

I actually agree with this. As I said, if the copy of FF #52 in question was graded a 6.5 last year through CGC, then all of a sudden the very next year the same exact book goes down in page and grade quality without being touched, that's going to invalidate A LOT of slabbed book grades. That seems terrible for the market. "Oh, it's a Hulk #181 7.5? Is it an old 7.5 or a new 7.5? Is it really closer to a 6.5? Who knows!" The majority of people buying books aren't professional graders, and the entire point of slabbing books is to have a uniform grade that we can reference and trust. For CGC to change the standard this drastically, it makes thousands, if not millions of grades suspect. If we're still forced to meticulously grade the books within the slab ourselves, it kind of defeats the purpose.

There are literally no CBCS holders in the pic. I have old CBCS labels on top of the CGC graded books, if that's what you're referring to. Regardless, all the books were prescreened to improve in grade, and in my experience, there has not been that large of a difference in their grading. The fact that there are instances of both labels going down and both labels grading the same illustrates that.

All of the books in the pictures above were graded by CGC.

I'll go ahead and show what we're talking about here, since the books with their new grades and the labels from their previous grades seem like really strong evidence. These are nine books I sent in to get CPR'd along with their results. At least two of these were previously graded LAST YEAR by CGC. The new current slabs can be seen on the top, while the label they previously had before CPR is on the bottom. The Avengers #6 kept the same CGC grade of 7.5, but was bumped down to cream pages. This is super weird because, as per the original label, it was just recently graded with OW pages on 8/2019. I have no idea why, barely a year later, the pages are suddenly cream after being encapsulated the entire time. (https://www.cgccomics.com/certlookup/2060457001/) Avengers #8 was originally a PGX grade of 7.5, OW/W. I sent that one in myself to C**S in 2017 and it came back the same 7.5, OW/W. So, again, it's weird that it now comes back from CGC at 7.0, Cream/OW after being in the same holder for years and after being pressed and cleaned. (https://www.cbcscomics.com/grading-notes/17-028919F-001) The Fantastic Four #52 was originally graded a 6.5 by CGC and was graded just last year on 4/2019. It has been in the slab the entire time. Now it's a 6.0 after pressing and cleaning. (https://www.cgccomics.com/certlookup/2032473001/) I definitely understand a single book going down due to a stricter grading or happenstance, but for every single book to come back the same or worse is baffling. Even if these books didn't improve from a pressing and cleaning, they should have at least stayed the same, and I have no idea how the page quality is suddenly worse of several of them.

As one of the catalysts for this post, I'm also curious. I had multiple books that were graded in 2019 (by CGC), not even a year ago, come back a grade down and the pages went from OW/W to C/OW after a press and clean. I really think if this is a CGC issue, where the standard is raised and books are being graded more strictly, it kind of changes the entire market, where literally every book that was previously graded before 2019 has an inflated grade according to the new scale. Like, is it possible the grader just had a bad day?

Got the book today and took a bunch more pics. The stain is actually much less noticeable in person and seems to show up more in pics. Most of the wear seems to be on the spine. The rest of the cover is pretty clean. The back looks lightly speckled with...dirt? I'm not sure. I was hoping that might come out with dry cleaning. I still have 30 days to return the book through eBay, since the seller accepts returns.

Another 7.0 just sold Buy-It-Now for $3344 on eBay, so I think the eBay sales are going for a bit more than wherever else GPA is pulling from.