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How Much Do Back Issue Comics Cost?

Posted Jun 06,2018

When you enter most comic stores you are going to stumble upon rows and rows of back issue comics. Some stores have them front and center, some are based around them and some are tucked towards the back, like ours at Gryphon Games and Comics.
 

What are Back Issues?

Back issues are "older" comics, generally anything older than a month. Some stores keep a few months worth of comics out on the New Release shelf, others file them right away. At Gryphon Games and Comics we will sometimes keep a 1st issue out with the 2nd issue, for those folks wanting to start a new series, but after that they get filed in back issues. 
 

How are Back Issues Organized?

At Gryphon we have our back issues organized alphabetically by series. Major characters are grouped together, so all Batman is together under "B" and Spider-Man is together under "S". 
We also have two other areas of back issues:
  1. Discount comics are not sorted at all and have their own area. We generally have ~2500 comics in this area at a time and they can be overstock or just older comics.
  2. Higher value back issues and variants are set aside in different boxes and often have their own display. This moves around occasionally but is generally near the new release comics. 

How are Back Issues Priced

We have 3 different pricings for back issue comics, depending on the value:
  1. Unpriced back issues are cover price, plus the cost of the comic board, if they have one. 
  2. Higher value back issues are priced individually.
  3. Discount back issues will have a round sticker. Green stickers are $1, orange stickers are $2.

How Do I Find the Comic I am Looking For?

If the comic you are searching for is recent, we can check our inventory to see if we have it. Our online store has comics from March 2018 on, but nothing before that, so you would need to contact us directly. Our discount comics are not inventoried or organized, so you get to have fun looking through to find your favorite comic! These comics are added to regularly as we buy collections, so it is always changing!