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How much of a premium are we talking for newsstand issues v/s direct editions?
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1,113 posts in this topic

Just now, Get Marwood & I said:

Snagging a newsstand group for cheap under the radar used to be a thrill back in the day. Seeing others listed priced to the skies, with zero justification, not so much  9_9

Completely agree!

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Been trying to put together a McFarlane newsstand 9.8 run, got positively annihilated on this one. I know there's a few others going after the run as well 'cause I've been beaten out on several books, but this was the most extreme premium I've seen on the McF's so far.. Directs hover around the $300 mark.....

1094865835_ScreenShot2019-09-30at7_05_50PM.thumb.jpg.b3554ce064cb02b2410449386ddde918.jpg

 

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1 hour ago, Martin Sinescu said:

Been trying to put together a McFarlane newsstand 9.8 run, got positively annihilated on this one. I know there's a few others going after the run as well 'cause I've been beaten out on several books, but this was the most extreme premium I've seen on the McF's so far.. Directs hover around the $300 mark.....

1094865835_ScreenShot2019-09-30at7_05_50PM.thumb.jpg.b3554ce064cb02b2410449386ddde918.jpg

 

:whatthe:  Wow....

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15 minutes ago, mr_highgrade said:

:whatthe::whatthe:

Hahaha. Just sticker shock. It's been a while since I have looked at the ASM Mcfarlane Newsstands.. Guess I should not be though when so many books have hit almost $1000... Really just makes me happy that I bought a lot of my books then at Walden, B&N and a few local shops Most sold Newsstands here.  :cloud9:

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On 9/18/2019 at 9:11 PM, RockMyAmadeus said:

I would be fascinated to find out the following about this ads:

1. How many orders were actually fulfilled?

2. What were the actual grades of the books that were sent out?

This is around 35 years ago and an N of 1, so take it all with a grain of salt: I placed probably a dozen different 35/50-cent orders from Mile High starting in the early-80s. I had to get a money order from the Post Office to pay, and they took a while to get to my house. (I never bought from their individually priced ads nor from their catalog, even though I got a new one every few months.) I remember not getting a book perhaps 3 or 4 times and being replaced by something I had on a back-up list. All of the comics I received (that I can recall) were in very nice condition. I stopped buying from Mile High before their first Mile High 2 ads, as I had already started getting a CBG subscription by then and was spending my money on those books. 

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On 9/30/2019 at 3:29 AM, Get Marwood & I said:

So in respect of the original thread title question, "How much of a premium are we talking for newsstand issues v/s direct editions?", the answer for me is it depends.

If a title has no collector interest it likely won't matter whether a newsstand version of a particular issue is 10 or 1,000 times scarcer than a direct. No one collects it, so the prices stay the same. You can pimp it all you like, no one will buy it.

If an issue has some collector interest / desirability,  a premium may creep in if the newsstand version is comparatively scarce as collectors will see it as a limited variation on a desirable book. Collectors and speculators will always buy desirable books. 

If an issue has rabid collector interest, and is for a character that attracts completists or run collectors, a newsstand may attract a huge premium if it is perceived to be extremely scarce (but not if it's an annual :bigsmile:)

Finally, if a newsstand is in the possession of Chuck Rozanski, it will be priced x1,000 direct edition value regardless. 

Well, that passed the time. 

Yours sincerely, 

Captain Obvious 

One of the funny things about the Mile High Comics website is that they list several comics with a newsstand premium when in fact it is the same thing as the regular copy.   Case in point:  Superman (1939 series) #348 with cover date of Jun 19082; Mile High lists a 'regular' copy in FN for $6.75 and a 'newsstand' copy in FN for $15.  DC's Direct sales issues were not even created until Oct 1982, so Mile High's 'regular' copy of Superman 348 is the same thing as a 'newsstand' copy.   They should be embarrassed for creating two separate listings for the same thing (especially since I pointed out this problem to them about 8 years ago).  The other thing that they might want to take note of is the fact that the earliest direct sales issues are harder to find than newsstand issues, yet they charge more for the newsstand issues and less for those direct sales issues.  

