Why do people think New Mutants #98 had a "high print run"...? 0

[RockMyAmadeus]

Let me try and answer some of this.

 

There were plenty of copies of each and every other issue available through DM channels to satisfy speculator demand, and no real instant demand that would cause speculators to run to the newsstand, like they did with books like Superman #50, #75, Robin #1, or other books that were instant sellouts at the DM level. New Mutants #98 was NOT one of those books, not be a long, long way.

 

During 1991, the New Mutants run was receiving attention because of Cable and Liefeld. People were buying up multiple because they saw this hot property really taking off. How hot?

 

The very last issue of New Mutants, #100, was released in February, 1991. All issues before that were now back issues. By April 1991, so was #100, newsstand returns for the others were long since done, and the remaining pool (heh) that were still available was set...once those returns were destroyed, they were out of the market (and, for the most part by this time, returns were actually destroyed...again, it must be stressed, for the most part.)

 

The interest...and all published information confirms this...was in #87 and the other early Liefeld/Cable issues (so, of course, does my personal experience, but since memories become fuzzy, I won't introduce that as actual evidence, and instead rely simply on contemporaneous data to confirm these things.)

 

The average speculator did not care about, and did not buy, multiple copies of, in general, issues 98-100, especially #100 with its actual ridiculous print run (500-600k copies), which still sold out at a distribution level and went to a second, and even a third, printing. But this was a different situation than previous sellouts, which happened at the retail level: this was one of the very first books that DEALERS speculated on across the nation, and so while the book was "sold out", once dealers realized that every other dealer had hundreds of copies of NM #100 on hand, it got dumped pretty unceremoniously a few months after X-Force #1 came out (keeping in mind that this was still before the days of the internet, and information took a long time to catch up to reality.)

 

Well, in 1991 we had an estimated five (5) million copies

 

Where do you get this figure? It has been repeated in this thread by others, and is not correct. Cap City orders for the book were 806,100. If Diamond was twice that, which would have been quite astonishing, that makes another 1.6 million copies, or 2.4 total for the DM. Since the newsstand was generally immune to the print run madness, it's likely that not more than 2-300,000 newsstand copies were printed, which puts the total at, at best, 2.7 million copies. The published reports at the time were 1.75-2.5 million copies printed.

 

For a figure of 5 million copies to have been printed, Diamond's orders alone would have had to have been a staggering 4 million copies, or 5 times Cap City's order numbers. As well, the SOO for issue #20 states that an average of 936k copies were printed in the period reported, which would have included #1's figure (or the average would be substantially lower.) If the print run of #1 was 5 million, for the average to be only 936k, the following issues could not have been printed in numbers more than 500,000, and we know that's not true, because the single issue nearest to filing date was 720k (and we know #2 and #4 couldn't possibly have had only 550,000 copies printed.)

 

So where does this "5 million" figure come from, other than an unsourced statement on Wikipedia? And why does Wikipedia claim that it is "the second best selling comic of all time"...? Adventures of Superman #500 had Cap City orders of 879,000 copies, against Cap City orders of X-Force #1 of 802,000! That's almost 10% higher! Diamond's orders were certainly going to be similar. How, then, can anyone claim that it was "the second best selling comic book of all time"...? The numbers do not add up.

 

of X-Force #1 come to the market because of the Liefeld/Cable excitement, which sold out.

 

It sold out at the distribution level...not the retail level. The horse was out of the barn. I bought 80 copies myself, brand spanking new, for $1 each (I would have been far better served putting that $80 into a nice high grade SA Spidey. Sigh.)

 

I still have those 80 copies, sealed in precisely the same ten packs that they were handed to me by the retailer who sold them to me. While technically "sold out", that doesn't mean it was sold out like Superman #75 sold out.

 

A record only beaten by Jim Lee's X-Men five-cover #1 that came out the same year, and combined sold 8 million copies.

 

 

Even typing those numbers is amazing. But I have to admit, I was in the mix of those pre-ordering X-Men #1E and X-Force #1 (4 of each card), because at the time anything Jim Lee and Rob Liefeld were working on were HOT, HOT, HOT! I sold most within two months for a profit, though not a tremendous amount.

 

So knowing this reality, and the demand that was out there, the later issues of New Mutants were selling hot only because of Liefeld and Cable - not Deadpool at the time. And people were grabbing whatever they could get.

