Collecting before internet

[clemso]

Today we take for granted instant communication, ebay feedback gives an indication of a buyers/sellers integrity and reputation is king. If I want a mego, our global network makes it easier to find. You can still get taken by a scammer though, but hopefully as a community we can look after each other a little. So what must it have been like to buy Megos before internet. How did you get to see the items condition for example, pic by snail mail, fax? And surely it was way easier to get ripped off then.For example I lost $1500 that I sent to someone selling FF 1 in a cbg ad, sent the check and no reply, it was that easy to get ripped off before internet. Please share your good and bad stories. Clem

[Meule]

I wasn't a Mego collector back then, I did collect vintage Batman toys tho, but finding any was pretty much a disaster

[jds1911a1]

I used to go to alot of toy shows, and comic shops that also had collectible toys, made contacts with sellers who would advertise in toyshop and Lee's toy review. Marz toys always used to have interesting joe auctions so did cotswold (back then they were selling mostly vintage stuff not their own line of figures like now). I avoided classified sellers though
antique malls and local collector clubs were the best sources for rare stuff.

never really got burned with those i dealt with and kind of miss the interaction of phone calls or the road trip to their store/basement

[drmego]

We didn't know that it COULD be better - and there was a lot more chance of
finding something really cheap from someone who didn't know MEGO.

[NewForce]

I used to run weekly ads in the CBG and the Toy shop... I am very fortunate enough to report that in all the years I did this, I never got ripped off, and always found the same customers buying from my ads over and over (I guess they felt comfortable doing so)...

establishing a client base was key, but references were even better back then!

[spamn]

My first Mego as an adult collector was a $75 dollar frayed-cape Thor that had no boots or accessories, found in a Ventura, CA Antique shop in 1998. I didn't like the price, but the guy pulled out a price guide, and being naive and it being the first one I'd seen since I was a kid, I bought it and a few others. That night I searched on ebay, saw that I could get them all and a lot cheaper, and went to bed as a hardcore collector.

To this day I'm disgusted with myself for being wide-eyed ignorant enough to buy that crappy Thor. But I literally had never seen any Megos in any antique store I'd ever browsed in (not that I was checking every shop and every flea market I'd ever seen, but every time I browsed a shop, I would look for them.) So in my mind Megos were super-scarce. If it wasn't for the internet, I'd still think they were, but I'd also be completely ignorant of several of their figure lines I only found out about through the museum.

[ctc]

Hmmmm....

Had catalogues from lots of different mail order places. Used to get comics and such the same way.

Don C.

[palitoy]

Read and advertised in Toy Shop, CBG, AFN. Drove all over creation doing shows and spent hundreds of dollars in long distance. I've been collecting since before a driver's license so I used to take the bus to shows, which wasn't fun.

All said and done, it was fun and rewarding, as much as I love the convienence of it all now (and I do) I miss the drives to New Jersey and knowing you'd spend all your cash before you ran out of things to buy.

[luey]

Mostly shows and Toy shop, the ole call in auctions and word of mouth... Being at the right place at the right time always helped... Communication! always ask!!

[Mikey]

In the old days (the 80's) I used to by 90% of my stuff by phone through adds (Toy Shop, Lee's etc) relying on the sellers word spoken description on the phone... To be honest, I was way more happy back then instead of the internet and ebay today ... Maybe I was just lucky, but most people didn't lie about condition and faults in the old days.
Also, there was no factory repro parts so repro's were never an issue...

[JDeRouen]

The first Mego I ever saw as an adult was a loose Capt. America as my wife and I were passing by the window of a collectible store. I really wanted him, but for some reason was embarrassed and wouldn't even ask what the price was. That night, my wife searched the Internet and found the Mego Museum, still in its infancy. (This was in 1996.) I never did go back and get Captain America, but seeing him lit the fire and soon thereafter I was visiting antique malls and flea markets looking for Megos.

My first Megos as as an adult were loose complete Mr. Fantastic, Invisible Girl, and Human Torch at Trader's Village (a huge outdoor flea market) in Grand Prairie, Texas. I paid $75 for the set. (I passed on the $40 each MIB Magnetic Batman and Robin... I still regret that!) I was incredibly nervous about spending that much money on dolls!

I visited eBay soon thereafter, and started buying a few here and there, but most of my purchases came from also visiting toy shows. (We lived in Dallas at the time, so there were good shows every couple of months!) This one guy always had boxes of loose parts that he let me have for a steal. I remember getting a fairly large sized cardboard box full of stuff, including a complete nearly mint brown Cornelius suit, a Batgirl cowl, Batman cowl, Cheron boots, Batman and Robin belts, Thor hammer and helmet, Supergirl slippers, all sorts of cool items. I think I paid like $20 for that cardboard box.

I miss those days.

[Hector]

Before the internet...I was really into comics and models like Aurora and Horizon...all comic book themed.

I did collect a few Star Wars stuff...and to a lesser extent...Star Trek.

Superman comics have always been my favorite...but was also into Marvel...like Spider-Man and the X-Men.

I had a few Megos from childhood...but didn't really started seriously collecting them until the internet boom...and eBay.

The ironic thing now...I have almost zero interest in comic books today.

[megoapesnut]

I was a hardcore football card collector in the 80's and early 90's and card shows were big back then. Plus we had quite a few card shops in the tri-county area so we didn't lack for places to buy. I also purchased quite a bit through mail order as Mikey did and I echo his thoughts that I was very happy with the seller's descriptions when I received the cards via mail. While I dabbled in a few Mego Apes figures in the mid to late 90's, it wasn't until Burton's remake of POTA that I became HARDCORE in collecting Megos and by then ebay was up and running, so I don't really have any Mego purchasing experiences before the internet.

[Sowth]

You had to have patience to collect before the web came along. We had maybe three - four toy shows a year, a limited range at a couple of comic / collectables stores and pot-luck at Garage Sales and Trash & Treasure fairs.

We got Toy Shop but it was always weeks later and just too hard to bid or buy with exchange rates and international money orders etc. Having said that I only got burnt once, over a Kenner Indy moc IIRC.

I loved the anticipation when lining up for early-bird entry to the fairs, you knew that the dealers would always have heaps of new stuff and were eager to sell, not like now where much of the stuff is "What didn't sell on Ebay" lol.

Good times!

[palitoy]

When I was in college, I would race across the street to Lichtmans and read Toyshop as it arrived, I'd stand there like a hobo, hastily scribble down numbers and then call from the mall phone.

I did a lot of cool deals like Cipsa Apes, Palitoy stuff etc from the public phone at the Atrium on the Bay mall.