Dealer Etiquette on pointing out Restoration 1 1

[MrBedrock]

13 hours ago, tth2 said:

In my list of things that I'm concerned about, "comic dealer's feelings being hurt" ranks somewhere around #4,637,243. 

Right behind bathing.

[Silver Surfer]

[Artboy99]

On ‎2017‎/‎09‎/‎13 at 5:38 PM, Silver Surfer said:

Take a guess, I'm betting you will get it the first time but I'm also betting that you won't be surprised or shocked either. 

Yep.

I already know.

[Artboy99]

I had an experience at a Calgary Comic Expo show where a regular buyer purchased what appeared to be a very high grade copy of X-Men #4 from another dealer at the show.

The buyer paid upwards of $1700.00 which at the time was about what that book was selling for in VF.

The proud buyer showed it to me and the first thing I noticed was a very large crease on the front cover bottom corner( about 4 inches in length from the bottom cover to the right side ). Upon further look the crease went through the entire book!

To me this is rather obviously no longer a VF, and I felt the book was at best a 5.0 and should have been more around the $500-600 mark.

I guess the problem is I told this to the buyer. He became rather angered and stormed off to discuss this with the seller who was another dealer in the room.

The dealer then stormed over to my booth and we had a rather heated exchange over grading books and the appeal of a book versus technical grade. He did have a point, that the book did look a lot nicer than some other 5.0 example he had to compare it to. I still say that a VF book with a 4 inch long crease through the entire book can't be called VF anymore.

Perhaps it was none of my business and I should have simply said "hey nice book" when the owner showed it to me.

Edited September 15, 2017 by Artboy99

[Silver Surfer]

If Greggy was the buyer you shouldn't have said anything. 

[Sqeggs]

4 hours ago, Silver Surfer said:

A similar copy [but with only one side that was trimmed and graded] sold for about $1,500 less in a recent Heritage auction and I pointed that out when he suggested it was worth every penny I paid for it.    I have since sold the book and took a haircut in doing so but I wasn't about to give them the satisfaction of burning me for a third time, I just wanted to get the stink of this whole episode off of me.

Understandable.  Maybe Vinnie bought the copy back off Heritage. 

[Sqeggs]

38 minutes ago, Artboy99 said:

I had an experience at a Calgary Comic Expo show where a regular buyer purchased what appeared to be a very high grade copy of X-Men #4 from another dealer at the show.

The buyer paid upwards of $1700.00 which at the time was about what that book was selling for in VF.

The proud buyer showed it to me and the first thing I noticed was a very large crease on the front cover bottom corner( about 4 inches in length from the bottom cover to the right side ). Upon further look the crease went through the entire book!

To me this is rather obviously no longer a VF, and I felt the book was at best a 5.0 and should have been more around the $500-600 mark.

I guess the problem is I told this to the buyer. He became rather angered and stormed off to discuss this with the seller who was another dealer in the room.

The dealer then stormed over to my booth and we had a rather heated exchange over grading books and the appeal of a book versus technical grade. He did have a point, that the book did look a lot nicer than some other 5.0 example he had to compare it to. I still say that a VF book with a 4 inch long crease through the entire book can't be called VF anymore.

Perhaps it was none of my business and I should have simply said "hey nice book" when the owner showed it to me.

I guess all these stories help to explain why CGC does the volume of business it does and why what originally struck me as a crazy stupid idea of sealing comics away in plastic has caught on the way it did. 

[Silver Surfer]

One thing I have found with dealers over the years is that when they are good, they are really good. However, when they are bad they are serial slim balls. There is no in between. 

[Sqeggs]

6 minutes ago, Silver Surfer said:

One thing I have found with dealers over the years is that when they are good, they are really good. However, when they are bad they are serial slim balls. There is no in between. 

Thank goodness that this means they'll have trouble reproducing! 

[sacentaur]

4 minutes ago, Silver Surfer said:

One thing I have found with dealers over the years is that when they are good, they are really good. However, when they are bad they are serial slim balls. There is no in between. 

Exactly - yet I've noticed that some collectors continue to do business with the slime-balls even after being repeatedly manipulated and cheated, rationalizing away egregious situations while hoping things will go better "next time".

I can state unequivocally that I am much happier in the hobby having stopped doing any type of business with the unethical Greed Merchants. The fear I had of not being able to find the right books was completely unfounded; in fact things have gotten even better since I'm no longer weighted down by those slimy dealers.

 

[Larryw7]

1 hour ago, sacentaur said:

Exactly - yet I've noticed that some collectors continue to do business with the slime-balls even after being repeatedly manipulated and cheated, rationalizing away egregious situations while hoping things will go better "next time".

 

I was one of those people, Steve. I don't know why I always rationalized bad behavior by this dealer, but I did. I bought a Whiz 42 that was sold as the Pennsylvania copy. CGC and several boardies here told me it wasn't after I became suspicious. I purchased a Marvel Mystery 19 that had half of the splash page of the Ka-Zar story missing(no disclosure). Books that came back from CGC that were several points lower than the raw grade. It was when Silver Surfer told me about his experience with the MM 9 that I decided enough is enough. I myself almost bought that book, and I dodged a bullet, though I'm sorry that Peter ended up being wounded. 

