Den of Geek - Bagged or Not Bagged

[Fred Slota]

And this is why I question ComicBase's bag-agnostic stance.

 

Issue 2, Item Description "Polybagged with Jupiter's Legacy Special Edition"  (Ancillary problem - should be Den of Geek SE 1, yes?)

Issue 5, Item Description "Polybagged with Vikings: Valhalla Special Edition"  (Ancillary problem - should be Den of Geek SE 2, yes?)

Issue 7, Item Description "Polybagged with The Sandman Special Edition"  (Ancillary problem - should be Den of Geek SE 3, yes?)

Issue 11, Item Description "Polybagged with Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Special Edition"  (Ancillary problem - should be Den of Geek SE 6, yes?)

 

Issue SE 1, Item description does not mention polybagged with Issue 2

Issue SE 2, Item description does not mention polybagged with Issue 5

Issue SE 3, Item Description does not mention polybagged with Issue 7

Issue SE 6, Item Description does not mention polybagged with Issue 11.

 

Questions -

Were the above issues 2, 5, 7, 11 ever also first-offer available in separate, unbagged form?

Were the above issues SE1, SE2, SE3, SE6 ever first-offer available in separate, unbagged form?

 

Is the Price valuation for Issue 2 contingent on it being still in bag?  Contingent on being sold with SE1?

Is the price valuation for SE1 its standalone value?  Or as a set?

 

Currently, the value for Issue 2 is $5, while the value of SE1 is $10.  

 

If I'm selling an Issue 2 on AtomicAvenue out of bag, on its own, do I have to specify that in some field to inform the seller that this is not polybagged with SE1?

If the seller doesn't specify, and the buyer receives an out of bag, on its own Issue 2, has something wrong taken place?

If I'm selling an Issue 2 on AtomicAvenue in bag with the included SE2, would a 'fair' price be the current listed $5 for Issue 2, or $5+$10 = $15?

 

Currently, neither Issue 14 nor SE 23 makes any claim of having been polybagged with anything.  I am holding an Issue 14 polybagged with SE 23.

Do I enter it in my database as Issue 14, update the Item Description to "Polybagged with Den of Geek SE 23" and submit the update?  If this Item Description is accepted, can that cause problems with current or future AtomicAvenue listings for others when that new Item Description is pushed into their databases?

Do I enter it in my database as newly created Issue 14-A with the Item Description "Polybagged with Den of Geek SE 23" and submit as a new variant? 

Should I also say that I own SE 23?  Or is that assumed when I claim to own either my above-described modified #14 or my above-described #14-A?

Edited December 15, 2024 by Fred Slota

[Gregory Hecht]

I am not sure that I am understanding this. 
 

Did the publisher put out both a polybagged and an unpolybagged edition of issue #2?  
• If so, why wouldn’t those be recorded as #2 and #2/A?  Cataloging the polybagged version of #2 as SE1 when presumably the indicia says #2 seems unnecessarily confusing to me. Do it as SE2 if you must rather than 2/A unless the number in the indicia really says #1. 
• If not, I think the practice for CB is that the two publications in the bag get listed separately in the database. If the ancillary publication (in this case, the issue of Jupiter’s Legacy) is identical to the JL issue that was sold separately from Den of Geek then so be it. If it is unique in some way then it is a variant issue of JL and gets treated as such under the appropriate Jupiter’s Legacy comic title.  
 

As for how to list (i.e. what selling price to use) an unopened polybagged edition on AA, I would think you should be able to charge a premium as compared to selling a high grade copy of just the Den of Geek issue removed from the polybag. As I understand it, CB gets its valuations primarily from AA listings & transactions and from Heritage, and by spot checking against eBay and other sort when users call out specific individual items.  In the absence of any data, I think CB defaults to cover price as the valuation. So for something relatively unusual like an unopened polybagged issue of Den of Geek, do some homework before listing such as checking eBay listings and completed sales. 
 

I am sure that @Mark J. Castaneda will correct me if I am wrong in my discussion above. 

[Fred Slota]

Clarification...

 

At my store, they only carried polybags with 2 magazines inside, Issue #2 (Suicide Squad on cover) and SE-1 (Jupiter's Legacy on cover).  Similarly, bagged pairs of 5&SE2, 7&SE3 and 11&SE6.  I don't know if they were ever initially provided as separate, unbagged issues.  Was the #2 ever offered separately?  I don't know.  Was the SE-1 ever offered separately (you suggest it was)? I don't know.

 

ComicBase wants to pretend that the bagged/unbagged distinction doesn't exist.  Look at Robin III: Cry of the Huntress.  6 -SC variants, all initially bagged, all with official cover scans showing them in bags, yet no mention of the bags in either the Notes or Item Description.  Inventorying, selling, buying or valuing bagged vs. unbagged, CB & AA can't help you.

