All I want to do is talk about COMC

[cardsrus1]

Originally Posted by Dragonman

I have been with COMC from day one with multiple accounts back then....I remember when submission fees went from 5 cents to 10 cents I think and everyone (Everyone meaning their was about 200 of us) had a fit and were screaming bloody murder and how everyone was leaving because the fees were too high, yet nobody left............Now their processing fees went up from 35 cents to 50 cents and they are getting more submissions than ever..........They truly are bullet proof and this is why they do not care to improve anything.........it is like the insanely hot girl, she can be the biggest bitsh, have no personality or anything yet everyone still wants her and she KNOWS it just like comc knows it

They could raise fees to a dollar a card and business would still be booming and they know it People would just say the same thing they say now "well I could get $1.75 for that card and a 40 cent profit or whatever is better than sitting in my house collecting dust ".........Only in America

I do not recall a nickle, I recall it going from a dime to a quarter. There was much more going on with that change. They cut the upload time in half and what I recall upsetting some sellers was they went from pay as they upload to payment upfront.

The shipping department must be running at 24/7 capacity until they have this under control. If that involves pulling the submission page, than that must happen. The number one priority is to send the cards that have been bought and paid for. It is clear that the people submitting cards have no desire to stop and help COMC recover so the only option is to pull the page down. It is beyond stupid to keep accepting more cards when you cannot control the current stock you have.

[cruiserdaddy7]

Originally Posted by cardsrus1

I do not recall a nickle, I recall it going from a dime to a quarter. There was much more going on with that change. They cut the upload time in half and what I recall upsetting some sellers was they went from pay as they upload to payment upfront.

The shipping department must be running at 24/7 capacity until they have this under control. If that involves pulling the submission page, than that must happen. The number one priority is to send the cards that have been bought and paid for. It is clear that the people submitting cards have no desire to stop and help COMC recover so the only option is to pull the page down. It is beyond stupid to keep accepting more cards when you cannot control the current stock you have.

They don't work weekends now which baffles me. No shipping notifications go out unless Monday-Friday. They simply couldn't care less. They are charging more than ever and see no value in their customers. Very shortsighted.

It's the model of this industry though. Look at Panini, Topps, PSA etc. Hideous wait times and horrid customer service.

[salthill]

Tim is an IT guy, not a general business manager. Not sure of his wife’s background, but I believe she runs the rest of the business?These shipping issues predated the covid situation. I assume they know what actions it would take to fix it, they just don’t want to take them.
Bear in mind, if they shut down shipping completely, people would complain their cards are being held hostage.
If they shut it down and just had one very expensive, super-express shipping method for those that absolutely wanted their cards now, they’d get grief for exploiting their customers. There’s no real path with a clear win for them. But their current approach is possibly the worst of all options. (Hint: That backlog is getting bigger, not smaller, right?)

[checkoutmydeals]

Does COMC actually take a decent look at cards when placing them in [EX to NM] category? Seems questionable at times.

At one time, they charged 5 cents to add condition notes to a card, and paid the people who were making the condition notes at least $10 per hour.

I would expect the cards are inspected with approximately the same level of speed, care and expertise that a McDonald's employee gives to the pickle slices that they put onto a Big Mac.

[OscarsCards]

Hey guys! I have a question for those who are shipping home cards often.

I haven't shipped cards for a two years and I have a question about shipment declared value.

Since I haven't payed infinite tax bill for COMC shipments ever I can't remember why. I have a suspicion about the shipping method where more expensive method has to include more detailed info?

Any intel from internationals?

[Dragonman]

Originally Posted by cardsrus1

I do not recall a nickle, I recall it going from a dime to a quarter. There was much more going on with that change. They cut the upload time in half and what I recall upsetting some sellers was they went from pay as they upload to payment upfront.

The shipping department must be running at 24/7 capacity until they have this under control. If that involves pulling the submission page, than that must happen. The number one priority is to send the cards that have been bought and paid for. It is clear that the people submitting cards have no desire to stop and help COMC recover so the only option is to pull the page down. It is beyond stupid to keep accepting more cards when you cannot control the current stock you have.

