Pro tip: check the print run numbers before buying back issues

I was at a show in Portland last weekend and a dealer showed me how some comics from the 90s had way higher print runs than people realize. Turns out X-Men #1 from 1991 had over 8 million copies printed, so that 'rare' copy in your longbox isn't worth what you think. Anyone else ever get burned on a book that turned out to be super common?

3 comments

3 Comments

wesley_adams1mo ago

Wait, did you check the numbers on that X-Men #1 yourself? I totally got burned on Spider-Man #1 from 1990, the one with the foil cover and multiple versions. I thought I had a goldmine since I had the "rare" platinum edition, but then I found out they printed like 500,000 of those things too. It was everywhere at every show I went to, and dealers wouldn't even give me $5 for it last year. The whole 90s boom was wild with print runs, man. It's crazy how much money people threw at those books thinking they'd be retirement funds.

jana_hart181mo ago

@wesley_adams I used to think those 90s comics were gold, but you just changed my mind.

the_xena1mo ago

dude you just fully changed my whole perspective on this. i was one of those people back in the 90s that thought every variant cover was gonna be my ticket to early retirement lol. i had a stack of x-men #1s in my closet for years, all the different gatefolds, thought i was so smart. turns out i was just hoarding a bunch of overprinted cardboard. its wild to think how many of us were out here treating speculator boom books like they were golden age finds when the print runs were absolutely insane. i swear every comic shop in the country had piles of those spider-man #1s sitting around for years. really makes you question everything you thought you knew about collecting back then.