This has been a facinating string. I think prices
have gone higher but I think that's with everything.
They are really higher with the event auctions which
is to be expected. I ache that the SINS OF NORA MORAN
and DANTE'S INFERNO have still eluded me.
One ray of hope for me is going to COMICON every year.
There are new, young, and hungry collectors of
comics. Many have started collecting comics from new
publishers. For instance, I love Slave Labor Graphics
who have the wonderful Jonen Vasquez, creator of
INVADER ZIM.
It gives me hope for new characters emerging and being
able to get them at a great price.
While I can say, I can't afford a Val Lewton one
sheet, I have been able to buy a lovely lobby card
from Channing and one from Bruce.
I think one has to be inventive about getting their
collection upgraded.
Not to plug too much, but if anyone wants a bargain
and some really great paper, they should check out
MoviePosterBid. I've gotten some great deals on some
beauties.
Pretty much all of us are going to bid on Bruce's and
Heritage's auctions. They are part of our Oscar-type
events. I don't think anything is cheap around here at
Oscar time and I can't imagine anything being cheap
around these event auctions.
Toochis
--- "Smith, Grey - 367" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:
> This is an email written by John Petty of Heritage
> Comics who is having trouble posting to MOPO as a
> member and has forwarded to me to post.
> Grey Smith
> Heritage Galleries
>
>
> Hi Rich:
>
> I have to say I'm a bit surprised to see this post
> of yours, as I know you've been in the comic and
> movie poster fields for quite some time. Needless to
> say, I disagree with quite a bit of what you're
> saying here, so bear with me as I work through your
> post point by point:
>
> "JR has made one of the most salient comparisons he
> could have when he
> compared high prices in comics to be a death knell
> for the ordinary
> collector."
>
> I suppose my first question here is, Who is the
> "ordinary collector?" Is it someone who buys
> high-end, grade Golden Age key books (or Universal
> horror posters)? I'd say that kind of collector is
> far from ordinary. People at that end of the scale
> are probably not going to be affected by the market
> and economic forces you describe below.
> Consequently, the "death knell" has nothing to do
> with them.
>
> "While comic dealers and others may trumpet how good
> high prices
> are, anyone must realize the dangers they pose to
> any hobby."
>
> How so? In my position, formerly as Director of
> Auctions for Heritage Comics and now as Director of
> Media Relations for Heritage Galleries, I've seen
> nothing but robustness and strength in both the
> comic and the movie poster fields over the last
> three years. I hear from new collectors every day;
> people that enter one field or another from another
> collectible field. If anything, comics and movie
> posters are expanding their reach, not contracting.
> High prices stimulate the market. I've talked to
> countless consignors who have brought treasures out
> of long-held private collections who have told me,
> "With prices as strong as they are, I just had to
> sell!" This is good for everybody, as it brings to
> light rarities that might otherwise have been buried
> for years or might never have come to market. What
> dangers, specifically, are you talking about?
>
> "For instance, in an economy where 50% of the
> population makes less than
> $25,000 a year, you would have to wonder how that
> half could possibly
> afford to collect anything, and you have to go all
> the way up to the top 5%
> of the American population to get to $50,000 a
> year."
>
> The fact is, Rich, collectors find things to
> collect. I personally know people who collect
> everything from barbed wire (I live in Texas,
> remember) to antique fish tank ornaments. It's a
> wacky world we live in, and everything is treasured
> by someone. Unless you're talking about high-end
> collectibles only (which I don't think you are, as
> you started your letter by talking about the
> "ordinary collector"), there are plenty of ways to
> collect virtually anything on a budget. I'm
> confident that if someone came into your gallery and
> wanted to start collecting movie posters on a budget
> of under $1,000, that you'd find a way to help them
> build a sweet collection within their means.
> Remember those cool Doc Savage pulps you helped get
> me into in the early 1980s?
>
> "You must also remember that the average cost of
> living in any good sized city in America is
> $48,000 it doesn't leave very much for spending
> money without sacrificing
> something else and while most collectors would
> happily sacrifice eating to
> get that comic book or poster, if that goes on too
> long.. one more
> collector gone!"
