I always enjoy showing off when we get a cool new collection in and this one is one that I’m super stoked to get in. It’s a small Funko Pop lot of I believe 34 pieces. Usually when we get in Pop collections, there are no Grail pieces. What that basically means is that it’s a bunch of commons and lower tier exclusives. Nothing super earth shattering. Well this one has a few and I can’t wait to show ya!
Last week I received a call from a regular customer’s mother. Turns out she had bought all of these Pops from us years ago and figured it was time to move on and cash in. Her initial investments turned out to be brilliant as she focused on properties like The Wizard of Oz & The Muppets. Both of which have skyrocketed in recent years.
As we spoke on the phone, she told me she had the full Wizard set minus the flocked Lion, some Muppets, Sesame Street, and a few others. So yesterday with her son, she brought in the vinyl treasures and we negotiated.
I rummaged quickly through them mainly to see what Muppets and randoms there were. She was a hard negotiator I will say. There were some pretty big pieces here and that changes the game drastically from the normal types of Pop collection that walk in most of the time. After doing some quick math and discussing with my partner, we came to the range of shelling out between $1000-$1375 for the lot.
It seems mom was looking for a bit more but as I explained to her how selling online works and the fees associated, she came around and we agreed upon the $1375. I also believe her son Tony helped play a part in explaining to her, the challenges of breaking down the lot and dealing with the madness of high end Pop collectors vs. outright one chunk for cash.
Here’s where I messed up a bit...
Now this is not something that’s going to really hurt us but as I unpacked the pieces later in the day once it quoted down, I noticed that there was no Metallic Wicked Witch. Did someone steal it?!? Where the fuck was it?!? I started panicking and I called Tony. Maybe they forgot it at home? I dunno...
Tony answers and I explain how the Metallic Witch is not here. That’s when I found out that she never had that piece. It was a miscommunication on the initial phone call from mom to me. Ultimately it’s totally my fault. I should have checked each individual piece and then I would have noticed it wasn’t present and inquired about its absence in which case I would have been told that she never had that piece.
That would have helped me out in my numbers and my offer which would have definitely been less than the final number of $1375. That piece alone is about a $500 piece so it changes the game drastically.
Tony felt really bad about the situation and I explained to him that it was a simple misunderstanding and ultimately if I had just looked properly, this wouldn’t have even had been an issue. I was just super busy yesterday and skimmed right by the Wizard pieces as I was told the whole run minus the Flocked Lion was there. I was more interested at that very second in seeing the others as I had no knowledge of what else was in the batch.
Either way, it’s still a good deal. My buddy Tony’s mom is happy and got a nice chunk of cash. She probably only spent $200 bucks on that batch like 6 years back so to turn that into almost $1400 bucks is solid. Us on the other hand paid slightly more (especially with my faux pas) than we usually do, but in fairness with larger scale pieces...that’s the way it goes sometimes. Wanna get killer conversation pieces in? Most likely you are going to pay!
Sone of those other Wizard pieces and Muppets pieces fetch bank as well. Glinda and the Metallic Muppets all bring in $250-$300 a piece. It’s been a while since we got a chunk of grail pieces in so our insane Pop people will be thrilled seeing these waltz into the shop.
All in all, we paid about 50% of what we will move these for so there is still plenty of meat on the bone for us. One fun thing I noticed is a few pieces still have our old stickers on them. The most shocking is that she initially paid $50 for the Metallic Winged Monkey Pop!!!
I’m guessing this is probably around 6 years back or so. Today, that piece alone is...well...take a look at the rough average...
Not too shabby! I will honestly price this piece higher than the average as there is only 1 currently up for sale at the moment and the asking price is absurdly high!!!
I’m the end, ages happy and has a wad of cash, Tony is happy that his mom is happy, and I learned a valuable lesson to always look closely as so much can be lost in communication. Either way, I can’t wait to pop these Pops in the case and have the hardcore folks drool over em!!!
Thx for looking!
Blewitt