 

No, actually, they weren't. The bloom was most certainly off the rose by the later issues. While X-Men #268, 270, and then #248 were selling for "big bucks" (keeping in mind that X-Men was at or near the top of print runs even during 1990), 274, 275, 276, 277 never were. The same is true for the later issues of McFarlane's Amazing (and for ALL of the adjectiveless series.)

 

And the same was true for the latter issues of New Mutants. People were crazy for #87...not the later issues.

 

And speculators focus on the NEXT hot thing...not the remnants of the LAST hot thing.

 

It is true that order numbers for the books went up for the Direct Market during this time period, especially for the Wolverine and X-Tinction Agenda...but they didn't go up by multiples, and while sell-through may have been better for the newsstand issues, it wouldn't have been so much that they would have upped the newsstand print run, especially, again, for a cancelled title, because newsstand buyers almost never bought multiple copies, and speculators already had plenty of DM copies that they wouldn't have gone to the newsstand for copies. There was no sellout, again, for any issue except #95.

 

Not completely accurate.

 

{snip}

 

That is what the words "almost never" mean: it doesn't mean no one ever did, it means that it was a very rare occurrence. The average newsstand buyer would consider it lunacy to buy multiple copies, and this has been true for most of comics history. The people who bought multiple copies were buying them at comics stores by this time. Hoards of newsstand copies set aside for speculation (as opposed to books simply warehoused), were and are extremely rare.

 

This is not true. I will explain why later in this reply.

 

Please see above. Your assumption about newsstand purchases are not accurate

 

You've taken out the context of what was said, so let's go back and see what it was I was replying to.

 

This is what you said:

 

Speculators were grabbing anything they could get their hands on, including running out to grab comics from any newsstand source.

 

And again, this is not an assumption. As I already explained, New Mutants #98 was a LATTER issue of the run, long after Cable's and Liefeld's beginnings on the title, and while speculators DID run to the newsstands for the latest hot sellout, they did NOT do it for average, typical latter run issues.

 

You have to understand the nature of the newsstand: there are no back issues. Once an individual issue has been on sale for a month or two, any remaining copies are pulled and returned/destroyed. They do not, in general, have issues that are 6 months to a year old still on sale (yes, in general, because some newsstands did.)

 

Liefeld/Cable fever did not kick into overdrive until X-Force #1 came out. This was SEVEN MONTHS after New Mutants #98 was on the stands...they were long since gone. The book was not an instant hit, nor was it a sellout, and speculators did not...like they did with books like Batman #457, Superman #50, and Robin #1...run to newsstands to scoop up copies because the DM copies had sold out. It just didn't happen.

 

Trust me on this. I was selling much of that collection at shows Gary Dolgoff organized in the NY/NJ area.

 

No one needs to trust anyone. The data bears this out. And since, 1-2 months after these books came out (New Mutants #98-100) they were readily available at just about any comic store, why were you running to the newsstands to get whatever copies they may have had, which at this time were mostly mangled? They were not sellouts, and if someone could buy near mint copies at their local comic store...and there were many in the winter of 1990/1991...during that 2 month window in which the books were on the newsstand as well, why would they go to the newsstand? They wouldn't.

 

Oh goody, I get the opportunity to puncture Chuck's musings with hard data. Yay.

 

I did state "(assuming Mile High is not confused, or attempting to boost the value of newsstand resales)" in my final comments. So I did assume there was some fudging of the numbers. But if he is cutting the actual distribution in half, that is just crazy on his part to further hurt his reputation. Folks are going to have access to various data, and can put a decent estimate together like you are attempting.

 

Looks like a pretty successful attempt, n'est-ce-pas?

 

In fact...according to the Statement of Ownership printed in New Mutants #99, 37% of the ENTIRE PRINT RUN was returned during the period covered, on average. More on that in a bit.

 

In looking over #99's statement of ownership, it states "preceding twelve months" as a reference point. So this data on returns could even be referencing pre-Liefeld return numbers.

It does, as I noted. But when one goes back to the LAST SOO, printed in #89, the numbers are HIGHER, not lower, on the pre-Liefeld books covered in that SOO, Avg printed - 313k (as opposed to 289k), and 210k sales (as opposed to 182k.)

 

And the previous SOO has even HIGHER numbers. New Mutants was a languishing title (which is one of the reasons Liefeld got it, and was allowed to do pretty much whatever he and Louise wanted.)

 

That is interesting. But it does state within that twelve months what the estimated print run was.

 

TOTAL NO. COPIES PRINTED (NET PRESS RUN): AVERAGE NO(.) COPIES EACH ISSUE DURING PRECEDING TWELVE MONTHS: 289,387. SINGLE ISSUE NEAREST TO FILING DATE: 318,102.

