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Forum Member
 
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Hi guys,
so lots of people talk about rare issues and small print runs, also about how in recent years print runs have gotten much smaller and so comics have become more collectable, anyways heres my question:
How do we know how large of a print run a particular comic has had??
The more information us buyers and sellers have about an item, the more we are able to justify a price or a label of "Rare!"
Is there someplace we can get exact numbers? Im fairly sure that Diamond has a best seller of the month list but i dont think they have print run sizes available to the public
-Jeremy
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Elite Collector
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Forum Member
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thanks alot ... its a great site.
its too bad the only numbers are from the late 90's and onward
i collect hellboy so i looked through the site and found out the the average print run for an issue is about 25 thousand give or take 5 thousand depend on the particular issue
the information is very good i wish there was another source other than diamond ... like the publisher or printer that would give print run numbers ... historical ones also .. do their books go way back 20 30 40 years on the numbers of issues printed?
then again i think the system back in those days was to way over print and then destroy shred what was left over so even if you find that something was printed 100 thousand times maybe 40 thousand of them didnt make it to store shelves
anyways thanks again,
let me know if you have any other alternative website on print runs
-Jeremy
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Elite Collector
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Do a thread search, i 'd do it for you but I'm lazy.  This was discussed at length before and there's also some more links to relevant sites that either Earl or Shadow provided that can help you out moreso.
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Elite Collector
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I can't remember what the name of the book was but I think it was from Krause Publishing that had/has print run totals. I don't know if it is published anymore.
As for believing those standard "rare" or whatever claims. Most are a big fat stack of BS. As you focus in on runs on some titles you will quickly figure out which ones are hard to find or downright rare. Overstreet or The Gerber Photojournals can give you an idea of some other rare books.
I can tell one thing which many DC collectors often agree on is that many DC titles that were released between lets say 1955/56 and 1960 are often very hard to find and especially in high grade. Print runs were low and what the quality of the materials used to make the books were lousy.
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Forum Member
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i do most of my comic buying on online and not my local comic shop because most of them are phasing out back issue bins and the more desirable comics that they have are overpriced compared to what i can find on ebay
I have a question for you guys, taking Hellboy as an example, i discovered from the suggested sites that most print runs are around 25 thousand give or take 4 thousand depending on the particular issue
in my view those numbers seem steady over the years ... and yet the prices online do not seem to match the print run sizes .... i would have assumed that since they all have similar print runs that all the comics would be valued the same
but for some reason comic A might cost 10$ because it is more "rare" than comic B that costs 3$ even though it had the same approximate print run!
so print runs do NOT seem to tell me very much about if a particular comic is going to be cheap or expensive .... how ever it is possible that since hellboy is modern that i cannot really draw too many conclusions from some comics costing 3 dollars and others 10 dollars ... perhaps one became rare because it was so popular and no one wants to part with it with out profit
-Jeremy
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Enthusiast
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Print run is only one factor. Desirability and availability play a more important role. If no one wants a book, then it won't be worth anything regardless of how many are made. Take She-Hulk #26. There was a release by Dynamic Forces where only 15 were signed and numbered by Greg Land. If you check the marketplace, there are none available and good luck finding one if there are only 15. However, this book is not as desirable as say Incredible Hulk #181. Even though there are quite a few Hulk 181 out there, more people want it and are willing to pay more money for it. This makes the book more desirable and the demand of the book always exceeds supply. This makes the book more valuable.
Everything ties in. Hulk 181 has significance, which makes it desirable. Did you know that in 1994 I purchased a copy for $1.25 at a comic convention? Back then it was worth something like $60, but no one wanted to pay that much for it. I forgot when, but it shot up like crazy. I remember one copy sold for $65,000 (or was it $25,000??) on eBay a couple years ago! The book became very desirable, therefore the value increased. Same with Giant Sized X-Men #1. I think this one was worth $10 in NM back then. Look at it now... It's not like these books somehow became unprinted. It's just that demand has increased and less are being made available for sale.
Another thing. Look at Witchblade #1 and Witchblade #1 sketch. The Sketch is limited to 1000, yet it sells for under $10. Witchblade #1 sells for anywhere between $15 - $35 and that has to have a pretty high print run. This one is driven by desirability.
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GSX #1 was a $10 book in NM in 1994? I don't think so. That book book was well over $50-$60 book in NM in 1980.
Aaron
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Did that have actual PRINT RUNS or just Sales data? There is a difference right?
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