Comic Book Investing - High Risks and Low Gains :: Exploratory Essays Research Papers

A few years ago, the popular media of the United States focused on the comic book world for one dramatic, 'tragic' event - the death of Superman.   After months of hype, the long-awaited death issue, Superman #375, was released, packaged in a black bag bearing a blood-red logo, complete with a black arm band.   The book's price immediately skyrocketed.   Thousands of people who normally paid no attention to the comic universe swarmed local shops, driving the book's 'value' to upwards of thirty dollars overnight.   Over the next few weeks, the book could be found with a price tag of as high as $100.   Today, Superman #375 is valued in Wizard: The Guide to Comics at a disappointing, anticlimactic ten bucks. What happened?   To start, the book was printed in enormous quantities.   After the first few weeks of sales, when new shipments of the issue arrived in comic stores, the book's price began to drop.   The long-term value of the book was also adversely affected in two ways.   First, Superman returned to the comic scene, alive and well, a mere four months later.   This may have been a surprise (or an outrage) to many of the non-collectors who purchased the book, but was not much of a shock to the average fifteen-year old Superman fan, well acquainted with the 'dead today, back tomorrow' mentality of the genre.   Finally, the black package or "polybag," while supposedly designed to preserve the book, was actually made of a cheap, slightly-acidic plastic that would eventually turn the issue's once-white pages to a plaque-like brown.   Thus, collectors were forces to decide between damaging their copy of Superman #375 by opening it or by keeping it in it's corrosive wrappin g.   Both paths ultimately led to a drop in the book's value. Sadly enough, this sort of hype with no follow-through occurs on a near-monthly basis in the world of comics.   Major publishing houses routinely emphasize the 'collectibility' of their output, hoping to snag the attention of young collectors eager to validate their hobby by earning a bit of cash on the side.   The simple truth is that the vast majority of the comics that are produced today are highly unlikely to become valuable, mostly because of one simple, undeniable fact. Today's comics are published in enormous quantities.   A typical issue of The Amazing Spider Man will have a print run between 300,000 and 500,000 copies.