 

So if the Statement of Ownership is referencing numbers prior to the "Liefeld Cavalcade", it would be safe to assume by New Mutants 98 during the heat of the run this could be anywhere from 289K to 318K. Right?

 

No. As noted, that average includes pre-Liefeld issues that were almost certainly HIGHER than the Liefeld issues that followed.

 

What needs to be understood is that Liefeld and Cable madness was NOT instant. It heated up during 1990, absolutely. But the reason #95 was a sellout was not because of either Cable OR Liefeld...it was because of X-Tinction Agenda.

 

Cable/Liefeld madness did not hit its peak until X-Force #1 came out, in June of 1991, and by then, all the New Mutants issues were long since printed, newsstand returns done, and copies distributed. In fact, I found (quite by accident), 5 copies of New Mutants #87 for $1.25 at a local store AFTER New Mutants #93 had come out, as well as all the rest in between (#93 was the first issue I bought brand new of the title.)

 

And this was a store that was very up on "the latest hot books", being an SF Bay Area store. It wasn't instant chaos, it was a slow simmer that took about a year to really hit the heat. Let me say this again: New Mutants, as it came out, was NOT the market juggernaut that some may claim it was. It wasn't, and the numbers bear this out.

 

What WERE the sales juggernauts at that time? Spiderman. Cap City orders of 202,000 copies for #6 (this is a STAGGERING figure.) That's nearly 4 times the orders for New Mutants #98. Uncanny X-Men...#273 has Cap City orders of 91,500 copies, well on its way to double the numbers for NM #98.

 

Were the numbers for #98 HIGHER than #87, 88, 89, etc? Of course. But were they higher than #95-97? No. #95 had the same Cap City numbers, #96 was higher, and #97 was 9,200 copies higher...just Cap City. And for perspective: Cap City orders of #98 were 55,200...#87? 34,500. So, the numbers for #98 were only about 60% higher than #87! And were they "hot" numbers?

 

Not even close.

 

Again, this is one of the reasons why NM #98 is so valuable today, and why the other issues shot up in value so quickly back then: print runs were low compared to other books being printed at the same time. The reported number for #87 has traditionally been 110,000 copies. This isn't likely, but it's not too far from the truth.

 

And that's why #87 was a $65 book in the Overstreet Update by the middle of 1991, and X-Men #266 was only ~$20. Supply did not meet demand in the case of the former.

 

So, no, because of Wolverine's appearance (#93-94) and/or X-Tinction Agenda (#95), that "issue nearest filing date" would have been unnaturally high, so it's not safe to assume that #98 would be HIGHER than the average, and close to the highest printed issue. In fact, it was most likely lower than the average, hence the ~ 250k figure.

 

Returns on the newsstand market were typically 50-70% at this time, which while not great sell-through, was usual. It cost very little more for Marvel to print 300,000 copies as it did 200,000...because the big costs were upfront, as any publisher can tell you. The numbers bear this out.

 

If 37% of the entire print run was returned (and we know that from the SOO), and we know that about 290,000 copies were printed on average for the period, and Cap City orders for the period were between 33-41K (putting Diamond roughly at 80-100k copies), that means that the newsstand portion of the print run, from about issue #82 to about issue #94, consisted of about 55% of the print run, and of that, about 70% was returned, which was typical.

 

I think there are some assumptions here that though an educated assessment, it can still be off.

 

1) The Statement of Ownership was referencing averages over a twelve month period (where that average starts and stops would be interesting).

 

2) Returns referenced in the SOO could also be questionable, as you would need to know what period of the run is it referencing? If it is pre-Liefeld and the excitement that came with his involvement at the time, the numbers are questionable.

 

These are legally documented numbers, filed under penalty of perjury with the USPS. Why do you think these numbers would be questionable?

 

We have a general idea which issues are being addressed, because the issue published "nearest to the filing date" of Oct 1, 1990 was #95, which came out in September. If that wasn't enough time, then it was #94.

 

Again...there was no "excitement" concerning Liefeld or Cable in any appreciable way that would have affected these numbers. That came later.

 

3) You also assumed hardly anybody was buying up more than one newsstand example, yet this is not the case. So better to assume around 50% returns versus a higher number.

 

I didn't assume that; it's a fact. Historically, newsstand buyers do NOT buy multiple copies (with rare exceptions), and speculators only ran to the newsstand when the DM copies were sold out, which wasn't true of #98.

