The Dandy edition that's now worth £20,000
Old Beano and Dandy annuals have soared in value. But you have to know how to spot the gems
By Charlotte Beugge
10:43AM GMT 25 Nov 2013
Superman can be pure investment kryptonite - and even the Bash Street Kids could make you a fortune. There are plenty of investors and collectors desperate for comics featuring their favourite characters, from Desperate Dan and Biffo the Bear to US superheroes such as Spiderman and the Green Lantern.
The comic world divides into two markets. There is the brightly coloured action-hero US comic, which appeal to serious investors with deep pockets. And there is the British comic market, featuring much-loved characters, often in black and white - where the inclusion of the original free gift can easily quadruple the price.
And we're talking about far-from-funny sums of money. Were you to come across a mint condition copy of the first edition of Action Comics, printed in the US in 1938, you might have found something worth more than $2m (£1.3m).
But while America is where the serious money goes, Britain still has its valuable comics. A first edition of The Dandy from 1937, complete with the free gift of a whistle, would sell for more than £20,000. The Beano started in 1938: 10 years ago a copy of the first edition sold for more than £12,000.
And at this time of year, when the shops are full of annuals aimed at the younger generation, a hidden-away annual from years ago could be worth a tidy sum. A Beano annual from 1940 sold for £4,265 in 2010.
"Annuals are attractive to collectors because it's a realistic achievement to collect them all - there's one a year, compared with 52 issues of the comic," said Phil Shrimpton of phil-comics.com.
If you find a 1973 edition of the Rupert the Bear annual where the bear is brown on the cover, you could get £3,000-£5,000 because Rupert was meant to be white. "There are only 12 in existence as the artist objected to the colour mistake," said Rob Rudderham of 30th Century Comics of Putney in south London.
British comics were mainly printed on low-quality paper, which degrades over time - and as many are stored in boxes in attics only to be sold when their owner dies or moves house, many are in poor condition. So there's a huge premium to be paid for those in good condition. And unlike US comics, British ones often included free gifts. With the original gift attached, the price will be far higher: a first edition of The Dandy without the whistle would go for around £5,000.
Mr Shrimpton has been collecting comics, particularly The Beano and The Dandy, since he was 10. Now 32, he runs an auction website that deals mainly in British comics. He has seen prices and interest in comics rise hugely over the past few years. "In the early Nineties I bought 10 Sixties annuals for £65 - now I'd have to pay more than £300 for them.
"In the early issues, the comics were a mixture of prose stories and cartoon strips. From the Fifties The Beano and Dandy became cartoon only.
We also saw the appearance of popular characters such as Dennis the Menace, who first appeared in The Beano in 1951, and in 1954, when the Bash Street Kids made their debut. The issues where popular characters made their debuts command higher prices."
Other comics have their fans: a first edition of Bunty from the Fifties in good condition can go for several hundred pounds, as can the first issue of Eagle. Some collectors go for particular publishers - the Dundee-based DC Thomson, which still prints The Beano, for example - while others go for particular dates such as Christmas or April Fool's Day.
"Comics are bought for different reasons," said Mr Shrimpton. "It's for nostalgia, the classic artwork, the humour and the escapism."
Long-forgotten names can be valuable. Find a copy of the first issue of TV Century 21 - a comic that contained Gerry Anderson characters such as Thunderbirds - from the Sixties and it could be worth £500-£1,000.
But the really valuable comics are from the US. What's so special about the record-breaking 1938 Action Comics is the first appearance of Superman. Mr Rudderham said: "American comics are where the serious money is, basically because there are a lot of rich people over there who want to buy them. We do get people buying comics for investment and we always tell them to buy the best-quality comic they can afford. A comic costing £2 now will never make you a fortune."
But for the most prized issues, prices have been rising fast in recent years, fuelled possibly by rich middle-aged people nostalgic for their childhoods.
Mr Rudderham added: "What you want ideally is the first edition in which a character featured, such as Iron Man, the Incredible Hulk or Spiderman. A pristine copy of Amazing Fantasy from 1963 - which included the first appearance of Spiderman - could sell for more than $250,000." He added that if you did come across a treasured US comic, you'd get the best price by selling through an American auction house.
Duncan McAlpine of comicpriceguide.co.uk has a collection of around 100,000 comics - including the muchprized Action Comics No 1. He said: "In 1987, when I was working as a floor manager on EastEnders, I spent £10,000 on a copy. If I tell you that recently a copy sold for $2.6m (£1.6m) you'll see it was a good investment. Although my copy is not mint, it's probably still worth several hundred thousand pounds. I don't think it will be long before we see the first $5m comic."
Marvel comics, which featured characters such as Wolverine and X-Men, have seen hefty prices rises in recent years. This is thanks to blockbuster films introducing them to a new generation. "These films have made these characters cool for a new generation," said Mr McAlpine. He pointed out that the popularity of comic collections had been helped by celebrity collectors including Jonathan Ross and Nicholas Cage. "Investing in comics is fun: you're buying art and escapism. No wonder it's becoming popular."
And comics don't even need to be that old: a 2003 copy of Walking Dead sold recently for $10,000 because seven years after it appeared a TV version came out, making it desirable. The original print run was just 7,000, which explains the record price achieved - the best ever for a comic of less than 10 years old. So if you can spot tomorrow's hit TV show or film in today's comics, your fortune is assured. 8)
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/pers ... 20000.html
