Mile High Comics

[Perpetual Failure]

Just a quick question I hope somebody won't mind answering: Are the prices at Mile High Comics fair? They have a very large selection and it seems their prices are pretty competitive, but if they overcharge I'd like to know. Is there any other online stores to buy old comics from? Also is there a 'good way' to buy (cheap comics) from ebay? It seems no matter how cheap you buy a comic for you always end up paying too much because of shipping, and I see very few multiple comic sales to counterbalance that. Thanks in advance!

[glue]

The only site I've ever used is MyComicShop.com. I love it. I've heard really good things about Mile High, but something about the site (I'm not sure what) has kept me from ordering.

[dan bailey]

Just a quick question I hope somebody won't mind answering: Are the prices at Mile High Comics fair? They have a very large selection and it seems their prices are pretty competitive, but if they overcharge I'd like to know. Is there any other online stores to buy old comics from? Also is there a 'good way' to buy (cheap comics) from ebay? It seems no matter how cheap you buy a comic for you always end up paying too much because of shipping, and I see very few multiple comic sales to counterbalance that. Thanks in advance!

I use both Lone Star Comics, a/k/a the above-mentioned mycomicshop.com, & Mile High through comparison-shopping. Mile High's prices are generally higher than Lone Star's, but the former's fairly frequent "code word sales" (like the 40 percent off one described in an email sent within the last few hours) for their newsletter subscribers tend to pretty much level the playing field. I can't imagine ordering from them without being able to take advantage of such discounting.

As for eBay, most of the buying I do off the site is multiple-comic lots, which generally translates into considerably less than $1 -- often more like 50 cents -- per comic, shipping included. Typing "run" or "lot" into your search can help with that.

[Red Oak Kid]

Mile High's prices are generally higher than Lone Star's, but the former's fairly frequent "code word sales" (like the 40 percent off one described in an email sent within the last few hours) for their newsletter subscribers tend to pretty much level the playing field. I can't imagine ordering from them without being able to take advantage of such discounting.
.

I just wanted to emphasize Dan's point about knowing the codeword. The prices posted in red are sales prices that everyone can see, but by subscribing to the Mile High email alerts you get a codeword that allows you to take even more off the posted(red) sale price. This extra amount of savings usually makes the postage fee a bit easier to take.

And like Dan says, I wouldn't consider buying anything at Milehigh at their regular prices.

[scratchie]

To reiterate what others have said: Mile High's sale prices can be excellent, or they can be not bad, but it's always worth comparison shopping. Personally, I find Mile High's system -- where you don't see the final price until you're in your shopping cart, checking out -- to be extremely frustating. The "XX% off" is off their "list price", which is not always the same as the price you see in their listings, so it's often hard to tell how much you're going to be paying until you get to the end of the process.

Lone Star/mycomicshop also has weekly code word sales, but they allow you to see the final price before you place the item in your shopping cart. Their prices are usually lower, too, but Mile High also has a wider selection.

Now, on to Ebay. The key word is "patience". There are plenty of good deals to be had, but they're few and far between. In other words, there are hundreds (if not thousands) of new comics listings on Ebay every day, but only a small percentage of them are worth your time. If you're patient, you'll find the good deals. I have bought hundreds of comics off Ebay in the last year (on the order of 8-10 short boxes) and the average (mean) price I paid (including shipping) was $2.61 per book. The median price (shipped) was $1.49. So the deals are definitely out there.

As already observed, the vast majority of comic book auctions on Ebay will rip you off on the shipping (e.g. $5.00 or more to ship a single book; for the record, it costs $1.59 to ship a single comic book via Media Mail, slightly more for First Class; Priority Mail costs $4.05 to ship as many comic books as you can fit in a Priority Mail box or envelope). I just looked at a listing that wanted to charge $11.00 to ship a single comic book via UPS ground. Um, thanks, but I'll pass.

Note that in addition to the simple rip-off factor, the difference between buying a $1 book and paying $5 to ship it, and buying a $5 book and paying $1 to ship it, is that if you have a problem and have to return it, the dealer ain't going to refund your $5 shipping.

Now that shipping is included in Ebay's email listings, though, it's that much easier to skip those auctions altogether. Some tips for buying on Ebay:

* Ebay offers a "saved search" feature that can email you daily when new items appear that match your search. For example, the search:

"captain america" (170,173,174,175) will send me an email when any of those four issues appears in an auction. Most of the time, the shipping will be too high and I'll skip right over the listing without even looking at the auction description, but when that listing comes along with $2.00 shipping, I'm on it. You can save up to 100 searches in your "My Ebay" section. This service is invaluable.

* Someone else noted that you can bid on lots, which usually have better per-issue shipping. Also note that many dealers offer deals when you buy multiple auctions from them. Again, many of these are total rip-offs (e.g. $1.00 for each additional auction, sometimes I've even seen $2.00 to add a single comic book to an existing package) but if you're patient, you'll find the good deals.

* Some dealers also offer deals like "$6.00 to ship as many comics as you win". So that's not a good deal if you get one comic, but it is a good deal if you get ten.

* ALWAYS CHECK THE SELLER'S FEEDBACK. Let me say that again: ALWAYS CHECK THE SELLER'S FEEDBACK. You don't need to restrict your purchases to dealers who have 100% positive feedback, but reading the negative/neutral comments will give you a good idea if you're dealing with a flake, or just someone who had a couple of flaky customers. For instance, I saw one dealer who had multiple negative feedback from people whose books were damaged in shipment, and his reply in every case was "Buyer didn't purchase insurance", well, sorry, chum, but I shouldn't have to buy insurance to get a $5.00 comic book shipped without damage.

Note that there's a drop-down selector at the bottom of the feedback page that will allow you to see 200 feedback listings at a time instead of 25 or whatever the default is.

* On a similar vein, if you're reading an auction description that seems kind of "flaky", e.g. no punctuation or line breaks, or two different shipping prices listed in different places, you're probably better off skipping that auction altogether. If someone's not detail-oriented enough to put together a legible, coherent auction listing, they're probably not detail-oriented enough to pack your books properly, etc. Dealing only with sellers who have a clue will mean much less frustration on your part.

Good luck!

[Perpetual Failure]

Wow thanks alot for all of the advice! As I have said elsewhere until now I have mostly been buying TPBs, but lately I've been trying to acquire cheap runs of stuff that hasn't been collected yet. So I'm basically new and don't know what I'm doing when it comes to buying actual 'comic books'. All of your advice was really helpful, and I appreciate it alot. Thanks again!