 

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7 hours ago, Cpt Kirk said:

One of the funny things about the Mile High Comics website is that they list several comics with a newsstand premium when in fact it is the same thing as the regular copy.   Case in point:  Superman (1939 series) #348 with cover date of Jun 19082; Mile High lists a 'regular' copy in FN for $6.75 and a 'newsstand' copy in FN for $15.  DC's Direct sales issues were not even created until Oct 1982, so Mile High's 'regular' copy of Superman 348 is the same thing as a 'newsstand' copy.   They should be embarrassed for creating two separate listings for the same thing (especially since I pointed out this problem to them about 8 years ago).  The other thing that they might want to take note of is the fact that the earliest direct sales issues are harder to find than newsstand issues, yet they charge more for the newsstand issues and less for those direct sales issues.  

 

It does give the impression of a flawed understanding doesn't it. Either that or the website is so old no one knows how to fix it :bigsmile:

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On 3/5/2014 at 11:33 PM, valiantman said:

It survived.

 

Glad to see someone else who looks at newsstand editions this way.

I grew up in the late sixties and seventies and remember those newsstands well. At 12, I started working for a comic book store in 1977 in San Jose, California. Back then, I had a huge collection that went all the way back to Batman #2 and other comics from the forties, fifties, and sixties. Then in 1979, my mother forced me to sell it all. In the late eighties, I started collecting again, and even pencilled some comics for Marvel and DC in the early nineties. During that time, not only had direct distribution taken over but there were all sorts of promotions from the publishers, all in an effort to generate hype around the comics.

As a collector, I always resented the efforts to market the same comics in different forms to buyers by making them artificially rare. It was largely because of these transparent ploys to collectors, designed to inspire them to buy dozens of copies that would never be read, that I stopped buying comics altogether. It was fake and I was disgusted by it. Holofoil covers, chromium, alternate covers by different artists, all of it was, as I perceived it, an illusion of rarity. Not only that but because it was an illusion (in the sense that the rarity was built into their marketing) I felt like those comics were part of a fraud on the collector's market. There was no genuine value in those variant comics.

Newsstand editions, from my perspective, are totally different. As Valiantman said, they are "survivors". To me, they are the guerrilla warriors of the comic book world and deserve some respect for that. Newsstand comics were not part of a purposeful ploy designed to trick kids into buying multiple copies of the same comic. They exist because comic book distributors and publishers had an idea to shift their business from a general audience market serviced by newsstand distribution to a collector market serviced by comic book stores. The rarity of newsstand comics is a by-product or side effect of switching distribution methods, not artificially created by the marketing teams at the publishers. From my point of view, all direct distribution comics, regardless of print runs or rarity (such as the first direct comics in 1979) are not valid targets for collecting. Ever since I discovered how to tell the difference between newsstand and direct, I stopped buying direct except for situations where I had to buy some direct copies to get a newsstand copy that I wanted. When I get those, I put the directs in a separate box of comics designated as comics to be sold, traded, or given away.

Bottom line is that I don't look at direct distribution comics as legitimate comic books. As far as my collector interests are concerned, they don't exist. It isn't an issue of rarity for me, but that newsstand comics are the real deal. They are what comics were in the beginning of comic book publishing, and they represent all that I think is cool about comic book collecting. The direct comics and all their variants are like so many Peter Max limited edition posters or Hummel figurines. 
 

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On 10/3/2019 at 8:10 PM, Cpt Kirk said:

The other thing that they might want to take note of is the fact that the earliest direct sales issues are harder to find than newsstand issues, yet they charge more for the newsstand issues and less for those direct sales issues.  