Sometimes ComicBase pretends it cares.  Look at X-Force.  #1-A through #1-E, sold bagged with one of 5 different cards, all with cover scans showing them in bags, with the cards, yet again no mention of the bags in either the Notes or the Item Description.  You can see that the different cards produced different values for the sets, but what is the valuation of an unaccompanied, unbagged #1?  CB doesn't care.  Want to sell one?  Have to pick one of the five flavors, but declare it sans card, which mucks up the valuation for actual issues with that card.

 

Back to Den of Geek. 

Me personally, I would create three entries - one for the bagged pair (using an appropriate variant tag), and one each for the unbagged, separated mags (each with appropriate Notes/Item Descriptions).

But, that's not how CB rolls. I think the entries for #2 and for #SE1 should represent unbagged, separated magazines.  Mention of the bagging should be in the Notes field of both entries, with the Item Description only describing the individual book.  That this will confuse anyone trying to sell or buy bagged pairs of issues, and distort the valuation of these issues, meh, who cares (besides me)?

 

[Fred Slota]

Thought experiment...

ComicBase (and Atomic Avenue) assume all entries are for singular, bare books.  Den of Geek #2 has a current value of $5.  SE1 has a current value of $10.

 

If I make an Atomic Avenue listing for Den of Geek issue #2, and specify that it is polybagged with SE1 for $15 ($5 + $10), and the sale goes through, what will happen to the valuation of issue #2 in ComicBase in the future?

(Incidentally, all 5 of the above each have an item on sale, at above $5, for polybagged pairs, so this is less a thought experiment and more an actual experiment in process.)

 

 

[Gregory Hecht]

I'm still not understanding something here that I suspect is a really basic piece of information necessary for this discussion.  

Are you saying that the Den of Geek #2 magazine and the Den of Geek SE #1 magazine are the same thing aside from the fact that one of these was polybagged with the copy of Jupiter's Legacy #1?  In other words, if you gave me copies of both of those Den of Geek magazines and I took them out of whatever polybags they were in, threw away any copies of Jupiter's Legacy #1 that were in those polybags, and then handed those Den of Geek magazines back to you, would you be able to tell the difference between them?  Are their covers the same?  Are their UPCs the same?  Does the indicia for one of them say "Den of Geek #2" and the other "Den of Geek Special Edition #1"?  Or are the two indicia identical?  (and, if the indicia are identical, what do they say?)  

The answers to the above help me understand whether DoG #2 and DoG SE #1 are truly duplicate listings in the database or whether the info about DoG #2 being polybagged w/ JL #1 is erroneous.  (I'm still stuck on this part, so please forgive me if you feel like I am rewinding the conversation!)  

[Steven L. Dasinger]

I can answer a few of these questions (based on images from eBay):.

They are two separate issues in one polybagged.  If you remove them, they would be two separate issues.

Neither of the two issues has a barcode on the front or back covers or any price.

(on their website subscription page there is

"Den of Geek magazine is available for FREE at over 140 fine retailers in the U.S. and Canada in our Comic Shop Network. Support these local businesses and get a free copy of our magazine."

They appear to be Free (not sure if the subscription is free or not but that would explain the lack of barcode and price).

The main issues has 'Den of Geek  on the cover. The other includes 'Special Edition' (with maybe some other text) on the cover.

The 'Special Edition' issues may have a Month / Year (or just Year) on the cover while the other issues does not have either.

There is no Number on any of the issues.

There isn't really an indicia of any kind on the interior (on found 1 or 2 examples so this may or may not be common with all issues).

This site https://issuu.com/denofgeek/docs/den-of-geek-magazine-issue-016 lets you look inside several of the issues. I don't know if these on-line versions are identical to the physical versions or not.

At a guess, they were available only as polybagged items.

Technically there is only 1 'Issue' but it has three states.

Polybagged (2 Issues, how you would find it in a store)

Main Issue (not polybagged)

Special Issue (not polybagged)

[Fred Slota]

No, I am not saying that.

The bags each have two items in the bag. For example, the one in m hand, received free from my store has:

• #14, a square-bound soft cover magazine, Issue #14 / Fall 2024 on the Spine, featuring Alien: Romulus on the cover.  (There is no printed cover price)
• SE-23, a stapled soft cover magazine, Summer 2024 at the top of the cover, featuring Netflix Animation Preview on the cover.  (There is no printed cover price)

In each case, the polybags appear to contain 2 different magazines, one a regular issue (#2, 5, 7, 11 and now 14) and one a Special Edition (SE1, SE2, SE3, SE6 and now SE 23).  I have only ever seen these issues offered at my store as polybagged pairs, never as unbagged issues.  If they have ever been first-offered as stand-alone, unbagged issues, I am unaware of it, but it may have happened.  Of course, there will be loose issues, as I'm sure some people have opened the bags to read the issues.

 

I have considered the bagged vs. non-bagged difference, and ComicBase's handling of it, as an annoying systemic problem when dealing with bagged solo issues (like Robin III), or issues bagged with inclusions (like X-Force #1), but now, with the bagging of 2 issues in one bag, I think this is a horse of a different color and makes an even stronger case that CB needs to change how they handle this.

