dadaluholla

So, anyone who has ever stepped into a comic shop or flea market knows what I'm talking about here. Usually a few scruffy looking long boxes stuffed with misc. crap for a a quarter or so. Let's hear your experiences with them! Find any gems? Ever pick up a full run of NFL Superpro just for the hell of it?

I finally went to my comic shop this past Saturday, and he had restocked his quarter boxes. After some digging, I was lucky enough to pick up the RARE final issue of Marvel's GI Joe. It wasn't in great shape of course, but I didn't think I would ever find a copy. Of course, these boxes are under a big table of records, so while sitting on the floor digging through comics, I was eye level with some old people's crotches while they searched for Elvis LPs.

stingermck

My LCS has $1 boxes. Only on Tuesdays. And then, its just overstock from the last few months of new issues. Sigh.

Anyway 5-6 years ago another store in town had 10 cent boxes. I scored a nearly complete set of DC’s Vigilante, and some other 80’s DC Direct stuff.

exharrison

Yes, in my younger days. I did also use these boxes to get the Hawkeye mini-series. But I still kinda like those.

Chew

I always got a whole crapload of goodies from the cheap boxes at the annual State St sidewalk sale in Madison while I was in college.

It's sales like those that have me pushing 25-30 longboxes now.

Trevor

Yep, I have been abused by many a quarter/50 cent/dollar box.

I went so far as to buy duplicates of many of my favorite series (Plop, Micronauts, etc) and create a "readers longbox". It was a box just full of duplicates of comics I thought I'd want to re-read over and over.

Of course, that box is buried in my closet with no easy way to get to it.

madcougar

I found Incredible Hulk #181 in a dime box in 1987 in a used book store. It was in good condition at best. At first I thought it must be a reprint or something, but there were some really old comic books in those boxes. I traded it to a dealer at a comic book convention a few years later for some pogs. OK, I traded it for about a dozen Uncanny X-Men comics I needed for my collection.

The really funny thing about finding that Incredible Hulk is that I spent weeks, I'm talking WEEKS, looking through about 50 long boxes one at a time hoping to find another hidden gem. I didn't find crap.

JasonF

I love quarter bins. You can find some really cool stuff in them, and even if the comic sucks, you've only wasted a quarter.

One time, I got a copy of First Issue Special #2 featuring The Green Team in a quarter bin. What a trippy comic!

ytrez

I haven't seen a quarter bin in years but I remember getting a ton of comics that way:

Firestorm
Masked Man
Silver Star
Omega Men
Suicide Squad

to name a few.

reverie

Mine are also $1 boxes. The best I ever found was a pretty good condition Wolverine #1. Not that I'm too up on comic values at all.

Off topic, I didn't know the last issue of G.I. Joe was rare. I collected it back in the day, so I do have that one (and the McFarlane "special" that followed it). It's neat to at least know I've got something then! (even if I wouldn't get rid of it)

dadaluholla

Yep, I think that special is even more rare than the final issue. I've seen them sell for big money on eBay.

A WINNER IS YOU!

TimeandTide

Man, reading this thread has brought back some good memories.

I scored an Iron Fist #14 for a dime at a paperback book store a couple decades ago. Found a complete run of George Perez Teen Titans and some early Brit Judge Dredd in some long boxes at an estate sale. Paid pennies for each. But mostly my "finds" amounted to things like Badger, Vigilante and Groo.

A lot of fun sifting through those boxes.

dadaluholla

Hey me too! Mine was in the dollar box though. Thanks for mentioning Badger by the way, I have been wanting to dig some of those up.

Patman

Just picked up over 70 comics from various $1 boxes at the local quarterly comic show in Atlanta today. It was the last hour and the previously priced $2 comics boxes turned into $1 comics boxes, and that's when I started digging into the boxes and found runs of miniseries that I wouldn't pay 20% off cover for (new), but for $1 each, it was enough to motivate me to buy them.

Superboy

I think that the quarter bin days are extinct, especially in the wake of the crash of the 90s. Companies just don't have the ability to have huge print runs anymore for comics that don't sell.

Josh-da-man

About six years ago I hit the jackpot at this one flea market. This one guy had about fifty long boxes of unsorted comics. Selling them for $.25 each or 5/$1.

I spent an afternoon digging through them and managed to fill a lot of holes in my collection, as well as grab some decent runs of things I didn't have.

Among them:

Miracleman #1-14, 17-24
John Byrne's Next Men #0-30 (Including the rare first appearance of Hellboy)
A bunch of American Flagg
A bunch of Grimjack
A bunch of Hellblazers I need from the Delano/Ennis runs
Mister X vol. 1
All of the Comico Grendels and DH Grendel Tales I needed
Flex Mentallo 1,2, and 4

I ended up spending something like sixty dollars on 300 comic books.

(A few years later, I managed to pick up Miracleman #15, #16, and Flex Mentallo #3 from an online seller for $19.00 plus shipping for all three.)

Wildo1966

Personally I like when my LCS has their year end sale where they give 75% off back issues, they want to dump stock to pay less taxes and I can usually score some great deals, especially full run sets and lots...