 

I'm creating a database designed to compare newsstand to direct edition comics. My goal is to work out actual rarity of each comic, and a fair valuation for them. To do this, after creating entries to identify the comics, I have to work out the rarity somehow, from scant available information. At the moment, I am resorting to counting comics in auctions on Heritage Auctions for older comics and eBay for newer comics. I don't count the results as a valid representation of rarity unless I find at least 50 sales for the issue, whatever it is. If there are 50 or more sales, then my database calculates the ratio of newsstand to direct comics. It does not take into account the possibility that in some cases it might be the same comic purchased in an earlier auction, offered again for resale. The reason is that I am working out rarity relative to the collector market, rather than actual rarity, which is much more difficult to ascertain. I also am using circulation figures when available in combination with estimates of print run percentages split for direct/newsstand copies, to approximate the number of copies extant. That figure is then compared to the ratios I'm seeing at auction to see how well they agree.

A couple of observations that are true of the titles I've sampled, though more data points might affect the results, are these:

1) Some newsstand comics published in 1990 or earlier are more difficult to find than their direct counterparts. If you are looking for these specific comics, you might be surprised how hard to find they are, given that on a print run basis they should be 3x-10x more common than direct issues.

My guess is that destruction of unsold copies and mishandling by casual readers removed most of these from the collector's market. Many might be sitting in attics owned by non-collectors, but these will be in poor condition and are not available to collectors now, making them irrelevant to a discussion about buying these now. I have heard the argument that these will come streaming out of attics once it is known they are worth something but I don't buy it. The reason is that many of the comics are worth something now, they are streaming out of attics already, but newsstand editions are streaming out in much smaller numbers than direct copies. For instance, X-Men #266 (1990), first appearance of Gambit, had appeared 205 times in Heritage auctions on the day I checked (a few weeks ago). Of those 205 sales, 198 were direct editions. One of the things I had to study when I earned my PhD was statistics. Not my best subject but I know it well enough that I am confident a 97:3 ratio is not an accident. On eBay, it is easier to find this comic in newsstand form. At first it seems a lot easier because the first thirty or so listings are almost evenly divided between newsstand and direct copies (possibly because I search for newsstand comics often). However, after going through the 325 listings I found, only 42, or 14.84%, were newsstand editions.

On the other end of the spectrum is Amazing Spider-Man 233 (1980). At Heritage, it showed up for auction 27 times. All of them are direct editions. None are newsstand copies. On eBay, it is a little more common in newsstand editions, but not as much as you might expect given the print run disparity (app 49,750/direct, 199,000/Newsstand). On eBay, there were 86 sales, of which 47 were newsstand copies and 39 direct copies. If the print run corresponded to the number of copies available, we would expect around 186 newsstand copies for the 47 newsstand copies found.

Right away we have two discrepancies between expectation and reality: firstly, print runs do not correspond to observed frequency. Secondly, eBay has a higher incidence of newsstand copies than Heritage. I think the first discrepancy is explained by customer mishandling and destruction of unsold copies. The second discrepancy is likely explained by the fact that low grade comics are more common on eBay than Heritage, which is more of a high-end auction site.

2) Some titles are rarer at the newsstand than in comic book stores, even if published in the same month. I haven't gone into this in a lot of detail yet but preliminary data supports the hypothesis that Marvel and DC did not use the same percentage split between newsstand/direct comics across all titles for the same month and year. Instead, it looks like they tried to guess which titles would fare better on the newsstand than in comic book stores, and then decided how many of each to print on that basis. For that reason, newsstand copies of westerns, war, and humor comics are easier to find than newsstand editions of superhero comics. It may be that the estimates we have of the percentages of newsstand/direct comics printed are average for all titles lumped together but there are substantial differences between titles.

3) Similar to point 2, it appears as if publishers radically increased the ratio of direct comics vs newsstand comics when they thought they had an issue likely to appeal to collectors. An example of this is Amazing Spider-Man 252 (1984). This issue showed up in 385 auctions at Heritage. Of those, 184 were direct editions, 201 were newsstand editions. My take on it is that although there is a statistical difference, where newsstand copies are less common than direct copies, it is so close that there shouldn't be a premium for either version. Contrast that with Amazing Spider-Man 238 (1983), published a year earlier. Based on print run percentage estimates, this comic should be the same rarity or even less rare in newsstand form than #252. However, it is more than four times rarer. Out of 136 auctions, 109 were direct editions, 27 were newsstand editions.

