Yes, everything is case by case type of scenario. One must also realize, in the golden and silver ages, there were more readers than collectors too more than likely. They treated them as periodicals you toss out when done reading. You bought to read, that was your entertainment you got from the expenditure.
How many of you all had your parents say something like, “grandma threw out my shoe box of baseball cards” cause who knew that Mantle 52 Rookie card was gonna be worth thousands. It was just a silly card at the time to a lot of people.
And there are still people like that today. What one sees valuable, another might not so much. I wouldn’t spend a damn nickel on a creepy doll but I know there’s collectors out there and a market for it. But nope… not me.
yep, that’s why it makes those golden age books so valuable.
When I first joined CHU my thoughts on modern comics is that eventually they may rise in value because the print run is so minuscule compared to books printed in the 90s. Books in the 90s had a million+ print runs while today modern comics barely scratch 10K to 20K, and that would make it a success. My thought was today’s trash could be someone’s treasure someday.
I don’t think that anymore simply because in today’s collecting world people get random moderns and just grade everything. They store and protect them so in the cgc census even very minor keys got hundreds or thousands graded in the census. This is not the case for golden age books. Some are single digits on the census. Scarcity makes them very valuable.
Yup and scarcity doesn’t always mean something is valuable. Demand is the drive behind value, then along comes availability that plays it’s role along with demand. But in the end, it’s all demand. If there’s no demand, then whatever it is has no actual value.
If you follow heritage auctions recently, even golden age has plummeted. Not as hard, but noticeable. The only stable or increasing prices/record sales are the books that don’t come to auction but every 5-10 years, or last sold in a particular high grade pre-covid.
Except for covers. If you slab a cover it’s gold. Isn’t that right @agentpoyo ?