Film at 11: All In Color For A Cool Million

[athelind]

First Superman Comic Sells For Record $1 Million

I dread work this week; odds are far too high that at least one bozo will come in every night, all excited about this, and wanting to talk about comics and collectibles as "investments".

He won't want to buy things, per se. He'll want my advice. What should he look for? What should he buy? What's the best return on his money?

How can he make a quick buck?

Your Obedient Serpent is honestly sick to death of comic books, superheroes, and pop-culture ephemera, but he'd still rather deal with people who read and enjoy these things than someone who bumbles in asking questions so clueless they defy an answer, simply because he's heard about someone who made huge returns on stuff that he's always dismissed.

How can you make a quick buck in the comics market? You can't. It took seventy godsforsaken years of carefully babying a fragile bundle of crappy, high-acid paper, starring a character nobody in the industry thought would catch on, to get that ten-million-fold return on Action's 10¢ cover price, you idiot.

Resolved: I am going to do my damnedest to sell these sleazy fools every worthless piece of crap I've got in the store, every random Big Event Comic, and most especially, every High-End, Hard-Sided, Nitrogen-Filled Comic Preservation Device I can dig up.

Because that's the real answer to the question. How do you make a quick buck in comics? By selling crap to the gullible.

Barnum was right.

---

Comments

[araquan.livejournal.com]

That's the best way to make a quick buck period, really. I wholly approve.

[braxus.livejournal.com]

Wonder if I ever bumped into you at Legends. Drop by every so once in a while while waiting for a flim to start @ Vall... err... Cupertino Square.

Valentino Cooper Square Plaza.

[athelind.livejournal.com]

It's quite possible. I've been working evenings for most of the past year -- MTTh until recently, and MTF since the holidaze.

[mocha-mephooki.livejournal.com]

There will never be a better opportunity to sell those totally worthless #1 comics that never took... and why do I suddenly feel like I'm quoting Groo for some reason?

[bfdragon.livejournal.com]

The thing is of course that things become collectible because nobody is collecting them.

As a friend once pointed out to me "Everyone saved their valuable National Geographic magazines, and as such, are today worth precisely nothing."

[athelind.livejournal.com]

Oh, yes. Definitely. When I'm not in a bitey mood, I actually try to give these guys Collectibles 101.

"What can I do to make sure my comics go up in value?"

"Buy every copy of a given issue that you can. Every. Single. One.

"Then burn them."

I'm in a bitey mood, and thus will wring them dry.

[foofers.livejournal.com]

Didn't someone once say that parting a fool and his money was a moral imperative?

Oh, wait. Come to think of it, I'm pretty sure it was you.

...

[athelind.livejournal.com]

See "Barnum was right", above.

[silussa.livejournal.com]

Investor oriented buyers did nothing for the comic book industry save a boom and bust cycle.

[hafoc.livejournal.com]

No, Barnum was wrong. The blessed event occurs considerably more often than only once a minute.

[athelind.livejournal.com]

Oh, I was referring to Barnum's OTHER adage: "It is morally wrong to allow a sucker to keep his money."