My guess is that the disparity is because of two things. Firstly, Marvel had no way of knowing in advance that Hobgoblin would be anything more than another run-of-the-mill villain at the time they published #238. Therefore, it had a normal direct/newsstand split for a superhero comic of that year, making it four times rarer than the direct counterpart. Secondly, Marvel could predict that #252 would attract serious interest because of the introduction of the new black costume, so they changed the ratio enough that approximately equal numbers of both variants survived.

4) Modern newsstand comics are very hard to find, particularly if you are looking for a specific issue. In my case, I am looking for full runs of certain titles and am finding that there are blocks of as many as 50 consecutive issues that haven't appeared for sale anywhere in newsstand versions since I started looking. I just got back from the New York Comic Con, where I spent most of my time, from the first day (Thursday) looking for newsstand comics. I found exactly one that was on my want list. I found another 40 or so that weren't on my list, bought for trading value only. I bought one, thinking it was a newsstand copy, only to discover it wasn't when I got home. In addition, I left behind around 50 others that were uninteresting either due to poor condition (most of them) or they were obviously common newsstand issues, most from the early eighties. The experience was similar at every dealer's table. I would go up to a table covered with perhaps 15 long boxes, then would go through the comics one by one, looking at the UPC codes. If they were modern comics, most boxes had zero newsstand issues. If the dealer had them at all, it was usually 3-4 individual comics out of 15 boxes or so. Older newsstands were easier to find but were still less common than direct editions.

5) Several dealers charge a premium for newsstand issues. Others don't, or it is negligible. My take on it is this: if I was a dealer, I would be charging a significant premium for modern newsstand editions because once I sell the copy I have, I'm not likely to see another. If I do, it will be at about a 100:1 ratio. I would also charge a premium for earlier newsstand comics but not as much. That said, I don't think the market has caught on to how rare some of these are yet, so it cannot command prices appropriate to actual rarity right now. Try, for instance, to find newsstand editions of Marvel comics from 2013. These are almost impossible to find. I've never seen even an image of some of these though they definitely exist.

AP

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On 10/3/2019 at 8:10 PM, Cpt Kirk said:

One of the funny things about the Mile High Comics website is that they list several comics with a newsstand premium when in fact it is the same thing as the regular copy.   Case in point:  Superman (1939 series) #348 with cover date of Jun 19082; Mile High lists a 'regular' copy in FN for $6.75 and a 'newsstand' copy in FN for $15.  DC's Direct sales issues were not even created until Oct 1982, so Mile High's 'regular' copy of Superman 348 is the same thing as a 'newsstand' copy.   They should be embarrassed for creating two separate listings for the same thing (especially since I pointed out this problem to them about 8 years ago).  The other thing that they might want to take note of is the fact that the earliest direct sales issues are harder to find than newsstand issues, yet they charge more for the newsstand issues and less for those direct sales issues.  

 

Two things, I have DC direct market issues starting with 10/1980 cover date. To your last point, in Fine condition or so, to ask a premium for a newsstand over direct is a bit foolish. However, I'd say that, while at the beginning the print runs were heavily weighted toward newsstands, my experience from the Batman/Detective run I was building a few years ago was that the number of newsstands which have survived in high grade from that early period is now much smaller than the directs. When I started putting my run together, I really didn't intend on getting a copy of each, just wanted 1 NM raw copy of every issue. I was surprised a few years later when I went back over my spreadsheet (which did break down whether I had N or D), that immediately upon the start of directs at the end of 1980, the copy which I had for my run was a direct. Very rarely was there a high-grade newsstand in the mix and this was, again, primarily from buying indiscriminately with no favorability toward one or the other. It is significantly harder to find 9.8 newsstands from the early 80's as well. Wolverine #1, DD 181 -- books that are incredibly common in 9.8 -- took a good bit of searching to find my 9.8's. They're not crazy-rare, but the directs overwhelmingly outnumber them. 

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1 minute ago, Martin Sinescu said:

DD 181 -- books that are incredibly common in 9.8 -- took a good bit of searching to find my 9.8's. They're not crazy-rare, but the directs overwhelmingly outnumber them. 