There are so many good dealers out there, plus boardies who sell nice books, so there's no reason to deal with the careless dealers or just plain sleazy ones.

 

Quote

 

 

[sacentaur]

Yup - and there's no incentive for the unethical dealer to change since they occupy a top spot and get billionaire/celebrity clients.

Even if a collector gets completely fed up with them, there always seems to be some other collector to fill the hole.

It's a deplorable cycle that is, unfortunately, perpetual.

[blazingbob]

On 9/13/2017 at 1:36 PM, Hamlet said:

I was at a small, local convention last weekend, and I noticed one of the regular dealers had a nice looking raw Archie 1 on his wall.  I said something along the lines of "Holy cow, is that an Archie 1".  He pulled it down and took it out and started showing it to me and a couple of other people who were nearby.  It was a nice looking book (very rough guess 4.0 with nice pages, which for that book is pretty darn nice).  One of the other dealers watching chimed in that it looked like the staple had been replaced.  I think he was probably right, since it was very bright and shiny, and there was a tiny bit of discoloration at the centerfold that seemed like it would have had to come from somewhere else, but restoration is not something I am particularly knowledgeable about, so who knows. 

How do people feel about the other dealer chiming in?  I think it is always good to have people keeping an eye out for restoration so that people know what they have or are buying, but I can see it annoying the first dealer to have someone talking down their book.  It's not like anyone in the room was real likely to buy a raw Archie 1 regardless ( or a certified one for that matter ), but I could see it creating hard feelings between dealers.

Does anyone have an strong feelings about this?

Unless I'm asked a dealer really shouldn't throw out an opinion on a book.  If the customer had a concern about the book they are the ones that have to ask the question about the dealer's return policy before they buy the book.  Just because the guy behind the booth has a sign and some boxes doesn't mean they are a business or have a return policy.  If the staple was an area of concern then having it graded would have been a very good idea.  Rather be 100% sure or constantly looking at the book and wondering.  I have had other dealer's books brought up to me at shows asking if I they got a good deal.  Very dangerous question to ask me since I generally am pretty upfront.  But remember that somebody could take one of my books and do the same so it is a fine line when you put a dealer in that position.  Everybody misses something.  I try and teach buyers when looking at raw books some of the grading tricks I've learned so that you don't miss subtle things like non-coloring breaking creases etc.   If the dealer gets pissed off at you pointing out something to the buyer it generally means they are more upset with possibly losing the sale or having their mistake pointed out in public.  There is the right and wrong way to do that.   

There really is no GRAY area for Disclosing restoration.  If it is there and you know it you should disclose it.  There is no GRAY area on this.  If you get caught that you knew it was restored and didn't disclose it you deserve the reputation you helped create. 

Edited September 16, 2017 by blazingbob

[Straw-Man]

21 hours ago, Silver Surfer said:

One thing I have found with dealers over the years is that when they are good, they are really good. However, when they are bad they are serial slim balls. There is no in between. 

there are some portly ones, too.

[porcupine48]

8 minutes ago, Straw-Man said:

there are some portly ones, too.

like balls soaked in port? 

[Gotham Kid]

This thread. In particular the latter part.

Edited September 17, 2017 by Gotham Kid

[batman_fan]

I asked a dealer who I won't mention to look at a book for me because something looked off.  We walked to the booth, he looked at the book and it had color touch on the spine and around the staple which he was able to spot.  Book was an Adventure 51, dealer selling it was a dealer who has been banned from the boards.  Show was Wondercon several years back but I can't remember if it was pre or post move to San Fransisco.  I definitely appreciated the dealer giving me his opinion on the book, saved me some serious money.  

[thehumantorch]

On 9/16/2017 at 3:24 PM, porcupine48 said:

like balls soaked in port? 

Don't soak them in port, they won't bounce.  

[Silver Surfer]

16 hours ago, batman_fan said:

I asked a dealer who I won't mention to look at a book for me because something looked off.  We walked to the booth, he looked at the book and it had color touch on the spine and around the staple which he was able to spot.  Book was an Adventure 51, dealer selling it was a dealer who has been banned from the boards.  Show was Wondercon several years back but I can't remember if it was pre or post move to San Fransisco.  I definitely appreciated the dealer giving me his opinion on the book, saved me some serious money.  

But you had the luxury of buying it in person which is a whole different ball game. Metro intentionally deceives and then hopes that the refund policy has lapsed so they can hide behind it and other lame excuses. Basically, we fooled you but its not our fault because we can hide behind the fine print.  Vinnie if you are reading this, take me off your mailing list please. 

[Larryw7]

I've learned that buying raw books from Metro is really a cra p shoot. There's an almost 50% chance that the book will have an undisclosed problem. Like I said before, I don't know if this is intentional or just plain sloppy, but it's really bad for the hobby.

Edited September 18, 2017 by Larryw7