Category Archives: new features

Announcing the COMC Mailbox service!

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COMC is proud to announce our latest service to help empower collectors: the COMC Mailbox!  Many folks have asked us over the years if they can buy on other sites or participate in a group break and have the items shipped directly to us to make things simpler and to save money.  Additionally, we’ve talked to international customers who have had difficulty buying from American sites due to the expense of tracking packages across borders.  A number of collectors have been interested in a 3rd party verification service for trades and purchases – a neutral service that can film packages being opened and verify contents.  People running group breaks have noted the potential benefit in shipping one large package full of many different participants’ items to a single address rather than mailing out everything individually.  The COMC Mailbox service is designed to serve all of these needs:
- Purchases from other sites
- Group breaks
- Proxy shipments to international customers
- Forum trades
- Many other potential uses

HOW IT WORKS

Have any package shipped to your COMC Mailbox instead of directly to you.  We’ll open the items in your Mailbox on a monthly basis and put them all into one large batch for you with One Week processing, or you can choose to have them opened and processed at any time.  You save money on shipping fees since you don’t have to pay once for the item to be mailed to you and once more to mail it to COMC, and you save on minimum processing charges by bundling multiple small packages together into one consignment batch.

Ship to:
COMC.com Mailbox
c/o [Your Username]
6727 – 185th Ave NE
Redmond, WA 98052
United States

Cost for a Mailbox: Free!
As an introductory rate, we aren’t charging anything for Mailbox creation or maintenance while we ramp up the service.  There’s no extra step for getting started either – your Mailbox is created automatically when we receive something addressed to your COMC Mailbox.  Additionally, we will never charge for un-used / empty Mailboxes.

Processing Service Levels Available: One Week or One Day ($5 minimum on all services)
When we receive a package, we will send you an email notifying you of your Mailbox delivery. You may either wait for us to process your Mailbox items on our standard monthly basis with One Week service (we will open Mailboxes once a month; at that time we will start to process all items in the Mailbox as One Week items) or you may choose to expedite the due date by responding to the email and indicating One Week or One Day processing for all the contents of that Mailbox. There is no additional cost to opening your Mailbox early, however our standard $5 minimums still apply and the items will be subject to all normal processing costs.  To prevent potential errors, users may not split Mailbox items up into different service levels.

Restrictions

  • Requests for One Day processing of Mailbox items must be received by 11:00am PST of the day before you would like your items uploaded (i.e. if you email us at 3:00pm on Tuesday requesting One Day service for your Mailbox items, we will upload your items by the end of the day on Thursday).
  • This service is currently for cards only, no comics or other memorabilia.
  • We will provide a picture of the package contents, and we will count the number of items in the package, but we are not able to identify any items that have not been processed yet.
  • If there appear to be any irregularities with the order, the user will be responsible for contacting COMC promptly; costs to return items to the original shipper or to return items to the account holder unprocessed will be assumed by the COMC account holder.
  • Other processing service levels beyond One Week and One Day are not available for Mailbox items at this time.
  • Graded cards will not incur an additional $5 minimum fee if they are processed at the same time as standard cards, although they will be billed at the regular oversized item processing rate of $2.00/item for One Week or $3.00/item for One Day.
  • International users of the Mailbox service will be responsible for any duties / border-crossing fees associated with any Mailbox items received.
  • Users should be aware of any external deadlines (ebay return deadlines for example) and proactively request an early open date if package contents need to verify contents by a certain time.

We’re excited to be offering this new service to further improve your collecting experience.  Like many of our great features, this one grew organically from the community.  We’d specifically like to thank cocoscards for engaging with us when we were in Edmonton.  We appreciate our users’ feedback, as your input has led to some of the innovations now available on COMC.com.  Keep following us on the blog, Facebook, Twitter, and our new Google+ page!

New “Submit Items” Process

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Greetings, COMC community!

As many of you have noticed, we have a new way to enter your submission information on the COMC website. Some of you have already started using this new Submit Items process, and we hope that you’ve found it easy to use. For those of you who haven’t checked it out yet, we’d like to use this opportunity to tell you more about it and hopefully answer some of your questions.