According to my database, the print run for this issue was about 250,000, of which 50,000 were direct editions. That would suggest that directs are four times rarer than newsstand copies. However, of 101 auctions of copies in CGC-graded 9.2 and above condition, 90 are direct, 11 are newsstand. Not only are direct copies not 4 times rarer, they are actually 8 times more common! I have three of these in high grade (one is slabbed at 9.4) and consider it a favorite target for purchase because of its rarity relative to other Daredevils from the same era. The more valuable 168, published about a year earlier, is not so good as a target for collecting because it is almost twice as common in newsstand edition than direct.

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1 hour ago, paqart said:

3) Similar to point 2, it appears as if publishers radically increased the ratio of direct comics vs newsstand comics when they thought they had an issue likely to appeal to collectors. An example of this is Amazing Spider-Man 252 (1984). This issue showed up in 385 auctions at Heritage. Of those, 184 were direct editions, 201 were newsstand editions. My take on it is that although there is a statistical difference, where newsstand copies are less common than direct copies, it is so close that there shouldn't be a premium for either version. Contrast that with Amazing Spider-Man 238 (1983), published a year earlier. Based on print run percentage estimates, this comic should be the same rarity or even less rare in newsstand form than #252. However, it is more than four times rarer. Out of 136 auctions, 109 were direct editions, 27 were newsstand editions.

My guess is that the disparity is because of two things. Firstly, Marvel had no way of knowing in advance that Hobgoblin would be anything more than another run-of-the-mill villain at the time they published #238. Therefore, it had a normal direct/newsstand split for a superhero comic of that year, making it four times rarer than the direct counterpart. Secondly, Marvel could predict that #252 would attract serious interest because of the introduction of the new black costume, so they changed the ratio enough that approximately equal numbers of both variants survived.

 

One other thing to factor in is the delay between newsstands hitting the rack versus directs. There were times I missed out on a book at the LCS because of day-of-release sellouts, but knew to keep an eye out at the grocery store a few weeks later to pick up the newsstand. I assume ASM 252 was very heavily speculated on and that would've extended to newsstand pickups as well, so that would almost definitely increase the high-grade survivors. As you said, 238 might've been more under-the-radar which would affect both the orders placed and copies hoarded upon release. Definitely agree on your observations for each book in regards to newsstands versus directs as I've noticed the same thing myself, but 238 doesn't fetch too much more for the newsstand version (more along the lines of what newsstands used to fetch a few years ago, which was maybe 10% premium, versus these days where it's based more on the desperation of the buyer).

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On 9/29/2019 at 8:24 AM, Get Marwood & I said:

It's almost like annuals 'don't matter' somehow.

Funny thing about that is that Giant-Size and Specials don't have the same stigma. I think the reason is that the annuals were often written and drawn by new creative teams being tested but the Giant-Size and Special issues were drawn by the regular creative teams on the book.

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On 9/29/2019 at 10:19 PM, Lazyboy said:

Annuals seem to be mostly ignored in general, even more so than regular run filler. Newsstands are just a different version of something almost nobody cares about.

Hold on to that newsstand hate it will keep you warm. 

Collect what you like, but don't criticize others for having fun chasing them.

 

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1 hour ago, paqart said:

I'm creating a database designed to compare newsstand to direct edition comics. My goal is to work out actual rarity of each comic, and a fair valuation for them. To do this, after creating entries to identify the comics, I have to work out the rarity somehow, from scant available information. At the moment, I am resorting to counting comics in auctions on Heritage Auctions for older comics and eBay for newer comics. I don't count the results as a valid representation of rarity unless I find at least 50 sales for the issue, whatever it is. If there are 50 or more sales, then my database calculates the ratio of newsstand to direct comics. It does not take into account the possibility that in some cases it might be the same comic purchased in an earlier auction, offered again for resale. The reason is that I am working out rarity relative to the collector market, rather than actual rarity, which is much more difficult to ascertain. I also am using circulation figures when available in combination with estimates of print run percentages split for direct/newsstand copies, to approximate the number of copies extant. That figure is then compared to the ratios I'm seeing at auction to see how well they agree.

