My Silver Age UK price variants 2 2

[Colin Nash]

My Silver Age comic collection is mainly comprised of original UK price variants. For the issues that do have a US 12 cent price, the covers have a (1/- ) UK price stamp. 

I was wondering if:-

1. Are UK price variants as valuable and collectable as their US counterparts ?

2. Would I be able to sell my comics on the US market ?

3. Would the UK price stamp on my 12 cent issues make these comics undesirable, even if graded by cgc as 7.0 ?

4. Are UK price variants considered rarer than US price ones ?

Your views and opinions would be invaluable to me. Thanks

[revat]

2. Yes

3.  Yes, slightly less desirable in general, depends on luck

4. yes

1. depends on issue and grade

Edited April 8, 2020 by revat

[pemart1966]

2 hours ago, Colin Nash said:

My Silver Age comic collection is mainly comprised of original UK price variants. For the issues that do have a US 12 cent price, the covers have a (1/- ) UK price stamp. 

I was wondering if:-

1. Are UK price variants as valuable and collectable as their US counterparts ?

2. Would I be able to sell my comics on the US market ?

3. Would the UK price stamp on my 12 cent issues make these comics undesirable, even if graded by cgc as 7.0 ?

4. Are UK price variants considered rarer than US price ones ?

Your views and opinions would be invaluable to me. Thanks

Please post some of the earliest.  Tx

[Kevin.J]

If you just want to see covers, click on the A-B Pence link at the bottom of my sig line, PB has killed a lot of the pics though  

 

If you wish to read about them, check this out for everything you wished to know about Pence issues

 

 

[serling1978]

Personally I'm a fan of the UK priced silver age books. They were the same print run, not reprints or any such silly thing that some people are mistaken about.  And they are more rare. The price printed on the cover does not in any way put a negative spin on an otherwise amazing book. Personally, I've got Hulk #1 and Avengers #3 pence books. 

They do sell for less, but that may not always be the case. They have carried a somewhat negative stigma for no good reason (I've never heard anyone articulate one anyway) but in all walks of life the most ingrained beliefs can eventually change over time. And if they don't? Who cares 😁 collecting isn't just value. Collect what you enjoy 👍

[Get Marwood & I]

21 hours ago, Colin Nash said:

My Silver Age comic collection is mainly comprised of original UK price variants. For the issues that do have a US 12 cent price, the covers have a (1/- ) UK price stamp. 

I was wondering if:-

1. Are UK price variants as valuable and collectable as their US counterparts ?

2. Would I be able to sell my comics on the US market ?

3. Would the UK price stamp on my 12 cent issues make these comics undesirable, even if graded by cgc as 7.0 ?

4. Are UK price variants considered rarer than US price ones ?

Your views and opinions would be invaluable to me. Thanks

Hello Colin 

Here are two salient posts extracted from my Marvel UK Price Variant thread which may help answer some of your questions.

One other point of clarification while I'm here - a cents priced copy with a UK price stamp is not a UK Price Variant. It is just a US copy which was shipped for regional distribution in the UK. For a copy to be a 'proper' UK price variant it has to have a printed UK cover price. I'm sure you knew that, but just to be sure. 

Anyway, here are those two posts - any further questions, let me know.

This one is about how pence copies are valued:

On 12/19/2019 at 8:39 AM, Get Marwood & I said:

Putting aside completists and run collectors most Marvel pence copies seem to be worth / prized notably less, especially the later ones. But some early books are now so scarce in any denomination that I find that they sell extremely well regardless, e.g. pre-hero. It all depends on the seller, buyer and appeal of the comic. Some UK dealers price pence and cents equally, others with a reduction for pence. Some dealers actively avoid pence. If money were no object, I would pay the same without hesitation. Others wouldn't. AF15 is a tough one as it is so highly prized and also highly expensive. Any suggestion that pence copies are somehow inferior will put off uneducated buyers. Who wants to slap down 30k for a book with a question mark? So you will need the right buyer to achieve parity. Some say that one day pence copies will carry a premium being as rare as, say, 35c variants. I don't see it myself. There will be a small group of people chasing them, and therefore only the basic rules of supply and demand will dictate what prices they achieve. Good luck @gadzukes

...and this one relates to how UK Price Stamps affects value etc:

On 4/27/2018 at 11:06 PM, Get Marwood & I said:

Oh my, a summons from the King of Australia! That's hard to turn down, if not a criminal offence. Thank you AJD 

Hello @Gfabiano, and welcome to the balds. I say balds deliberately, as very few of us have hair around here. I myself wear a cap to hide natures haircut, but I'm doffing it to you now in respectful acknowledgement of your first, and hopefully not last, post 

I'll try to answer your question as fulsomely as possible, under three headings if I may. Those headings are; Personal Preference, Variant / Historical Focus and Value.

