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Moderns that are heating up on ebay!
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63,730 posts in this topic

Its all about minimizing time while not sacrificing security of the book. It just takes practice.
I think I can complete a book in about 15 min from start to finish and feel satisfied it wont 
get bent in the mail. 4 books in around hour at $13.05 a piece wouldn't be bad. 

Plenty of different ways to pack a book. I could cut it down even more if I wasn't too cheap
to buy my own precut cardboard. 

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9 hours ago, the blob said:

Wouldn't a few "hot" $15-$25 books at auction help drive traffic to your expensive fixed price slabs? probably a different market, but you never know. But I get it, I too am loath to spend $5 on a likely $15 sale for new books. Last time I did that was with that Wonder Women Federici variant cover that was hot a month ago...bought the last one off the rack. You know what I did not remember to do with that book? Try to sell it. And now it's 50/50 whether I can recoup the $4.99 cover price. Passed on 10 of the Deadpool Garbage Pail variant I could have flipped for $20-$25 then because I did not know it was hot. That one you can still make a little money on, but not much.

 

One of the most ridiculous claims of the speculators...from any era...is to say "look at all the money I made!"....while never, ever sharing their failures. Hindsight is 20/20; foresight is blind, deaf, and dumb. I've said it before: if you're into variants, don't waste your money spending $50, $100, $200 or more on the latest hot one. Just wait. For every ASM #667 1:100, there are hundreds of failures that you can buy for $1 or $2, and then spend the $XXXX on the ASM #667....you'll still come out ahead.

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14 minutes ago, RockMyAmadeus said:

One of the most ridiculous claims of the speculators...from any era...is to say "look at all the money I made!"....while never, ever sharing their failures. Hindsight is 20/20; foresight is blind, deaf, and dumb. I've said it before: if you're into variants, don't waste your money spending $50, $100, $200 or more on the latest hot one. Just wait. For every ASM #667 1:100, there are hundreds of failures that you can buy for $1 or $2, and then spend the $XXXX on the ASM #667....you'll still come out ahead.

True. but then, there are plenty of people that simply like selling a book at a profit, even if it's offset by losses. There is definitely an enjoyment factor in the speculation game for some. Perhaps many. Otherwise, people wouldn't spend the time to hunt through bargain bins at conventions for that missed book.

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14 minutes ago, GeeksAreMyPeeps said:

True. but then, there are plenty of people that simply like selling a book at a profit, even if it's offset by losses. There is definitely an enjoyment factor in the speculation game for some. Perhaps many. Otherwise, people wouldn't spend the time to hunt through bargain bins at conventions for that missed book.

True. I go with my gut on moderns, variants or not. Fortuntely, I usually can make back 90% or so of the money on my "failures". I do SS books exclusively. I have great wins many, many times and it allows me to pay for my own collection (I dont do it for a living, just hobby).

For example, I saw the Batman Who Laughs character and bought about 10-12 TT12 books for cover or discounted cover. Many of them came back 9.8 after sigs. I did the same with Batman Damned 1 (regular cover and variant), I bought 12 of them for cover and some of those were discounted cover (from DCBS). Those are just two examples. I did well recently with my Stan signature books too.

I made good money on the Seven to Eternity books some time back and of course, Rick and Morty books were VERY lucrative for me. 

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14 hours ago, Bird said:

I love selling slabs as opposed to raw books, the slabs are bang bang, bubble wrap, double box and out the door lickety-split. I have to cut cardboard and wrap in brown paper for raws, take 2-3 times longer than a slab. Yes, I cut cardboard that I get for free from the LCS, and the diamond boxes are nice and thick. I sold a lot of Gen13, 1-77 and used a cut down old longbox for that (which the LCS also gave me for free).

I was doing that as well because I had an unlimited free access to cardboard until I realized how much time I was wasting cutting-up cardboard.  I went to Uline and got the pre-cut cardboard, now packing raw books takes zero time....and I don't even sell much on ebay, but having that pre-made stack of cardboard readily available with a stack of brown envelopes makes it so much smoother! 

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4 minutes ago, spreads said:

I was doing that as well because I had an unlimited free access to cardboard until I realized how much time I was wasting cutting-up cardboard.  I went to Uline and got the pre-cut cardboard, now packing raw books takes zero time....and I don't even sell much on ebay, but having that pre-made stack of cardboard readily available with a stack of brown envelopes makes it so much smoother! 

I bet that it does. I precut the cardboard and make a stack but it is time consuming, yes.

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9 minutes ago, Bird said:

I bet that it does. I precut the cardboard and make a stack but it is time consuming, yes.

Best decision I ever made was to not cut cardboard and instead buy it in bulk from Uline or on E-Bay.  I can add the cost to my shipping but I can't add the time I spent.  Being able to quickly get 10 packages ready in a flash is well worth the $0.50 a piece.