Q. Why the new process?

A. As COMC continues to grow, we’ve been actively looking for more opportunities for you to submit your items. We’ve added a second office in Canada, increased the number of shows that we attend so you can drop off submissions in person, and, in the very near future, you’ll even be able to submit items to your COMC account at select local card shops. We want submissions to be easy and convenient; increasing the number of submission services and locations is a big part of that.

As we find new ways to get your items into COMC, however, we do want to standardize the process and the paperwork so that we can receive and process all of your items as accurately and efficiently as possible. As we continue to move into comics, memorabilia, and other new-to-COMC types of collectibles, this standardization will become even more important.

This new Submit Items process is designed to be extremely user-friendly, and will be compatible with all of the product lines that we accept. It enables you to easily print Submission Slips with detailed information and barcodes for each item type and service level. Just print and include one with each portion of your order and we’ll take care of the rest.

Q. Any big changes I should know about?

A. The new Submit Items process still asks you to break down your submission by service level (One Month, One Week, etc.).  You’ll also need to separate your submission by item type, for example:

  • Standard Size Trading Cards
  • Oversized Trading Cards
  • Standard Size Gaming Cards
  • Oversized Gaming Cards

After telling us what types of items you’re sending us and what service level you want, you’ll then tell us how many of each item you’re sending us. You can specify whether your quantity is approximate or exact, and you can break larger quantities down into smaller quantities we’re referring to as Groups. For example, if you’re sending us three smaller card boxes inside a larger mailing box, you’ll want to consider each of the smaller boxes as a separate Group, as if you’re sending three boxes of 400 each rather than one box of 1200. (See the video above for a demonstration.)

You’ll get a Submission Slip for each Group/Item Type/Service Level, which you’ll include with each group of items that you submit. When we process your shipment, each Group will be separated into its own batch and given its own transaction number. So if you send in a shipment comprised of both regular and graded cards, it will be processed as two separate transactions instead of one. Please be aware that just like when you combine service levels within a single shipment, each transaction will be subject to its own minimum batch fee – so you’ll want to make sure that you send enough of each item type to meet each minimum.

There are a few other changes as well:

  • New pricing structure for graded and oversized cards
  • More submission location options, including a list of upcoming shows that we’ll be attending, in case you’d like to drop off your items in person and save shipping costs.

Q. Why has the cost of processing Graded Cards increased for One Month service?

We are laying the groundwork for our new drop-off locations.  All of our non-bulk services factor in the cost of shipping the items to us from a drop-off location.  We decided not to offer a different rate for people mailing One Month items to us instead of dropping them off because we want to encourage them to visit a local drop-off location instead.

We expect to have 10-15 permanent drop-off locations spread across the US and Canada by by the end of this year, and we hope to add hundreds more over the next couple years.

Q. I noticed some new service level options. What are these new “Bulk” services?

Many of you have been asking for additional service level choices that don’t quite fall in line with our normal One Month/One Week/One Day options, and we’re pleased to announce some new options:

Bulk Ten Week offers our lowest processing rates for those of you who value economy over speed (some restrictions apply). Bulk Two Week offers a nice sweet spot between our normal One Month and One Week services – affordable and quick. And we even have a Bulk Two Day service if you need it. Please be aware that all Bulk services have a $100 minimum batch fee, and while they may not fit your needs if you only have a few items to send in, we hope you’ll take advantage of these new services for your larger submissions. Here’s the bulk pricing chart:

BULK TEN WEEK

BULK TWO WEEK

BULK TWO DAY
Standard Size Trading or Gaming Cards

20¢ per item *

35¢ per item

$1.50 per item
Oversize Trading or Gaming Cards

50¢ per item

$1.00 per item

$2.00 per item

These are new, additional options.  Our processing fees have not changed for standard size items. 

So that’s the new Submit Items process. You’ll note in the video that the old method is still active, but we’re phasing that out very soon. If you have any additional questions or thoughts about submitting items, please let us know in the comments below. Thanks!

* The following restrictions apply to the Bulk 10 Week service:
- Items must be grouped in lots of 100 or more items from the exact same set.
- No penny sleeves
- No serial numbered items
- No vintage (pre-1980)

You Can’t Spell Comics Without COMC

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Friends, collectors, and citizens of Metropolis – please help us officially welcome comic books to COMC!