 

And "assuming 50% returns vs. a higher number" demonstrates a staggering ignorance of the newsstand comics market:

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2001/06/18/business/cover-story-oh-how-far-a-magazine-will-go-to-stimulate-newsstand-sales.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm

 

Only 35 percent of the magazines offered for sale on newsstands last year were actually sold, leaving 65 percent of the millions printed destined not for the coffee table but for the industrial shredders and pulpers of the magazine wholesalers.

 

That sell-through rate has been steadily declining over the decades: in 1973, 65 percent of newsstand magazines sold, while 48 percent of them sold in 1988, according to the Magazine Publishers of America.

 

That's ALL magazines, including the most popular like TV Guide, Time, and Newsweek.

 

And:

 

http://www.icv2.com/articles/indepth/300.html

 

For comic publishers the current situation is fraught with difficulties. Some of the key newsstand distributors are calling for a minimum sell-through percentage of at least 30%--a figure that many comic titles have trouble maintaining. All signs point to a further decline in the number of comic titles receiving newsstand distribution. Even Archie, the one comic publisher that is getting decent numbers out of its newsstand channel, has cut the number of its standard format comic titles, though not the number of digests. Archie Digests, which are typically racked in the check-out stand at the grocery store right next to TV Guide and Prevention, are arguably the most successful comic publications on the newsstands with an annual sell-through rate of 43.8%. Most other comic publications are rumored to have sell-through percentages in the teens and twenties.

 

(That is an article from 2001, but things weren't radically that much different 10 years earlier. Maybe a few percentage points higher.)

 

And, as already explained, it does not jive with the numbers published in the statement of ownership. If the newsstand sell-though is 50%, as you claim, that means that since the average return number was 107,000 copies, then the total newsstand copies printed was 214,000, with Cap City orders between 33,000 and 55,000, which means Diamond orders on average for the period were only 20,000 to 42,000 copies...?

 

You cannot assume a 50% sell-through at the newsstand; no one can, not on any comic published after about 1980. Maybe...possibly...Superman #75. Maybe. But absolutely not even close on a non-hot, typical, non-sellout issue like NM #98.

 

If NM #98 had a 30% actual sell through, that would be pretty amazing. It likely was less, around 25%.

 

Great discussion though.

 

Indeed.

[RockMyAmadeus]

However, people were upping orders and stockpiling every issue from issue 93 and up.

 

True. And #93 was 6 months after #87. And still #87 was at that point only a $5-$10 book...if you could find one.

 

I was 25 deep on every single issue because of demand and because no one knew what the next $20 book was going to be. I wasn't alone at all. You couldn't find a copy on the stands of anything towards the end of that run.

 

Yeah, that wasn't really the case though with the issues after 96-97. 97 especially was available for quite some time at the comics stores, and even moreso #100. Several stores in the Bay Area actually had copies sit long enough to get bagged and boarded and put in the back issue bins at a quarter or 50 cents over cover.

 

You're totally right, It had nothing to do with Deadpool, it was all Liefeld. It was several years before anyone gave a moist Cleveland Steamer about Deadpool.

 

Heck, just earlier this year I pulled one of my OO's out of the box and slabbed it to a 9.8 for a sweet sweet 79,900% profit. It's the only good thing Rob Liefeld's ever done for me.

 

250,000 print run is pretty massive compared to the new modern hotness and even the "Top of the Charts" Diamond book orders, where a 100,000 print run is a reason for a parade of unicycle-riding clowns sculpting balloon animals.

 

Walking Dead #115 just had a print run of 352,000 copies...every single one of them non-returnable...and it sold out....

 

[RockMyAmadeus]

New Mutants #100 was cancelled in AprilFebruary, 1991. In June 1991, X-Force #1 came out and sold 5 1.75 million copies.

 

It's pretty safe to say that New Mutants was a popular title before X-Force, and even though it probably wasn't selling one million copies a month, it's sales were escalating since Cable showed up.

 

 

I wouldn't say it was a "high" print run, but I'd definitely qualify it for a "normal" print run, and back then, Mutant books were all the rage. There's plenty of NM98s for everyone.

 

 

Are you disagreeing that mutant books were popular in 1991?

 

Not in the slightest. X-Men, as I have stated, was at or near the top of the print run and sales charts through 1990-1991 and beyond.