I could not remember if it went from 5 cents to 10 cents or 10 to 15.

[Budler]

Originally Posted by salthill

Tim is an IT guy, not a general business manager. Not sure of his wife’s background, but I believe she runs the rest of the business?These shipping issues predated the covid situation. I assume they know what actions it would take to fix it, they just don’t want to take them.
Bear in mind, if they shut down shipping completely, people would complain their cards are being held hostage.
If they shut it down and just had one very expensive, super-express shipping method for those that absolutely wanted their cards now, they’d get grief for exploiting their customers. There’s no real path with a clear win for them. But their current approach is possibly the worst of all options. (Hint: That backlog is getting bigger, not smaller, right?)

If you check out their BIO you would see Julie : She completed her BA in Psychology and MA in Counseling Psychology with an emphasis in Culture and Social Justice at Northwest University in Kirkland, WA. Shows she is the Business manager and Tim as the CEO. But wait it appears that it has not been updated since 2007. Like a lot of stuff on their site.

[JustMoe]

Originally Posted by salthill

Tim is an IT guy, not a general business manager. Not sure of his wife’s background, but I believe she runs the rest of the business?These shipping issues predated the covid situation. I assume they know what actions it would take to fix it, they just don’t want to take them.
Bear in mind, if they shut down shipping completely, people would complain their cards are being held hostage.
If they shut it down and just had one very expensive, super-express shipping method for those that absolutely wanted their cards now, they’d get grief for exploiting their customers. There’s no real path with a clear win for them. But their current approach is possibly the worst of all options. (Hint: That backlog is getting bigger, not smaller, right?)

Julia's background is in psychology and "social justice", and she once worked for a law firm that handled business law...so, she thinks she's got what it takes to run a business.

When I started in 2012, Julia was all but out of the picture at COMC - while she had helped start the company, and if you google the internet archives for the old check out my cards com website, you'll see that everything was in her name. But, at some point, she and Tim had split up.

Tim was running things by himself and during that time, the company had experienced a growth spurt. In late 2011, they moved into the office space they're still in now and I was part of a hiring spree the company had - they increased their staff to nearly 40 people in early 2012. Things were good...and, later that year, Julia saw how things were going well and she decided to come back into the fold...

We had business staff on payroll and people that Tim brought in to run things while he managed the website and development. But, the longer Julia was there, those people started leaving and she was taking more control of the company.

In the 4-5 months before I left, we rarely saw Tim in the building and we weren't allowed to bring any issues to him - everything had to go through Julia and she would decide what to bring to Tim's attention...Tim was pretty much designated to managing the website and acting as the face of the company - she was handling all the day to day stuff - and the way the company is failing, I'd say she still is.

[Wolf8MeVillie]

Originally Posted by cardsrus1

The shipping department must be running at 24/7 capacity until they have this under control. If that involves pulling the submission page, than that must happen. The number one priority is to send the cards that have been bought and paid for. It is clear that the people submitting cards have no desire to stop and help COMC recover so the only option is to pull the page down. It is beyond stupid to keep accepting more cards when you cannot control the current stock you have.

I got an email from COMC stating that my cards were in the final shipping stage and would ship the next "BUSINESS" day. That was a Friday, Monday after that email, nothing. So no 24/7 shipping. Plus no more responses to emails. I don't expect them to completely stop shipping, but maybe get rid of the rush express until they catch up. I have not had previous issues with shipping, minus that they took two shipments, because they were behind, and shipped both in one package, but still kept the 2 shipping charges. I placed my order 2 weeks before they announced the delays in shipping on Upper Deck, I never got an email from COMC announcing this, and I don't have social media.

[aguinness]

Originally Posted by imwonderboy

While I agree that they are not likely to 'pause' their Ebay efforts how about stopping the promotions with Ebay that will only drive more tarffic? I'm sure they are paying a hefty marketing fee for that and all it will do is make things worse.

Ugh - I bit the bullet today and paid $500 to have 1,000 of my top cards sent home. Maybe I'll have them before the MLB All-Star break.

I have a pretty established Ebay account myself that I will take my chances with.

