As anyone will tell you who knows me even a smidge, I have been purging comics in an effort to rid myself of a storage unit. But it is a long and frustrating process. Options for ridding myself of them are in order of least desirable -
I could simply open up multiple trash bags and toss ‘em out. I do not want to do this.
I could sell them. Multiple attempts to offer them to a comic book shop have elcited responses of “we’ll give you a $1.98 for 15 long boxes of comics from the 70s and 80s. Uhm no.
I could sell them online. Last year I noticed one BlueSky comic collector looking to complete his DC Comics Presents collection and it just so happened that I had the first 50 issues or so and then a couple dozen scattered over the rest of the run. I took pictures and was very excited and then he responded with a snide “they’re not in good condition” - which was not true - but I realized that I wasn’t about to part with my beloved books to someone who was haggling with me over, well, peanuts. (As a side note, right up front I admitted that I didn’t have a lot of experience selling on line and then, after the transaction went awry, he posted how I didn’t know what I was doing - and my internal response was ‘uhm yes, I admitted that from the get go’. The block button is a lovely invention and saved me from having further conversations with this person).
However, I could try to sell them online again but I’m not sure that I have the patience for it. If you sell online, how do you do this w/o losing your mind?
What I have been doing, instead of going round and round, is I’ve been donating certain comics to Housing Works. Housing Works is a New York non-profit that will take donations of furniture, clothing, books, etc and sell them. The profits from the sale of these items goes to fund HIV/AIDS organizations. I’ve donated probably thousands of dollars worth of items to Housing Works over the past 20 years (only ‘gently used’ items of course, they aren’t a dumping ground for garbage).
When I write “certain comics”, I mean comics that are more recent and more likely to be of interest to someone who happens upon them. My most recent ‘big dump’ was about four years worth of Wonder Woman - I started collecting again around 2019 and the book was a constant item on my pull list throughout covid and up until Tom King got his hands on her and dragged out a mostly dull story for 20 issues - when I realized that at $4 a pop, 20 issues equaled $80 - and I most certainly did not think that the story he was telling was worth $80 (sorry, Tom King, you’re super cute and Trinity is awesome, but those 20 issues draaaaaaaaaag). At one point, I realized that I had about 50 issues or more and that I would almost certainly never re-read them. And while removing them from my collection wouldn’t make THAT much of a dent, I figured every little bit helps. So off they went and hopefully someone discovered them and loved them.
I’ve done with other titles and ‘regular’ books off the shelf that I re-read and then passed along to Housing Works. It’s been a kind of weird but fabulous experience. One set of books that did not go to Housing Works was my collection of Harry Potter hardcovers - about a year or so ago I realized that the chances of ever reading them again was slim to none and that someone else could love them - in this case, there’s a school that I know of that does book fairs so off they went. A few months ago, I also donated a dozen children’s picture books that I’ve loved for 30 years. The school was appreciative for both donations.
So this week’s donation consists of three years of Jeremy Adams’ Flash (spectacular run, I re-read a couple weeks ago and, while I really loved them, I am happy to donate and let someone else discover them) and The Sculptor book that I wrote about last week. In that link, I also wrote about the early 90s run of Animal Man by Grant Morrison. Although they are not current, I know there is zero market for re-sale - so they’re going to go in this week’s donation too. They were quite dark for the time, but these days? They’d probably be considered light reading.
Do you donate your old comic books? Do you just keep them hoping for a day when they’ll be worth something? Do you haunt Ebay hoping for a good deal to complete your collection?
I’ll tell you what - if you’re a DC comic collector and you are looking for something to complete your collection from the mid 70s - early 80s, I probably still have it. Reach out to me and I’ll let you know if I have it. BTW I am not a wheeler/dealer, lol, I am just a guy who loves his comics and wants them to go to someone who loves comics as much as or more than I do. :)
I think it's great that you're donating these comics to a worthy cause! That said, I actually don't have many comics--it was never something I really got into, but I'm starting to tiptoe my way in as a way of learning more about the medium. So if you had a series or a few selections you were looking to part with and think I might like, I'd gladly float you a few bucks (and cover the shipping, of course).
Of course, I have little guidance as to what I'm looking for! 😅 Last time we were in a comic shop I picked up a handful of $1 back issues, just random stuff (I told my wife "if the cover looks interesting, grab it"). 🤣 I think I'm less of a dynamic action guy and more into fun writing and art that leans more cartoony than realistic.