 

NEW MUTANTS, on the other hand, was not anywhere near as popular. Everyone remembers that New Mutants were HOT HOT HOT!!!!!...but a lot of that recollection is from AFTER the entire run was completed, and was founded on the very fact that New Mutants did NOT have X-Men type numbers available to purchase. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, and the demand was absolutely fueled by the fact that there weren't enough copies to go around.

 

Again...the print run info bears this out. At a time when Spiderman had a 750,000 print run, Uncanny had a 600,000 print run, X-Factor was in the 400s, and even FANTASTIC FOUR was in the 300's, New Mutants had print runs less than 1/2 of X-Men, and sales of less than 1/2 as well.

 

And we're not talking about 1991. We're talking about 1990. New Mutants #87 came out in Jan of 1990, and #98 in Dec.

 

Remember: New Mutants was a dying title. Liefeld and Louise were given pretty much carte blanche to do whatever they wanted. The low point was reached around the 80's, with Cap City orders from 33-35k. Yeesh!

 

Did Cable become popular? Yes. Immensely so. Was he popular in Jan of 1990? No. How about June of 1990? Yeah, there was definitely an active buzz. September of 1990? Now we're starting to see some results.

 

But did it translate into exponentially higher sales?

 

No.

 

In fact, from #87 to #99, actual print runs and sales only increased about 60%. That's good...but still less than 1/3 of Spiderman's numbers.

 

The only issue of the entire run with a print run over 400,000 was #100, the very last issue.

 

At a time when Spidey had a print run of 750,000, and X-Men now had print runs in the same neighborhood (because of Jim Lee.)

 

Some might say "well, of course there couldn't be THAT much increase in demand in just a year, so that does reflect a huge increase, right?"

 

Wrong.

 

Watch this to see some astonishing, demand driven intense spikes in print runs and sales:

 

Cap City orders -

 

Adventures of Superman #496 - 17,700

Adventures of Superman #497 - 25,450

Adventures of Superman #498 - 80,500 :o :o (an astonishing FIVE FOLD increase in TWO MONTHS.)

Adventures of Superman #499 - 81,800

 

And, of course, three months after those...

 

Adventures of Superman #500 - 879,050

 

 

In the span of 7 months, the amount of copies ordered increased an absolutely astounding 50 TIMES.

 

Quite a bit more than 60%....

 

 

New Mutants was the least of the mutants titles in 1989. Liefeld helped, quite a bit...but he didn't quadruple, triple, or even double print runs and sales...he increased it just about 60%. Good...but that doesn't translate into the silly numbers of X-Force #1, Spiderman #1, X-Men #1, Adventures of Superman #500, Turok #1, etc etc etc. That's precisely why they were oh so hot by the time X-Force #1 came out.

[fastballspecial]

Man those Superman numbers are staggering never looked at that before.

 

I think eventually the census will give us an idea of how tough the book will be to some extent.

 

I think its just hard to not think a book from that time period didn't have a large print run because many did.

 

[RockMyAmadeus]

In fact....

 

New Mutants, particularly #87 and #98...fit quite comfortably in that niche of "not too rare", and "not rare enough."

 

Very few X-Men issues after #142 have and sustain any real value precisely because there are just so many of them available.

 

And so, there aren't any issues that sell as raws for more than $10 on a regular basis except #266.

 

But there's a flip side to that as well...

 

Things can be too rare for their own good.

 

If any particular item only rarely shows up for sale, and isn't available for long periods of time at ANY price, all but the most dedicated buyers will get frustrated and move on to something more obtainable.

 

For example...pound for pound, New Mutants #98 is worth more than TMNT #1.

 

"You're crazy, RMA! A 9.8 Turtles #1 is worth $15k! New Mutants #98 is only worth $400!"

 

Granted.

 

But Turtles #1 suffers from its own rarity. There are only 11 copies of Turtles #1 in 9.8U, while there are 1112 copies of New Mutants #98 in 9.8.

 

That means for every 1 copy of Turtles #1 in 9.8 at $15k, you have 101 copies of NM #98 at $400 each. If NM #98 had only 11 copies in 9.8, extrapolated out, that means that each one would be worth $40,400. There are 1112 copies of New Mutants #98 in 9.8, and it STILL sells for $400. If that sort of demand were transferred to Turtles, it would be a $1.5 million book.

 

 

Pound for pound, copy for copy, New Mutants #98 is worth more than Turtles #1.

 

Crazy, huh?

 

And that's what happened with New Mutants. They were in the sweet spot: they weren't sitting by the long box in dealer's back rooms, but they weren't so rare that even at the height, there weren't 5-10 copies of #87 that could be found at a convention. The fact that they were sitting there, staring potential buyers in the face, helped to fuel demand, even if they weren't always purchased. They were just "rare enough" to be worth something, but not "too rare" that buyers got frustrated looking for them.

