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How many comic collectors in the U.S.?
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53 posts in this topic

It's a good question, as many people come to the Boards and say they stopped in the 90's....

A few say that they inherited, but you can also still be older and inherit...

Is there a logical answer? lol

 

Edited by ADAMANTIUM
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I like to take it a step farther and ask the question are there more modern collectors than people who collect copper age or older?

I am going to vote yes?

I was just checking out eBay sales and surprisingly modern comics are the biggest sellers by volume.

The new Spider-Man and Batman comics in particular are huge sellers.

It really surprised me how good moderns sell on eBay.

 

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2010 census...157M female, 152M male

Total population = 309M

Assuming only males collect comics and 1 in 200 = .05 * 152M = 7,600,000

Of that 7.6M male comic collectors, assuming only 1/5 fall in the copper age or older range = 1.52M

 

So the answer is 1.52M collectors who collect copper age or older in the US:acclaim:.  Unless somebody has some actual data my answer is 100% correctlol.

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The number is going to be a lot larger if you include inactive collectors who still cherish what they have, but are no longer participating in the hobby, and those that still buy new stuff and reprinted volumes, and/or are involved in fandom, but no longer acquire back issues to add to an existing collection. That's not even counting the tens of thousands who have copper age (and earlier) books, purchased in their youth, stashed in garages, basements, closets and storage units, and might argue they still have a "collection".

 

 

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I think readers vs collectors is also an interesting question.

With the advent of digital comics, I think readership is nearly impossible to figure out.

I know, I don't plan on buying another physical comic any time soon.  At most, I may buy a trade here and there.  But it's so nice to just be able to grab my tablet and read exactly what I want.

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8 minutes ago, rjpb said:

The number is going to be a lot larger if you include inactive collectors who still cherish what they have, but are no longer participating in the hobby, and those that still buy new stuff and reprinted volumes, and/or are involved in fandom, but no longer acquire back issues to add to an existing collection. That's not even counting the tens of thousands who have copper age (and earlier) books, purchased in their youth, stashed in garages, basements, closets and storage units, and might argue they still have a "collection".

I really agree with this.

We've had this discussion before on here and many folks guessed low-to-mid 5-digit numbers which to me seem incredibly low. (After all, there are lots of comic sellers on ebay with 5-digit feedback.) It's possible to say there are fewer collectors than there used to be, and still think that overall figure should be high 6 digits, low 7 digits when you include all the varying degrees of casual and lapsed comic enthusiasts.

 

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I feel like the number is relatively high, though much of it is casual. Think of all the finds in antique malls, etc. that are recounted in these pages... if there were only 30,000 of us, that averages less than 500 per state and province. It seems unlikely that it would be worth selling comics in places like that if only a handful of people will look at your stuff in a typical month/year. And that small a base of collectors surely wouldn't be enough to drive price increases over time.

And yet we find keys scooped at the antique malls, people bidding at public auctions, folks lining up at estate sales, collections getting snapped up on Craigslist... Some aspects of the market may be more formal than others, and it's definitely smaller than it was, but I still think it's relatively big. Well, biggish...

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Similar questions as this have come up from time to time on these boards. I found an old thread from 2002; looks like after 17 years we are still looking for the answer. Here's a link to the old thread.... click the "arrow" in the box to link to the whole thread.

 

Edited by Jaylam
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Another supplement question to add to it is how many of those collectors collect just Batman, Spider-Man, Superman,Avengers and X-Men type of comics? It wouldn't surprise me that those 5 superhero and related titles make up over half of all comic book collectors.

Edited by ComicConnoisseur
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