Several months ago, as Check Out My Cards became COMC, we launched a Beta program for comics, coins, and other collectibles. It’s been a long time goal of ours to expand our unique consignment model into other areas beyond trading cards, and we are proud to announce that our first group of comics is now live on the site.

Everything that you like about buying and selling cards on COMC will also apply to comics. You’ll still get all of the benefits of the largest and fastest-growing online consignment community, including:

Benefits for buyers:

  • Detailed front & back cover scans of each comic book.
  • The ability to combine multiple orders from multiple sellers into one convenient shipment from our world class shipping department. All comics will be safely shipped with bags and backing boards.
  • The peace of mind of dealing with one established company instead of dealing with auctions and/or unverified vendors.
  • The freedom to make an offer below the asking price.

Benefits for sellers:

  • We do the scanning and listing – all you need to do is set your prices.
  • We handle the packaging and shipping, even to international addresses.
  • Trusted & reliable customer service for you and your customers, during and after every transaction.
  • The option to make your comics also available on Amazon.com, widening your potential customer base by millions.
  • A choice between cashing out your earnings (20% cashout fee) or using your profits to buy other items on the site (no fee!)

Sellers can either ship comics to us or drop them off in person at our secure, climate-controlled Redmond, WA location.
The new Comic Pilot Service has a processing fee of $0.50 per item, and your items will be uploaded to your COMC account within one month.

A few rules for submitting comics:

  • Nothing with explicit content or that has a Parental Advisory label.
  • Nothing with a shipping or address label on it – retail copies only.
  • No graphic novels or trade paperbacks (yet) – single issues only.

Emerald City Comicon

If you’re in the Seattle area and happen to be attending the Emerald City Comicon this weekend, be sure to stop by Booth 1408 and say hello to us. We’d love to tell you more about this new chapter in the COMC saga, as well as get your input about what sort of features you’d like to see in the future.

Vancouver Fan Expo

We will be at the Vancouver Fan Expo April 20-21.  More details to come!

We’re tremendously excited to be joining the comics community, and look forward to working with all the fans and collectors.

Partial Port Sales are here!

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Hello collectors and sellers! Over the past few months we’ve been working hard to introduce and refine new features on the site, many of which have been suggested from COMC users. One of the top items on our “By Request” list is the ability to offer partial port sales, and we’re happy to announce that this feature is now live!

A portfolio sale is when a user sells all of the cards they have listed as “for sale” in their account as a single large transaction, usually at a significant discount. In the past, COMC users have been able to offer port sales through our old Classified Ad feature, but it was an all-or-nothing affair. Until now there hasn’t been an easy way to limit your port sales to individual categories or eras.

Through the Promotion creator, COMC users can now offer port sales that are limited to a particular category, a specific year range, or both. For example, the Port Sales section of our Promotions page currently lists four partial portfolios from user WilliamsCards: 1954-2000 Football, 1936-1956 Baseball, 1957-1970 Baseball, and 1972-2011 Hockey.

pps

Sellers can still offer their entire port for sale if they prefer, but the ability to also define smaller, more specific partial ports will enable them to target collectors of a particular category or era who may not be interested in an entire inventory. Also, while all listed ports will be able to field offers as usual, sellers will now also have the option to include an instant-purchase price.

Promotional Port Sales are now advertised in the Promotions section of the site and are included in the featured Promotions on the main COMC home page. We’ve added some additional port statistics for potential buyers, such as Average Book Value, Average Selling Price, and Highest & Lowest Priced Items. The Promotion approval process is automatic, so no more waiting for your ad to go live! The sales are managed by our system as well, making all

sales instant upon seller approval. In the past, large port sales have slowed down and, in some extreme cases, even stopped the entire site. The ability to now break down large ports into more profitable and manageable partial portfolios will improve everyone’s experience.

We encourage all COMC users to go to the Promotions page and browse some of the new port sales to get an idea of how the new process works. The link to create your own port sale Promotion is in the upper right section of your dashboard’s Manage Inventory page — we’ve tried to make the process as simple and self-explanatory as possible, and we expect to continue to improve it with your help.

We hope you like this new addition to COMC and, as always, we appreciate your feedback.

Canadian Warehouse Open for Submissions

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It’s been a long time coming; with lots of back and forth negotiations, tension-filled days and nights, and plenty of hand wringing and hair pulling included, but finally…

The NHL lockout is over!