I'm not sure that stopping the promotions would help - unless I am mistaken, it's really a marketing thing and not adding more to the workload where it counts. I peruse COMC's auctions every day and unless I wasn't paying close enough attention, I haven't noticed a surge in auction items during the days of a promotion. And if this is the case, stopping the promotion wouldn't free up any extra time to use elsewhere, but perhaps lower eyeballs on the items up for auction.
I'm not sure they'll be able to free up any time somewhere to address shipping, processing, CS, etc., although I do think they could be more efficient in some areas. Why they still auction items that will clearly get no bids or have a market value in the single digits is beyond me. And they could slow the incoming cards to be processed if they set a threshold value that cards need to be or a requirement that there be less than "X" amount of the card already available on COMC. If they receive a batch with an item that does not meet the requirements, that batch goes to the end of the line, perhaps.

[Phils747]

Just made a cash-out request that gets all of my initial investment back. Have a bunch of cards that I'm holding onto as investments but I may sell them cheap at some point if this shipping mess doesn't improve.

I'm even a little hesitant to buy from them with the intention of just relisting the cards right now because I'd imagine their customer base is shrinking with their inability to ship in a reasonable timeframe.

[Budler]

Originally Posted by Dragonman

I have been with COMC from day one with multiple accounts back then....I remember when submission fees went from 5 cents to 10 cents I think and everyone (Everyone meaning their was about 200 of us) had a fit and were screaming bloody murder and how everyone was leaving because the fees were too high, yet nobody left............Now their processing fees went up from 35 cents to 50 cents and they are getting more submissions than ever..........They truly are bullet proof and this is why they do not care to improve anything.........it is like the insanely hot girl, she can be the biggest bitsh, have no personality or anything yet everyone still wants her and she KNOWS it just like comc knows it

They could raise fees to a dollar a card and business would still be booming and they know it People would just say the same thing they say now "well I could get $1.75 for that card and a 40 cent profit or whatever is better than sitting in my house collecting dust ".........Only in America

I joined in Sept of 2011. I watched them for several months, read all their blogs (Did you know they locked out their employees for a while). even called a couple of times before I joined. At that time they are asking for suggestions to improve the site. Around the 1st part of 2012 I send Tim a E-mail with some suggestions and a some issues I could see coming as the company was growing real fast.. Sure wished I keep that e-mail. I'm sure he should have been aware of what I was talking about. Off of the top of my head here are a few.

1. You may become a warehouse for cards that will not sell. There are cards now with 1,000 cards.
2. You may become a store front for 20 to 30 large dealers.
3. You need to focus on processing and shipping Sellers will come and buyers will follow. No need to expand real fast.
4. Keep CS at the level it is now. Do not cut back on it.
5. Be ready for the ups and downs in the hobby. Labor will be the issue here.
6. Be transparent when making charges.
7. Remember Happy buyers make happy sellers.

I had a page full. He reply was No need to worry as I have it all under control.

[Budler]

Originally Posted by aguinness

I'm not sure that stopping the promotions would help - unless I am mistaken, it's really a marketing thing and not adding more to the workload where it counts. I peruse COMC's auctions every day and unless I wasn't paying close enough attention, I haven't noticed a surge in auction items during the days of a promotion. And if this is the case, stopping the promotion wouldn't free up any extra time to use elsewhere, but perhaps lower eyeballs on the items up for auction.
I'm not sure they'll be able to free up any time somewhere to address shipping, processing, CS, etc., although I do think they could be more efficient in some areas. Why they still auction items that will clearly get no bids or have a market value in the single digits is beyond me. And they could slow the incoming cards to be processed if they set a threshold value that cards need to be or a requirement that there be less than "X" amount of the card already available on COMC. If they receive a batch with an item that does not meet the requirements, that batch goes to the end of the line, perhaps.

Because they get $3.50 to list it.

[aguinness]

Originally Posted by Budler

Because they get $3.50 to list it.

Of course, on its own. But my point is to add requirements to make things more efficient. Require auction submissions to meet a certain level or risk sending the entire submission to the back of the line would likely curtail auction items that sell for single digits, while possibly carving out some time to catch up on where they are behind. It’s not just what you bolder in the quote, but in conjunction with the rest.