Edited by 1Cool
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1 minute ago, 1Cool said:

Best decision I ever made was to not cut cardboard and instead but it in bulk from uline or on E-Bay.  I can add the cost to mu shipping but I can't add the time I spent.  Being able to quickly get 10 packages ready in a flash is well worth the $0.50 a piece.

Maybe I just have too much time. (shrug)

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1 hour ago, Bird said:

@1Cool & @spreads  which cardboard do you guys buy from uline? I am confused on that website.

I'm not sure how you are mailing out books - envelope with cardboard sandwich?  If so here is the product I used and you can customize your size to give books some spacing:

https://www.uline.com/BL_1853/Small-Corrugated-Pads?keywords=Cardboard+Box+Dividers

You can go with the S-2437 and it would be about $0.75 for two including shipping if you buy in bulk.  I personally like the mailers with bubble wrap and extra cardboard if the package appears to be not sturdy enough.  No comments yet about damage in the mail via the mailers (knock on wood).

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1 hour ago, Bird said:

@1Cool & @spreads  which cardboard do you guys buy from uline? I am confused on that website.

You didn't ask me, ( :) ) but I don't order cardboard... 2 pieces of cardboard is .75. Instead, I get the Kraft Stay-Flat mailer at .40 each in quantity.

https://www.uline.com/Product/Detail/S-2220/Stay-Flat-Mailers/Tab-Locking-Kraft-StayFlats-5-9-3-4-x-12-1-4

They are bulletproof. I wrap the comic in a bit of bubble wrap, slide it inside, and have NEVER gotten a complaint... in fact, people specifically compliment my packaging in their eBay feedback. Just sayin'. YMMV.

EDIT: And that mailer will hold up to 4 comics, plus bubble wrap, and stay under a pound, so you can still use First Class Mail with eBay.

Edited by oldrover
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33 minutes ago, oldrover said:

You didn't ask me, ( :) ) but I don't order cardboard... 2 pieces of cardboard is .75. Instead, I get the Kraft Stay-Flat mailer at .40 each in quantity.

https://www.uline.com/Product/Detail/S-2220/Stay-Flat-Mailers/Tab-Locking-Kraft-StayFlats-5-9-3-4-x-12-1-4

They are bulletproof. I wrap the comic in a bit of bubble wrap, slide it inside, and have NEVER gotten a complaint... in fact, people specifically compliment my packaging in their eBay feedback. Just sayin'. YMMV.

EDIT: And that mailer will hold up to 4 comics, plus bubble wrap, and stay under a pound, so you can still use First Class Mail with eBay.

Thanks! I don't use an envelope, cardboard sandwich with brown paper over it and I get tons of compliments on my packing & shipping as well! But I may go this route, although I have the cardboard cutting down to a science. I can eyeball it successfully at this point, no need to measure or anything.

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2 minutes ago, Bird said:

 I have the cardboard cutting down to a science. I can eyeball it successfully at this point, no need to measure or anything.

You have more patience than I. I tried cutting cardboard for a few packages, and wanted to kill myself. After accidentally almost doing so a few times. LOL

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Agree with everything above, cutting cardboard even if you are a retired millionaire is so tedious....

 

@oldrover, how does the Kraft loader work, is there heavy cardboard on both sides?  It seems like it's combining an envelope with heavy cardboard?

@Bird - I ordered a 200 pack of 8/12 811 for .33 each CAD.  I tape two on each side together, so I'm using four pieces.  For cheaper books you could probably get away with just one piece of cardboard on each side.  I also ordered a stack of brown envelopes, that worked out to about 33 cents each (CAD).  I looked around and even comparing to places like Walmart the envelopes were by far the cheapest.  Again, I'm in Canada so prices might be better for you...

*EDIT I also found that this method allows me to ship 1-2 comics as 'letter mail' as determined by Canada Post - which is dirt cheap to ship.  If I changed the envelope size or added extra weight I might not be able to ship that way, you'll have to figure that part out for yourself.

Edited by spreads
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27 minutes ago, Red_Hood said:

Hey!  Can you guys go start a different thread about "No one cares how fast you pack a book" and keep this thread on topic so I know what $2.00 book to grade and sell for $200.00 all day long.

Earlier today I did notice the thread title and was like "oh wait, we are posting about this HERE?"

New Avengers 11! New Avengers 27!

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1 hour ago, Red_Hood said:

Hey!  Can you guys go start a different thread about "No one cares how fast you pack a book" and keep this thread on topic so I know what $2.00 book to grade and sell for $200.00 all day long.

Screw comics, I'm getting into the cardboard business! :flipbait:

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