 

I imagine that's a good deal why a lot of the books from the 2000's aren't worth much: most of them are genuinely hard to find, so out of sight, out of mind, they aren't worth anything to inspire anyone to offer them for sale, no one has them stockpiled in any large numbers, and without an external influence, demand remains nil.

 

There are hundreds, if not thousands, of books just as rare and rarer than Walking Dead #1...but they're worthless. Hence the huge, immense price increases when even the slightest sort of demand pressure is applied.

 

 

[rjrjr]

does anyone know if those 3 comic collector packs sold here and there tended to be newstand or direct editions? personally, i never saw one for 90s books until i went to europe last summer where, oddly enough, you see early 90s french image books shrink wrapped at gas stations and what not, but i read about them, so maybe it was more of a regional thing.

 

Almost always, any of the books sold in multi-packs of any type from the mid 80's on, were direct market copies. I don't think I've ever seen a multi-pack from after 1986 that had any newsstand copies in them.

 

The multi-packs I picked up a TRU about 3-5 years ago all had news stand copies of comics from the 70s and 80s. The Dollar Store about a year ago had multi-packs, but it was mostly Image, Valiants, First, Eternity, etc. They were all direct editions.

 

Does anyone else remember the TRU multi-packs from a few years back? What a strange find so many years after those comics were produced.

Edited November 12, 2013 by rjrjr

[RockMyAmadeus]

"A titan against a titan!"

 

Question- during this period, do we still assume that returned newsstand issues were destroyed? Or were they repacked in those "Three rare out of print comics for $5.00!" multipacks or sold at Vintage Stock stores?

 

exactamundo. why are we assuming these went into the shredder, especially when these are probably books that could have been bulked out out to dealers 6/$1 or whatever through the back door before hitting the shredder because the title/artist was hot? as we know from the mile high II collection, this is kind of how it was done back in the day.

 

It is PRECISELY because of situations like Mile High II that more books ended up in the shredder, because the authorities were watching. Not destroying these books and then selling them was a CRIME, and created no small amount of problems for many people in the 1970's. By the 1990's, you can believe that they were NOT doing "back door deals" for returns.

 

And if you think the average newsstand dealer cares, or even KNOWS, about the latest "hot title", when his/her comics sales account for maybe 2-5% of their entire business, you'd be wrong.

 

-------------------

anyway, the notion that this book getting "un-hot" may have resulted in lots of them getting dinged up is silly. this book was bagged and boarded just like any other X-book of its era and even when it was "cold" it was more "in demand" than 99% of the other stuff produced in 1990/1991.

 

 

Apparently you don't have much experience with the treatment of books in stores, at cons, especially of books that no one cares about. 15-17 years of lying around, not being cared for, is not only not "silly", it's reality. That is why it is called "attrition." It happens, even in the best of conditions. I have all sorts of books that I carefully picked out brand new that got smashed because of bad box conditions that I wasn't aware of, and I'm wayyyyy more anal about storage than most.

 

Not only did lots of them "get ding'd up"...but SOME of them were even thrown AWAY.

 

 

I know, SACRILEGE!

 

Are you aware of the comics market in 1999-2001? People were throwing comics by the pallet-full into the landfills. Were they throwing New Mutants 98 by the long box? No, of course not. But were lots and lots of dealers trashing inventory that simply wouldn't sell? Yes. Were there lots and lots of back stock that was wasting money being stored from failed stores? Yes. Is it reasonable to assume that, for every case of X-Men #1 that got tossed, a copy or two of Liefeld New Mutants were tossed, too? Yes.

 

If you're paying storage on stuff that isn't selling, and no one wants...and Liefeld New Mutants were at the top of that list, I assure you...what do you do with it? Wait until the market might turn around?

 

Yeah, ok.

 

Better to not throw good money after bad.

 

RMA, it's ok, you're a smart guy and i know, this is "your era" of collecting and you have 1,000 copies of NM 98, but there's no need to start posts touting its relative "rareness"...its sales figures (today and 23 YEARS AGO) speak for themselves.

 

That's right, they do. And 23 years ago, they were not anywhere near what would be called "high."

 

(thumbs u

 

the 150-200,000+ copies floating around out there apparently have a pretty good FMV. sure, if all of them went up for sale at once it would crash, but so would the Picasso market. yes, it's clearly not a glut book. people will not be building houses out of NM 98s like they can with turok 1.