>
> Not at all. I know for a fact that there are plenty
> of collectors out there who manage to build and
> maintain nice collections on very modest budgets,
> and manage to do so even while juggling the demands
> of home, family and whatever. I'm sure there are
> plenty of examples on this very list. Can we all
> afford to collect Golden and Silver Age keys or
> Universal horror? No, we can't (I sure can't), but
> putting together a nice collection within one's
> means is certainly not rocket science.
>
> "Back in the middle 80's I was on the way to
> becoming the top dealer of
> original comic art & pulp illustration in the world.
> Only Russ Cochran was
> on my level. Well as time went by, I only began
> selling more & more
> expensive items. So in 1986 I took in $20,000 at San
> Diego Comicon (SDC
> from here on ) with about 400 customers. at SDC in
> 1990 I took in $35K, but
> with only 150 customers. In 1992 I did $40K with
> less than 100 and in 1995
> I took in over $50K, but with only 40 buyers as they
> were the only ones who
> could afford my stuff. Not only that, I was finding
> I could not afford to
> buy collections anymore as the prices had become so
> high & the margin was
> getting so low that I was going to have to start
> taking in almost
> $1,000,000 a year to make the same profits I made in
> 1989 one $350K. In
> other words I would have to work 3times as hard to
> make no extra."
>
> Well, Rich, not to be too snarky, but one could
> interpret this as having as much to do with your
> prices as with anything else. And using San Diego as
> an example really slants the argument. You're
> talking about one of the most expensive, and most
> competitive, conventions in the world. It's tough
> for anyone to make their nut in SD. You're also
> focusing on a period of time in which original art
> was becoming more and more collectible. I started
> collecting original art in about 1983, when I was
> buying John Romita Jr AMAZING SPIDER-MAN covers for
> $100 (the same covers could easily fetch in the
> four-to-five figure range today). It wasn't too long
> after that that the market started to take off, as
> more and more people got into it. Not a bad thing,
> just the reality of the market. Frankly Rich, and I
> don't say this in a bad way, you were one of the
> people that raised market perception about original
> art to begin with. By your efforts, you made
> collectors realize that this stuff, forme!
> rly considered worthless production material, had
> value. The price of success and all that...
>
> "But wait there's more, at the same time several
> bigtime collector's had either
> stopped collecting, or personal issues (like
> divorce, loss of good job etc)
> removed these top customers from the field resulting
> in difficulty
> achieving the same high price were getting for
> things like Flash Gordon
> Sunday pages by Alex Raymond (up to $50K in 1991,
> same pages sold in 1996
> for $15) and taking losses on those items to move
> them out, or be forced to
> hold them for 10 years to sell which is a negative."
>
> But those old-time collectors who moved out were
> replaced with new collectors. Markets like this are
> cyclical. For example, we're just now starting to
> see the market for Kirby art and newspaper strip art
> rebound after hitting a low point for several years.
> That's just the nature of things. As a dealer, you
> have to be responsive to the changes in a
> constantly-shifting market. That's just the business
> you've chosen to go into.
>
> "Today comics & comic book art are in my own opinion
> the most overpriced
> hobbies there are and anything good is beyond the
> average collector in
> price."
>
> OK, here's where we really get into the meat of it,
> and I couldn't disagree with you more. 'Anything
> good is beyond the average collector in price'?
> That's pretty short sighted. I could list dozens of
> purchases that I've made personally in the last six
> months that would put the lie to this statement. If,
> by 'anything good', you specifically mean high-grade
> Gold and Silver (or to state it in poster terms,
> Universal monster material), then you're right. That
> is beyond the means of most collectors. But there's
> a plethora of 'good stuff' out there just begging to
> b picked up. At Heritage, we've been selling
> original Harvey comics art by such artists as Warren
> Kremer, Howie Post and Marty Taras. This is, by any
> reasonable measure, 'good stuff', and yet it's
> affordable to virtually anyone. Can't afford
> High-grade Gold and Silver? How about collecting
> High-grade Bronze instead? I recently bought a copy
> of MISTER MIRACLE #1, CGC-graded 9.6 with a double
> cover for $400. Good stuff in!
> deed, and quite affordable. Can't afford Universal
> monster
=== message truncated ===
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