With all sides settled on a new long-term Collective Bargaining Agreement, the dust has settled and it’s time to drop the puck! And we at COMC couldn’t be more excited!

As the NHL gets back to work, our Canadian location is ready to accept batches for consignment! Since we’ve just opened and are still getting things finalized, we’re currently only able to offer our One Month service through our Canadian warehouse. For now, One Day and One Week submissions must be submitted directly to our US warehouse.

Please send your shipments to:
COMC Consignment
4311 Canada Way
Burnaby BC  V5G 1J3

For our friends in the Lower Mainland (or anyone willing to make the drive) we’re going to be able to accept your drop-off submissions at our office. This will be done by appointment only, between 10am-4pm, Monday to Friday. Please call 1-800-517-3540 to set up your drop-off time with our office staff. Any shipments that are currently in transit to our P.O. Box will be fine.  We are keeping it until February 28, 2013 to facilitate the transition.

Please note that we won’t be able to ship any purchases from Canada for a few weeks, but we’re hoping to be fully operational mid to late February.  If you have any questions or concerns about a Canadian submission, please contact us by phone or email, and we’ll be happy to answer your questions, as well as address any and all of your concerns.

Holiday Info, Phasing Out Old Site, Canada Opening

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Happy Holidays!  There is a lot of exciting information to share with you regarding the holidays, phasing out our old site, and the opening of our Canadian warehouse!

Holiday Shipping Schedule

In order to get your orders by Christmas, make sure you choose the following shipping options and place your orders by the following corresponding dates:

Priority – order by 11:59 p.m. PST 12/19

Express – order by 1 p.m.  PST 12/21

THIS IS THE LAST 24 HOURS TO ORDER PRIORITY AND GET IT BY CHRISTMAS!  There are still a couple more days to order Express shipping.

Holiday Shipping Special

Now through the end of 2012, order 12 or more items on COMC.com only and receive free shipping! This promotion is not available on CheckOutMyCards.com and is only available on COMC.com in Simplified Shipping Mode, not in Advanced Reselling Mode.

Holiday Customer Service Hours

Customer Service will be closed (phones will be off) for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.

Upcoming Features

There are a number of exciting features currently being developed that will be released very soon: Promotions, Port Sales & Partial Port Sales through the new Promotion mechanisms, and Featured Items.  Just wanted to give you a heads up, but you will hear and see more very soon.

Phasing Out the Old Site

As we are building upon COMC.com, we anticipate many of our upcoming new offerings, such as comics, coins, etc., will prevent us from hosting two compatible websites simultaneously: the old site and the new site.  Already, the old architecture is holding us back.  We need to start migrating off of it, so we can enable things for the future.  Starting January 1, in order to get to the old site you will be required to log in.  Any anonymous user will only see COMC.com.  As replacements become available on COMC.com, we will be removing more and more features from the old site and eventually replace it completely.   More details will be announced.

New Canadian Office

We signed a lease and moved into our new office!  We apologize that website features have been taking longer than expected because we had a very aggressive timeframe for opening the Canadian office, which unfortunately took longer than predicted.  The good news is that business has begun at the new location, and we are able to send and receive payments in Canadian funds.  Over the weekend, the exchange rate was 1-to-1.  So to our Canadian customers, please send your items and Canadian checks/money orders to our new Canadian warehouse!  The only service we are currently supporting at this location is the one month service.  We will announce the address shortly.  In the meantime, please continue sending items to the PO Box:

COMC
PO Box 50062
South Slope RPO
Burnaby BC V5J 5G3

We are thrilled to end 2012 with so much promise for 2013.  Best wishes and Happy New Year.

Cyber Monday – $10 COMC Gift Certificates and More!

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It’s Cyber Monday!  There are five things that make this Cyber Monday great.

