Set Description:
At one time, back in the late 90's early 2000's these sets were a big deal. The first complete set had just been completed as I was closing in my completed set. I believe I was the second to own a complete set.
I actually went on to own two complete sets. Price variant collectors for some reason tend to be hoarders by nature. I started to think it was more of a mental disorder and decided to sell my under copies and get on with the business of collecting other comics.
I still pick up a new variant once in a blue moon, but not often.
There was a day when you could find variant gold hidden among unsuspecting EBay sellers listings. I think most of that has disappeared or far too many people are looking, one or the other.
I finally decide to scan my collection in this year.
One thing I will say is this:
Feast your eyes on this pre-2003 collection (for the most part) of high quality UNPRESSED books.
Actually, I'm likely to start sending in a few and see what happens. Most of these are pristine copies with a finger ding here and there.
Thank goodness they have been immaculately stored and preserved.
I know these were originally ordered in a rank of difficulty to find between 1 and 5. I'll use my best memory on a scale of 1-10 with 1 being the easiest and 10 being the hardest.
I should note that I had many, many copies of most of these books go through my hands. Suffice to say, the grades of the books very much speak for themselves with respect to the difficulty of obtaining books. A book in 7.5 for example would certainly be difficult to find or, believe ne, I would have found a nicer copy.
In 2003 the following article was published in teh CGC Newsletter:
In April of 1976 Marvel began a test-marketing program with all comics in their current line-up. At the time issues were priced at 25 cents. The idea was to test the market to see if a price increase would hurt sales badly. Generally speaking, in that time frame Marvel comics have a “Starburst” where the price belonged with the words “Still only 25c”.
The test was accomplished by selecting a few test sites around the country. While not universally acknowledged, it seems generally accepted that the test cities were: Baltimore, Maryland, Richmond Virginia, San Jose California and San Antonio Texas. The comics sent to these markets had the same “starburst” only instead of having the 25-cent price it had a very plain looking “30c”.
Other differences included 30c price boxes that were different than the style noted above. It almost seems as though Marvel tried to “disguise” its change in price. A small number of these issues have a 30c price that is a regular square price box below the logo. Another very small group have the 30c price inside a circle. Still another very small batch had a very oversized logo box with a square price showing the 30c price. Still, the vast majority use the starburst with the plain 30c price marker.
It odes not even seem certain that all test markets got only 30c issues. It seems that even within test markets, there might have been a mix of 25 and 30c issues. The test marketing must have been a success because in September of 1976 all Marvel comics were boosted to 30c regular cover price nationwide. While not a subject of this document, a year and a half later, or so, Marvel once again experimented with test markets, boosting the price from 30c to 35c in certain select markets.
It has been estimated by some that these variant runs composed less than 5% of all distributed copies. Some think the number was even less. Occasionally you will see someone suggest the issues were limited to as few as hundreds or maybe thousands at the most. Nobody seems to have a sure formula for how many actually exist. What is certain is that they are certainly, far, far more scarce than the regular cover price issues. Many collectors of Bronze Age comics will go through hundreds or even thousands of issues without ever seeing a single copy.
While the scarcity factor is a significant factor in these comics, it is even more complex than just saying they are scarce. Marvel comics could be subdivided into a few categories. Super-Heroes, Westerns and Horror with a few miscellaneous titles (Where do you place “Adventures on the Planet of the Apes”)? The super hero issues seem to be relatively “common”, most likely because they had large print runs to begin with. Horror titles and most of the Western titles, on the other hand were pretty much made up entirely of reprints of older titles from the 50’s and 60’s, mostly.
Western titles were going downhill fast and were just about gone by the time the 80’s got into gear. Therefore, it seems likely that many of the Western issues simply never even made it into the hands of collectors, because nobody bought them any way, for the most part. The same is true to a slightly lesser extent with the Horror issues. While the genre survived, it moved to original horror versus reprints with the introduction of such characters as Man-Thing and Morbius, the vampire and others.
In making a guess as to the actual existence of these variants, I would make the following guess. In superhero titles, they are probably about 1 in 200 to 300 issues available. For Horrors, the number is probably closer to one in 600-700. For westerns, it might be closer to one in 1000. To say the least, these are scarce.
Starting a few years ago, the proof of the variant existence became unquestioned and Overstreet began to list them separately in their price guide. Typically they are listed at about two times the price of the standard issues. The initial legwork on this genre’ can be attributed to a fellow by the name of Jon McLure, I understand he lives somewhere in Colorado these days.
One of the biggest problems with variants in general is that aside from their price differential, there is really nothing “special” about most of them. The biggest value in the comics is the variant value, not the comic book itself. For instance a comic book like Kid Colt 205. Who really cares about that comic, unless your specialty is really fine (apologies to those whose are, but you get the point)? So a comic book that is otherwise worth a dollar or two develops some value, because of the price difference.
This raises some potential issues for collectors today. As it turns out, the variants are most valuable to those trying to collect the entire series. They also have some value to those collecting a particular title that suddenly realize that their collection might not be complete without the variants. All told there are 187 variant issues, quite an undertaking if you want to try to get them all, especially in any kind of high grade. The issue in my mind is this: Anybody with an Amazing Spider-Man 1, 30 or even 150 knows they have an item that may be worthwhile. How many kids that bought a 30 cent variant 30 years ago has any idea that the Rawhide Kid 133 they have may be worth up 100 times what they paid for it, while the Rawhide Kid 131 they have may be worth 50 cents? I don’t think very many.
Therefore, there may be a dormant factor in these issues that will unwind over time. There might be an unknown supply of these issues that does not make it to the market until a few collectors die and their heirs bring all their old issues to the local comic shop to “cash in”. A second possibility is that some of this stuff just gets thrown out, as happens and it never makes it to the market.
In any case, it seems that the awareness among rank and file collectors of these variants is virtually unknown. This is ironic in a sense as “variant” publications for the sheer purpose of driving prices in the comic book market has been around for many years now. Publishers such as Marvel are anxious for collectors to buy these “variant” issues. In reality these are marketing schemes designed to sell more books. The value of many of these variants is debatable. On the other hand the price variants are truly rare and collectable. These were not public ally discussed by Marvel and, in fact, they did not want their existence to be known. How else could they properly test market price, if those buying the comics thought they were being ripped off?
I am an avid collector of these issues. Feel free to contact me at Gmalloy@aol..com if you have any questions, stories or collections that you would like to share.
Biography:
Glenn E, Malloy
Profession: Portfolio Manager with a major financial firm.
Background: I began collecting comics, as did many like me, born around 1960. The first comic I can remember buying was Amazing Spider-Man 64. My second comic series began with Captain Marvel #1. After moving away from collecting for many years, I got back into collecting, mostly higher grade comics in about 1999 with the advent of significant availability of comics on eBay and later the risk reduction that came with the advent of CGC comic grading. At long last you could buy comics, nearly sight unseen, without worrying about getting ripped off on grade.
In 2002 I completed a full run of the 1961 series of “The Amazing Spider-Man”, mostly in VF or better with significant portions in VF/NM or better. In 2001 I happened to spot the first Marvel 30c price variant of my life, a Spider-Man issues of course (# 156). From there I was hooked. I have spent the last two years or so collecting the entire variant issues in the Marvel series, 187 total.
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