[Budler]

Originally Posted by aguinness

Of course, on its own. But my point is to add requirements to make things more efficient. Require auction submissions to meet a certain level or risk sending the entire submission to the back of the line would likely curtail auction items that sell for single digits, while possibly carving out some time to catch up on where they are behind. It’s not just what you bolder in the quote, but in conjunction with the rest.

This is what it says:
COMC Auctions on eBay is the easiest way to quickly sell your items valued at $25 or more. We list new 7-day $0.99 eBay auctions every week. Auction consignments will be added to your COMC account for your review within one week of receipt. Your items will be scheduled to list during the following week after they enter your account.

So you want them to figure out if it is over $25.00. They have stated this several times about people sending in cards that sell low when it started. It would take them more time to check them and still have to do them if they are send back to the end of the line. Appears that some do not read it.

[kjetilfan]

Originally Posted by chezball

$37.50

An Aussie, so maths is not my strong suit

[chezball]

Originally Posted by kjetilfan

An Aussie, so maths is not my strong suit

[KhalDrogo]

Originally Posted by salthill

Tim is an IT guy, not a general business manager. Not sure of his wife’s background, but I believe she runs the rest of the business?These shipping issues predated the covid situation. I assume they know what actions it would take to fix it, they just don’t want to take them.
Bear in mind, if they shut down shipping completely, people would complain their cards are being held hostage.
If they shut it down and just had one very expensive, super-express shipping method for those that absolutely wanted their cards now, they’d get grief for exploiting their customers. There’s no real path with a clear win for them. But their current approach is possibly the worst of all options. (Hint: That backlog is getting bigger, not smaller, right?)

There is a path, like you already identified. Hire more employees and hire a systems engineer to reconstruct your entire operation.

This company is in a death spiral. Name me any other company where you buy a physical item and are made to wait months to have that item shipped to you despite it being in stock.

[shrevecity]

Originally Posted by KhalDrogo

There is a path, like you already identified. Hire more employees and hire a systems engineer to reconstruct your entire operation.

This company is in a death spiral. Name me any other company where you buy a physical item and are made to wait months to have that item shipped to you despite it being in stock.

well if it were the 1980s then I could name tons.

People do not seem to think that success can kill a business, but it can and I honestly think COMC is a prime example of where a mediocre managment team is being exposed due to the rise in business. They have failed to adjust to it and continue to fail. Money is not always the issue in these cases its almost always managment.

[imwonderboy]

Originally Posted by shrevecity

well if it were the 1980s then I could name tons.

People do not seem to think that success can kill a business, but it can and I honestly think COMC is a prime example of where a mediocre managment team is being exposed due to the rise in business. They have failed to adjust to it and continue to fail. Money is not always the issue in these cases its almost always managment.

One of the most common ways that businesses (especially small to medium) end up failing is they are forced to grow too quickly and do not have the capital or resources to do so.

Sorry guys but this isn't headed anywhere good.

[base set]

I realized a deep irony in it all - I don't have time to ship cards one at a time from eBay sales. So I went with a consignor who could ship cards like that - COMC - and then they went and connected themselves to the firehose of eBay sales and it turns out they didn't have time to ship cards one at a time from eBay sales, either.

Meanwhile this morning I saw a new card listed in a set I collect. The player accumulated a career 2.4 WAR playing for a small market team, last appeared in a game in 2018 and is now 31 years old. Baseball Reference hasn't quite made it official with the "Last Game Played" notation, but, it's over, Johnny. The cheapest 11 copies of the card are all below 50¢ and there are 93 copies behind those waiting to sell, for about a 2.5x ratio of inventory : 4 year sales. Given that the 4 year data has a minor peak in it when the player had one last chance with a new, large market team in 2018 and this is his RC actually, I would expect that ratio to balloon out to 8x or 9x or even higher inventory:sales numbers as soon as the 2018 data comes out of it. Though I'm sure an occasional set or team collector would buy a copy in the years to come, I seriously doubt 104 such sales will ever happen.