 

 

I have 3 copies of NM #98 left: an SS 9.8, an SS 9.6, and a raw 9.6 that I happened to find in a long box of mine a month or so ago. I sold the rest...18 9.8 slabbed copies...through 2010-2012.

 

So...no.

 

I have no horse in this race, there is no ulterior motive here, so try not to imagine what isn't there. My motive for posting this is to correct the quite common misperception that New Mutants #98 had a high print run, relative to other books of the day. Nothing more, nothing less.

 

(thumbs u

[RockMyAmadeus]

I worked in a newstand for 5 years and I remember all comics we returned had the covers torn off and returned to show proof of credit.

 

 

 

 

-slym

 

maybe they learned their lesson by the early 90s from the mile high II mess

 

[ThoseBackPages]

RMA,

 

As a newbie to the boards, could you please tell me why it is you use emoji's pretty much all the time?

 

You sure do seem to know a lot, and damn you can type!

[ThoseBackPages]

and while im asking, why is Deadpool popular?

[the blob]

I already conceded the newstand return/backdoor point in another post. I didn't know when they started tearing covers.

----------

RMA, you're missing my point about the "ding" issue...NM 98 is no more likely to have gotten dinged/trashed than any other book from that era (aside from xmen 266, sandman 1 and a few others that held their value a bit better) and if dealers were pulling the non-total out of longies before landfilling them, NM 98 would have been yanked. Hence, 9.8s and 9.6ses are no big deal for most 1990/1991 books and are no big deal for this book.

 

You keep on comparing NM 98 to the BIG sellers, but a 300K print-run was pretty substantial compared to many Marvel titles and likely blasted the majority of DC titles at the time. What wwere the numbers for Alpha Flight, Excalibur, West Coast Avengers, Conan, Thor, Daredevil, Captain America, Iron Man, etc.? I see plenty of those books circa 1990 in the 50 cent box in high grade.

 

[the blob]

P.S. - If I happen to stumple upon 10 copies of NM 98 at a flea market or yard sale for a buck a pop I assure you that it will then become one of the rarest books of the early 90s.

[the blob]

I would really love it if someone did an estimated circulation chart for some of the marvel books like the valiant fan guy did on his website. RMA, you clearly have some spare time and a good grasp of the numbers....

 

I'd also be interested in DC because I suspect that chart will show some pretty low numbers for DC second and third tier titles pre-1991 unless DC just had a policy of printing too much stuff and warehousing it or something.

[Bronty]

good lord this thread is getting out of control. Its a common book but not a glut book. what more needs to be said?

[dgarthwaite-migration]

So if the max print run was 250K,25K are destroyed.That leaves 225K(are you impressed by my guzitas)

Does anyone know what the print run of say a Hulk 181 is?

 

 

Most popular Marvel Bronze comics were in the 250,000-300,000 range, but there would have been newsstand return on that whereas NM #98 would not have returns.

 

Relatively speaking, NM #98 is a high print run.

 

DG

 

 

 

#2. 250k copies is the entire print run for the issue, nearly 30% of which were distributed to newsstands, most of which would have been subject to destruction as returns from news agents.

 

 

70's books would have a higher ratio of returns AND damage. Anything on a spinner rack longer than 4 houirs would have spine creases.

Collecting was a new trend, so handling after the purchase would not have been done with as much care. Anything resembling a backing board back then was very unusual. It was normal to see unbagged comics at conventions.

 

I think your numbers are off for NM #98 AND by that time the majority of comics were protected immediately and treasured as collectibles.

 

I'm not trying to debate intangible vague info, but if there were 150,000 Hulk #181's out there in high grade, I'd call that a high print run too.

 

DG

[the blob]

don't try to muzzle me goshdarnit! RMA started it!

 

I agree with you though. Someone tried to point that out earlier...it's not X-Men 1, Turok 1, spawn 1, Magnus 25 or, heck, even X-Men 282 in terms of 10 copies existing per collector...but RMA kept on pounding away. Clearly he must be related to Deadpool or something.

[RockMyAmadeus]

I already conceded the newstand return/backdoor point in another post. I didn't know when they started tearing covers.

----------

RMA, you're missing my point about the "ding" issue...NM 98 is no more likely to have gotten dinged/trashed than any other book from that era (aside from xmen 266, sandman 1 and a few others that held their value a bit better) and if dealers were pulling the non-total out of longies before landfilling them, NM 98 would have been yanked. Hence, 9.8s and 9.6ses are no big deal for most 1990/1991 books and are no big deal for this book.