OK, here we go.

Personal Preference

In the 40 years I've been mucking about with comics in Englandville I have only ever met one person who liked and collected Thorpe and Porter (henceforth referred to in this post as 'T&P') price stamps. The vast majority find them ugly and intrusive. Look, even Spidey here is pointing to them whilst battling another one of those flipping robots that Smythe used to keep sending out every five minutes:

 

I used to own that copy and I eventually sold it and replaced it with a stamp free copy. Let's face it, it's not overly attractive is it. That's not to say that all price stamps are ugly intrusive horrors. Look at this rather attractive one here - much less obvious and, in a way mildly complimentary:

 

T&P's stamp was always big, black and bolshie and, accordingly, found favour with few. So it is in my experience a negative when it comes to personal preference - 99 out of 100 people in a room wouldn't want a copy with it on. But there may be one or two who don't mind them, or maybe even like them. But they're in the minority, in my experience.

Variant / Historical Focus

But let's not dismiss them too quickly. There are a handful of misguided cretins serious comic historians who find value in our generally unloved ink blots. Take the L Miller variants that I bore everyone into a comicoma entertain my fellow board members with in one of my many UK focused variant threads. For Marvel comics of a certain price, during a certain time period, of a certain title (or three - look up the thread if you're interested) a cover stamp like this rather attractive 6d one can mean that a variant indicia exists inside:

 

Also, the majority of collectors with a passing interest in UK distribution history assume that T&P were the only distributors in the UK. They were not, as cover stamps like these betray:

 

Miller was at it too. Even with Archie! (thread coming soon)

So we can learn to love the beastly cover stamps as, on occasion, they tell us things we may not have known / realised.

Value

So, to the third heading, the one which actually responds to your question. Do the stamps affect value?

In my experience, yes and thrice yes. Negatively. As I said earlier, put 100 collectors in a room and show them two structurally identical ASM #22's, one clean and free as the day it was born, the other with a dirty big T&P stamp on it, applied after the comic was born and had travelled a bit. In my view, the vast majority would want the unstamped copy. You don't actually need to be a comic expert to work this out. The stamped book has been defaced as truly as if someone had written 'Barry's Book - leave off' in pen on the cover. Most collectors will go 'yuck!'. And pass on it. There may be one or two guys and gals who will go "ooh, how lovely. That really adds to the history and is part of the end to end process. I must collect them and, indeed, pay a premium for them". That person is as rare as a visitor to my L Miller Variant thread.

I owned many copies of ASM with T&P stamps on them back in the glory years. I sold them (me, yes me - Mr UK Pence Man) as I wanted 'pure' untouched cents copies to sit next to my pence copies. They all sold for less than copies without stamps would. Again, this makes sense. eBay can offer multiple copies of the same book on any given day. Why buy stamped when you can buy unstamped?

So it's very likely that your books will realise less money - however you sell them - than they would have had they not been stamped. Sorry.

Anyway, I hope this helps. Please do come back and tell us what you think, and maybe post a picture or two. People are always saying how important it is for new members to be welcomed, but the last 4 I helped did not return, even to say 'thanks'. So do buck that trend please Gfabiano won't you. Otherwise I will cry tears of pure sadness. And you don't want to make a grown man cry do you?

 

[Get Marwood & I]

...and Colin @Colin Nash, if you want to read those embedded posts within the actual thread from which they were extracted, click on the little curling arrow which you will see at the top right corner of any embedded thread - example screenshot below:

 

The arrow  is a hyperlink and it will take you to the original thread so you can see any other relevant posts before and after it.

Good luck 

[Colin Nash]

On 4/9/2020 at 3:44 AM, serling1978 said:

Personally I'm a fan of the UK priced silver age books. They were the same print run, not reprints or any such silly thing that some people are mistaken about.  And they are more rare. The price printed on the cover does not in any way put a negative spin on an otherwise amazing book. Personally, I've got Hulk #1 and Avengers #3 pence books. 

They do sell for less, but that may not always be the case. They have carried a somewhat negative stigma for no good reason (I've never heard anyone articulate one anyway) but in all walks of life the most ingrained beliefs can eventually change over time. And if they don't? Who cares 😁 collecting isn't just value. Collect what you enjoy 👍

Thanks for your feedback, much appreciated. I agree with you in that, I don't see any difference in say, a 7.0 grade ASM #50 and a 12 cent one. They are the same and there should be no descrimination. 

UK price stamps are a whole different matter and unfortuantely I have too many 1960's comics carrying them. Some stamps are faded and descrete, but some are a bit in your face. Those over zealous newsagents were a bit too keen to deface the front the covers. Why not the back instead ? I only ever had one comic with a small white price label on it, which came off nicely with a bit of heat. Maybe this newsagent was a collector  ha..ha.