 

If ComicBase and AtomicAvenue want to continue to treat their entries as representing individual, unbagged issues, then my suggestion is

• The Item Description should never mention the polybagging (or the inclusion, or the second issue)
• Rather, the Notes field (of both the regular and the SE) should mention this issue was originally offered polybagged with the other issue
• Ownership of bagged pairs will have atypical database entries and atypical storage.
• AA sales of bagged pairs will require special notes and will pollute the valuation data for those issues

 

Alternatively, I suggest ComicBase and AtomicAvenue recognize that bagged items are separate entities from unbagged items, and my suggestion is

• Every physical bagged item would have two variants in ComicBase
  • One for the unbagged issue, with an Item Description of the loose book with appropriate Notes (Den of Geek #2 as "sold polybagged with SE-1" and Den of Geek SE-1 as "sold polybagged with #2)
  • One for the bagged issue, with an appropriate Item Description, (new Den of Geek #2/A as "Polybagged with SE-1")
• Owners can accurately record their bagged and unbagged variants and their storage will reflect that.
• AA sales will clearly separate bagged vs. unbagged sales, and valuation of said variations will be separate and clean as well.

[Gregory Hecht]

Oooooh, I get it now.  💡  This whole time I thought that the Jupiter's Legacy issue was a copy of the Jupiter's Legacy comic book, but it is actually a magazine about the Jupiter's Legacy tv show.  

1 hour ago, Fred Slota said:

If ComicBase and AtomicAvenue want to continue to treat their entries as representing individual, unbagged issues, then my suggestion is

• The Item Description should never mention the polybagging (or the inclusion, or the second issue)
• Rather, the Notes field (of both the regular and the SE) should mention this issue was originally offered polybagged with the other issue
• Ownership of bagged pairs will have atypical database entries and atypical storage.
• AA sales of bagged pairs will require special notes and will pollute the valuation data for those issues

For situations where two publications are sold/distributed together in the same polybag (examples: Den of Geek magazines; Hero Illustrated magazines that contained exclusive comic issues), I agree with the first three bullet points and concede that the fourth bullet is a natural consequence of this approach.  

For situations where publications were polybagged with or without chachkis like trading cards rather than actual second publications (examples:  Marvel's recent "red band" comic series; X-Force #1; a lot of the output from Topps Comics) I wouldn't be opposed to having the bag mentioned in the Item Description field.  But the CB editors might prefer a more "one size fits all" policy.  

1 hour ago, Fred Slota said:

Alternatively, I suggest ComicBase and AtomicAvenue recognize that bagged items are separate entities from unbagged items, and my suggestion is

• Every physical bagged item would have two variants in ComicBase
  • One for the unbagged issue, with an Item Description of the loose book with appropriate Notes (Den of Geek #2 as "sold polybagged with SE-1" and Den of Geek SE-1 as "sold polybagged with #2)
  • One for the bagged issue, with an appropriate Item Description, (new Den of Geek #2/A as "Polybagged with SE-1")
• Owners can accurately record their bagged and unbagged variants and their storage will reflect that.
• AA sales will clearly separate bagged vs. unbagged sales, and valuation of said variations will be separate and clean as well.

This merits some discussion, I think. 
The biggest hassle that I can foresee is whether to list more than two options for polybagged items that were distributed with chachkis (e.g., Jurassic Park #1 polybagged with cards; JP #1 unbagged but with cards; JP #1 unbagged and without cards).  That could get to be a real PITA for those things that had many different things included in the bag (e.g., Superman #75).  But probably the simplest way to handle it would be to say "polybagged with [stuff]" and "unbagged" leaving it to sellers to notify buyers in an appropriate field whether their unbagged copies come with [stuff] or not.  

At any rate, IMO this approach merits some discussion.  

 

 

[Fred Slota]

That's a small side issue with the current presentation of the Den of Geek situation.  In my opinion, the reference shouldn't be "Polybagged with Jupiter's Legacy Special Edition", but rather "Polybagged with Den of Geek #SE 1".

 

Of course, whether it was an issue of Den of Geek or Jupiter's Legacy, it causes the same problem; is this entry for the singular item or the bagged pair?  How do you inventory both situations?  How do you sell both situations?  How do you value both situations?

 

Too many options?  What, more than the many, many alternate variant covers for a given issue we already have to keep track of?  😄

Floating another suggestion:  Add a new field, call it "Special Modifier" or some such.  This field would be user controlled, and would describe any modifying details that differentiates the particular item from the base ComicBase item.  Special Modifier could be "Signed by J. Smith", or Superman #75/CS "missing arm band".  The kicker is, anything sold with a "Special Modifier" field would be excluded from having that sale include in price valuations.

 

So, X-Force could have #1/A through #1/E be the five different bagged with each of the five cards, a new #1/G would be the plain, unbagged issue without a card, and anyone selling an unbagged with a Cable card could either sell it as #1/A Special Modifier "Unbagged" at a discount or as #1/G Special Modifier "with Cable card" at a premium, and either way it wouldn't disturb the valuation of 1/A or 1/G.