 

You keep on comparing NM 98 to the BIG sellers, but a 300K print-run was pretty substantial compared to many Marvel titles and likely blasted the majority of DC titles at the time. What wwere the numbers for Alpha Flight,

 

Cap City*** for issues cover dated 2/91:

 

New Mutants #98 - 55,200

 

Alpha Flight #93 - 21,400

 

Excalibur #34 - 37,400 (PS. Excalibur numbers blew New Mutants out of the water for all of 1989 and half of 1990.)

 

West Coast Avengers #67 - 28,500

 

Conan #241 - 11,800

 

Thor #429 - 36,000

 

Daredevil #289 - 25,200

 

Captain America #382 - 28,800

 

Iron Man #265 - 31,800

 

You are comparing a title that WAS just coming off an incredibly successful crossover, was gaining a lot of popularity because of Cable and Liefeld, and was a mutant title. Comparing it to the absolute dregs of the Marvel line at the time doesn't say much, but it does say something that the Cap City orders for NM #98 were only about double those.

 

***Cap City accounted for about 20-30% of the market at this point.

 

Do not misunderstand what I have said.

 

I did not say that NM #98 had a low print run. I also never said that New Mutants #98 was subject to MORE attrition than "any other book of that era."

 

I said it did not have a HIGH print run. It did not. I've also said nothing about why there are so many 9.8s and 9.6s. When I talk about attrition, I MEAN attrition...including the point of destruction/discarding. If anyone thinks there are the same number of copies of NM #98 in existence as there were in June of 1991, they'd be wrong.

 

And you don't apparently understand how NOT HOT Deadpool was for a very, very long time. You know the New Mutants that would have gotten pulled? #87. That's it. That's the ONLY issue of the entire run that maintained a $5-$10 value since 1990. The only one. No one would have "yanked" #98, because no one wanted them.

 

Many of the people who DID keep them, kept them very well, no doubt. But not all of them were kept, and certainly not all of them were kept in perfect condition.

 

And the issue has been "OMG, why is NM #98 worth so much money, there's a BILLION of them in existence!!! They printed like 750,000-1 million copies of that book, just like X-Force #2!!" This thread is to explain why that's not really true.

 

 

 

 

[RockMyAmadeus]

RMA,

 

As a newbie to the boards, could you please tell me why it is you use emoji's pretty much all the time?

 

 

Personal reasons.

[dgarthwaite-migration]

You keep on comparing NM 98 to the BIG sellers, but a 300K print-run was pretty substantial compared to many Marvel titles and likely blasted the majority of DC titles at the time.

 

Actually, I was told that Wonder Woman circulation dipped down to the 20,000-30,000 range and was almost cancelled in the 70's.

 

DC also considered having Marvel make their comics. DC was struggling.

 

DG

[RockMyAmadeus]

So if the max print run was 250K,25K are destroyed.That leaves 225K(are you impressed by my guzitas)

Does anyone know what the print run of say a Hulk 181 is?

 

 

Most popular Marvel Bronze comics were in the 250,000-300,000 range, but there would have been newsstand return on that whereas NM #98 would not have returns.

 

Relatively speaking, NM #98 is a high print run.

 

DG

 

 

 

#2. 250k copies is the entire print run for the issue, nearly 30% of which were distributed to newsstands, most of which would have been subject to destruction as returns from news agents.

 

 

70's books would have a higher ratio of returns AND damage.

 

The first is not true, as has already been explained in this thread re: newsstand sell-through, and the second is entirely anecdotal.

 

Anything on a spinner rack longer than 4 houirs would have spine creases.

Collecting was a new trend, so handling after the purchase would not have been done with as much care. Anything resembling a backing board back then was very unusual. It was normal to see unbagged comics at conventions.

 

I think your numbers are off for NM #98 AND by that time the majority of comics were protected immediately and treasured as collectibles.

 

What numbers? You mean, the published, verifiable data from Capital City, the Marvel Statements of Ownership, and the Krause Standard Catalog of Comic Books...? You dispute those numbers...?

 

:shrug:

 

And this discussion has nothing to do with surviving copies in high grade. No one disputes that, so far as I have seen.

I'm not trying to debate intangible vague info, but if there were 150,000 Hulk #181's out there in high grade, I'd call that a high print run too.

 

DG

 

Knock yourself out!

 

But can you answer one question? Why did you say that NM #98 would "not have returns"...?