I have criticized this paid baseball card cemetery activity in the past but today I finally realized several things about it. The new listing for this could be just a re-pricing from a newly sold port, for one, and I don't actually know which of the 104 cards is the newly available copy as the lowest price card shows to basically be the front / 'face' of the whole listing. But it could have been inside someone's long delayed 2020 submission for 50 cents and they priced it at least over their intake fee.

Although COMC itself warns people not to send in these types of cards, there is no accounting for optimism by their customers. And what I realized this morning is that it would probably ultimately cost COMC more to reject this card entirely, particularly as they no longer have the Declined Items mechanism to recover such cards, given the EX-NM and other grade buckets used for all cards now. And there is clearly no way they can even consider shipping rejected cards back to anyone - right now - ever again?

A single baseball card no one will ever want is not a problem for any of us. But owning and listing millions of such cards - I think a Systems Engineer (great suggestion) would seek to find a way to unload such dead wood. The next listed new card after it has a 3.5x ratio, and the next card after that is an Alex Rodriguez card - but still sits over 2x inventory:4 yr sales. After a Trout and a Jeter card another RC appears of a player who appeared in his last game right about when Topps issued the RC, for a -0.3 WAR across 27 innings of MLB action. Submitters have managed to largely avoid sending in a copy so there are only 18 available - but that is still a 2.5x ratio of inventory:sales for a now 8 year old card.

The up-front instructions do inform submitters that COMC reserves the right to reject such cards. What I wonder is - do they ever exercise this option? Can they even still do it? Or does their business model now force them to accept 50 cents for every piece of cardboard that arrives, keeping it like Ted Williams' frozen head in careful storage and forever for sale for all eternity to check out the scans, and all part of a set of servers with heavy duty back-ups and crucial seek times in the database, etc., etc.


The good news in it all is that there was a newly listed card that I want to purchase. And that's why I don't think COMC will fail, nor am worried about my own overall inconsequential exposure to risk. A solid portion of their inventory is desired by customers. But I do note that these new attempts at creating a stock/commodities type trading floor websites for cards do severely restrict the types of cards they will even consider allowing. I wonder if those new sites charge people for submitting cards they then refuse to list?

Oh well, best of luck everyone. My has run out and it's time to go make my donuts.

[cruiserdaddy7]

I have seen some new cards listed that I want as well. Then I realize that I have no idea if and when I will get the card. I pass over it. I'm not a fan of digital trading cards, and at this point that's all COMC is offering. You don't get what you pay for, yet you pay them very high shipping...to not ship. Screw that game.

[aguinness]

Originally Posted by Budler

This is what it says:
COMC Auctions on eBay is the easiest way to quickly sell your items valued at $25 or more. We list new 7-day $0.99 eBay auctions every week. Auction consignments will be added to your COMC account for your review within one week of receipt. Your items will be scheduled to list during the following week after they enter your account.

So you want them to figure out if it is over $25.00. They have stated this several times about people sending in cards that sell low when it started. It would take them more time to check them and still have to do them if they are send back to the end of the line. Appears that some do not read it.

It would take them more time to check, I agree. But clearly the $3.50 base fee for auctions isn't dissuading people from sending in cards that won't even garner $3.50 at auction. My suggestion is a higher penalty for submitting such cards, and while it may take more time at first, the hope would be that submitters would quickly get the message and stop sending in those low value cards. At that point, the more time spent checking would return on the investment.
That's just my suggestion - probably not the best idea, but I think more needs to be done to de-incentivize sending in these cards (and also those noted in the other post about the "card cemetery").

[boxbuster7]

Originally Posted by shrevecity

well if it were the 1980s then I could name tons.

People do not seem to think that success can kill a business, but it can and I honestly think COMC is a prime example of where a mediocre managment team is being exposed due to the rise in business. They have failed to adjust to it and continue to fail. Money is not always the issue in these cases its almost always managment.

I've never thought about COMC this way. Spot on.

[Swipe79]

I'm just curious if anyone using the Economy Rushed option for shipping is waiting for a package older than mine - was supposed to be shipped February 11th. This was not basic shipping - it was the expedited choice to be cleear.

32 Days Later = No cards shipped.