The Hoarding of the Applewood Editions

An article by Kent Winslow in the first issue of The Mystery and Adventure Series Review from the summer of 1980 mentions the rise of comic book prices as well as the hoarding of comic books and how the same could happen to series books:

Allowing prices to rise too high, I firmly believe, will cause the books to disappear entirely from the ordinary market, the same way old comic books have already, as speculators seize whole lots and pack them away in warehouses to await eventual monster profits . . . The now well-known Comic Book Price Guide ended up having a PRESCRIPTIVE rather than DESCRIPTIVE effect when, as part of this process, people started consulting it for advice on how much to charge instead of seeing its figures as averages of prices real people were setting . . . However, book dealers are beginning to realize that . . . series books can become a strongly profitable source, too . . . most series books were printed in hard-cover editions that stand the ravages of time and present a sturdy appearance long after the average comic would have been destroyed. For this reason, the old books are more likely to have survived . . . Nevertheless, they can be made a scarce commodity (scarcer than they are, that is), artificially. The local book dealer I mentioned earlier—who claims to have one of the largest stocks of books in the southwestern United States—is at this time in the process of hoarding salable items for just this reason. In reply to a query of mine about whether he had any Tom Quest books or anything else by Fran Striker, not long ago, he actually laughed out loud and pointed at a stack of cardboard boxes nearby that reached all the way up to the ceiling. "See those apple boxes over there?" he asked . . . "Well, down in the warehouse we have 700 boxes just like that, and that's where we keep all the Fran Striker books we get in—Lone Ranger . . . all that stuff. If somebody brings them in for trade, they go right into the warehouse."

The situation as described above is what I believe has happened with the Applewood edition Nancy Drew books.  The books have been made artificially scarce and now command high prices.  The books were still selling for low prices in the first few months after Applewood's contract expired.  After it became common knowledge that there would be no more books printed by Applewood, sellers began stating in their auctions that the books were out of print and sure to become scarce (actually, they probably said that the books were to become RARE) and hard to find. 

At this point, we began to see the prices spike from $10.00-$25.00 up to $30.00-$50.00.  During this time, all of the books were still readily available.  As the months passed, the number of books available gradually dwindled in number from online sites such as Amazon.com.  By this point, the resellers were stating that the books were RARE and valuable.   The prices climbed slowly upward.

I have no doubt that the people selling the books were buying up the available copies and placing them on eBay.  In the summer of 2008, the only Applewood editions that are still available for reasonable prices are the first five or six titles, #20, and #21.  For some reason, #20 and #21 are already commanding high prices on eBay, even though they can still be purchased for under $20.00 from online sites. 

This scenario is what happened with the rest of the titles around a year ago.  Those titles were still available when the prices spiked on eBay.   As people are now paying high prices for #20 and #21, we can expect the stock to gradually disappear from Amazon.com and others, thus causing the prices to rise even more sharply.

The reason why the stock is dwindling is because the resellers are buying up the books.  It is because the resellers have bought up all available copies of #7-19 that were priced at under around $50.00-$75.00 that the books are now only listed for very high prices on the fixed-price sites.  Since the sellers know that they can get around $100.00 or so per book, it is worth it for them to pay as much as $75.00 per book and then sell the book. 

By the way, people can enter want criteria on the different fixed-price sites, so when the Applewood editions come up for sale at reasonable prices, the books are probably sold within an hour or so of when the book is listed.  This is why the average buyer will never see any books available other than the expensive ones. 

The Applewood situation has been caused by book hoarding.   It doesn't have to be just one person doing it; an entire group of people can collectively be responsible.  I believe that the books will retain their artificial value for a number of years, but ultimately, the value will fall again to normal levels.  Many parents bought the books for their children, and after the children grow up and move away from home, many of the books will be sold.  This is when more examples will surface, and the books will fall again in value.