A couple of observations that are true of the titles I've sampled, though more data points might affect the results, are these:

1) Some newsstand comics published in 1990 or earlier are more difficult to find than their direct counterparts. If you are looking for these specific comics, you might be surprised how hard to find they are, given that on a print run basis they should be 3x-10x more common than direct issues.

My guess is that destruction of unsold copies and mishandling by casual readers removed most of these from the collector's market. Many might be sitting in attics owned by non-collectors, but these will be in poor condition and are not available to collectors now, making them irrelevant to a discussion about buying these now. I have heard the argument that these will come streaming out of attics once it is known they are worth something but I don't buy it. The reason is that many of the comics are worth something now, they are streaming out of attics already, but newsstand editions are streaming out in much smaller numbers than direct copies. For instance, X-Men #266 (1990), first appearance of Gambit, had appeared 205 times in Heritage auctions on the day I checked (a few weeks ago). Of those 205 sales, 198 were direct editions. One of the things I had to study when I earned my PhD was statistics. Not my best subject but I know it well enough that I am confident a 97:3 ratio is not an accident. On eBay, it is easier to find this comic in newsstand form. At first it seems a lot easier because the first thirty or so listings are almost evenly divided between newsstand and direct copies (possibly because I search for newsstand comics often). However, after going through the 325 listings I found, only 42, or 14.84%, were newsstand editions.

On the other end of the spectrum is Amazing Spider-Man 233 (1980). At Heritage, it showed up for auction 27 times. All of them are direct editions. None are newsstand copies. On eBay, it is a little more common in newsstand editions, but not as much as you might expect given the print run disparity (app 49,750/direct, 199,000/Newsstand). On eBay, there were 86 sales, of which 47 were newsstand copies and 39 direct copies. If the print run corresponded to the number of copies available, we would expect around 186 newsstand copies for the 47 newsstand copies found.

Right away we have two discrepancies between expectation and reality: firstly, print runs do not correspond to observed frequency. Secondly, eBay has a higher incidence of newsstand copies than Heritage. I think the first discrepancy is explained by customer mishandling and destruction of unsold copies. The second discrepancy is likely explained by the fact that low grade comics are more common on eBay than Heritage, which is more of a high-end auction site.

2) Some titles are rarer at the newsstand than in comic book stores, even if published in the same month. I haven't gone into this in a lot of detail yet but preliminary data supports the hypothesis that Marvel and DC did not use the same percentage split between newsstand/direct comics across all titles for the same month and year. Instead, it looks like they tried to guess which titles would fare better on the newsstand than in comic book stores, and then decided how many of each to print on that basis. For that reason, newsstand copies of westerns, war, and humor comics are easier to find than newsstand editions of superhero comics. It may be that the estimates we have of the percentages of newsstand/direct comics printed are average for all titles lumped together but there are substantial differences between titles.

3) Similar to point 2, it appears as if publishers radically increased the ratio of direct comics vs newsstand comics when they thought they had an issue likely to appeal to collectors. An example of this is Amazing Spider-Man 252 (1984). This issue showed up in 385 auctions at Heritage. Of those, 184 were direct editions, 201 were newsstand editions. My take on it is that although there is a statistical difference, where newsstand copies are less common than direct copies, it is so close that there shouldn't be a premium for either version. Contrast that with Amazing Spider-Man 238 (1983), published a year earlier. Based on print run percentage estimates, this comic should be the same rarity or even less rare in newsstand form than #252. However, it is more than four times rarer. Out of 136 auctions, 109 were direct editions, 27 were newsstand editions.

My guess is that the disparity is because of two things. Firstly, Marvel had no way of knowing in advance that Hobgoblin would be anything more than another run-of-the-mill villain at the time they published #238. Therefore, it had a normal direct/newsstand split for a superhero comic of that year, making it four times rarer than the direct counterpart. Secondly, Marvel could predict that #252 would attract serious interest because of the introduction of the new black costume, so they changed the ratio enough that approximately equal numbers of both variants survived.

4) Modern newsstand comics are very hard to find, particularly if you are looking for a specific issue. In my case, I am looking for full runs of certain titles and am finding that there are blocks of as many as 50 consecutive issues that haven't appeared for sale anywhere in newsstand versions since I started looking. I just got back from the New York Comic Con, where I spent most of my time, from the first day (Thursday) looking for newsstand comics. I found exactly one that was on my want list. I found another 40 or so that weren't on my list, bought for trading value only. I bought one, thinking it was a newsstand copy, only to discover it wasn't when I got home. In addition, I left behind around 50 others that were uninteresting either due to poor condition (most of them) or they were obviously common newsstand issues, most from the early eighties. The experience was similar at every dealer's table. I would go up to a table covered with perhaps 15 long boxes, then would go through the comics one by one, looking at the UPC codes. If they were modern comics, most boxes had zero newsstand issues. If the dealer had them at all, it was usually 3-4 individual comics out of 15 boxes or so. Older newsstands were easier to find but were still less common than direct editions.

5) Several dealers charge a premium for newsstand issues. Others don't, or it is negligible. My take on it is this: if I was a dealer, I would be charging a significant premium for modern newsstand editions because once I sell the copy I have, I'm not likely to see another. If I do, it will be at about a 100:1 ratio. I would also charge a premium for earlier newsstand comics but not as much. That said, I don't think the market has caught on to how rare some of these are yet, so it cannot command prices appropriate to actual rarity right now. Try, for instance, to find newsstand editions of Marvel comics from 2013. These are almost impossible to find. I've never seen even an image of some of these though they definitely exist.

AP

I loved everything till you got to the end and used the 100:1 ratio. Can you explain to me where you got that number? I know where I think it came from, but I wondered if you arrived at the number another way?

Keep in mind its only recently that newsstand have seen a stronger appreciation(Other then ASM 36) and part of this isn't to the rarity of the book, but the promotion by the "PT Barnum's" of our industry and their spec site breathren that like to hype stuff. (This is excluding Image 1s which were getting appreciation before this by a little bit.)

 

Edited by fastballspecial
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14 minutes ago, paqart said:

Funny thing about that is that Giant-Size and Specials don't have the same stigma. I think the reason is that the annuals were often written and drawn by new creative teams being tested but the Giant-Size and Special issues were drawn by the regular creative teams on the book.

I bet those annuals started to lose their appeal (among the run collectors) when they became the platform for crossovers like Atlantis Attacks and Evolutionary War. I can definitely see collectors of specific titles passing on their own titles' annuals if it would also necessitate buying annuals of books you didn't collect to get the complete story. I feel like up until then the quality was higher, but the gimmicky nature of the big events kind of tarnished their credibility. Just my two cents.

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26 minutes ago, fastballspecial said:

I loved everything till you got to the end and used the 100:1 ratio. Can you explain to me where you got that number? I know where I think it came from, but I wondered if you arrived at the number another way?

I was unclear with the sentence that referenced a 100:1 ratio. In that sentence I was referring to approximate rarity, not value or price. Since the rest of the paragraph is about price, I can understand why you might have read that as a "fair price". The number is a rounded average of some of the highest rarity indexes I've seen in the database. The "rarity index" is my way of determining whether an asking price is attractive for a comic. It is calculated based on a number of variables but should be read as the expected number of direct edition copies available per newsstand copy. For example, Amazing Spider-Man #700: On Heritage, 13 copies have sold. All are direct, all are above 9.2. On eBay, 146 were offered on the day this was checked, of which 8 are newsstand editions. The rarity index for that issue is 13, indicating 13 direct copies for every newsstand copy. Issue 606 is comparatively harder to find. Out of 10 sales at Heritage and 101 offered on eBay (111 total) none are newsstand editions. That makes for a rarity that can't even be calculated because it requires division by zero. Add to that a print run estimate of 708 copies manufactured in newsstand form, and you have a rare comic. There are a lot of newsstand copies like that. For all of them, I round them down to 100.

Edited by paqart
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