  1. COMC Cyber Monday Special – To cap off our “Perfect 10 Weekend” we are giving away $10 gift certificates for COMC.com.  All you have to do is buy $100 of store credit or spend $100 with the new “Pay with Amazon” checkout option, and you will receive a $10 COMC gift certificate!  For every additional $100 you spend after the first $100, we will give you a $5 gift certificate.
  2. Cyber Monday Promotions – It should be easy to find $100 to spend, as Sellers are slashing prices for the final day of our Black Friday Weekend Specials with great Cyber Monday deals!
  3. New Feature Announced – You may have noticed we mentioned something we previously have not offered…Gift Certificates!  We are announcing our new gift certificate feature, which will be released early December in time for the holidays.  In the next week or so, you will be able to buy COMC gift certificates yourself.  More information to come.
  4. Extended Customer Service Hours – Cyber Monday, Customer Service hours will be 7 a.m. – 9 p.m. PST.
  5. New Pay with Amazon – We want to encourage people to use the new Pay with Amazon feature.  It is so easy!  Here are some screen shots of the checkout process below.

Find the card you want, Add to Cart…

Under Payment Options, select “Pay with Amazon”…

Enter your login info for your existing Amazon account…

Make sure you select the correct Shipping and Payment info.  Then review your order and click “Place Order.”

Then you’re done! You can even click “Continue Shopping” to take you back to COMC.com. It’s that simple!

Happy Cyber Monday!  Happy Holidays!

Join Our New Email List to Stay Connected

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One request we’ve had from users is for more and better communication.  One step we are taking to meet that request is with a new email list!

Click here to join our new email list

If you would like to receive vital information from us, please join our email list.  Information will include specials you won’t want to miss and how to use new site features.  We may also use this channel to request feedback as to what you like most about the COMC experience, what features you most anxiously await, and how we can improve.  We will limit this distribution channel to only relevant information that will make your life better.  We hate waste and inefficiency, and that includes email spam.  Please join!

Our first email will announce our Cyber Monday Promotion!  A small hint is it will involve a new feature we are releasing…

It should be exciting!  Please join our email list and stay connected.

10 X the traffic = some site hiccups

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Let’s start with the good news: we are getting TEN TIMES our normal traffic today!

Image

This means we have the necessary traffic to reach our goal of increasing sales by 10 times (as part of the previously announced “Perfect 10 Black Friday Special”).

As for the not so good news, as you may have noticed, there have been some site issues today.  Please know that we are working very hard to resolve them all and expect to be fully up to speed very soon!

Even so, please don’t hesitate to contact our Customer Relations Department if you need help with anything.  You can reach us until midnight tonight at staff@comc.com or by 1-800-517-3540. Here are our Extended Customer Service Hours. Thank you for your patience!

New Referral Program! Black Friday Specials & Canada Update

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Julia & Tim w/ Warren Moon

Hello, Julia Getsch here!  You may remember me as Business Manager and Co-Founder from the early years of CheckOutMyCards.  I am happy to announce that I am back at COMC, as Director of Business Development.  I am here to drive business, launch new offerings, and free up Tim’s time to focus on feature implementation.  I look forward to seeing you in the near future at a card show or here online!  I want to announce our upcoming specials that are unprecedented and unmatched.  We are gearing up for the biggest sale of the year!

Item #10,000,000 & “Perfect 10” Black Friday Special

Today is 10 days from Black Friday, and we are quickly approaching item #10,000,000.  This calls for a “Perfect 10” Black Friday Weekend Special!  What better way than to launch a 10,000,000 Penny Giveaway as a token of our appreciation for our buyers and sellers.  It is our buyers and sellers being a “10” that makes COMC a success. This special will run Black Friday, November 23rd through Cyber Monday, November 26th.

In order to give away 10,000,000 pennies, we are giving 5,000,000 pennies ($50K) in buyer specials and 5,000,000 pennies ($50K) in seller incentives.

Black Friday Weekend – Buyer Incentives

  1. Get Paid to Buy – COMC will pay 10 cents store credit for every item purchased & shipped from COMC.com* on Black Friday only!
  2. Free Shipping – Just order 10+ items from COMC.com* and get Free Shipping, Black Friday through Cyber Monday.
  3. Huge Savings – On top of the COMC incentives, hundreds of sellers will be slashing their prices to bring you extraordinary deals!

* Note: CheckOutMyCards.com and the Advanced Reseller Mode on COMC.com will direct buyers to the specials and promotions that are only available from the default COMC.com Simplified Buying Mode.

Black Friday Weekend – Seller Incentives

  1. Restock for Free – For every item sold with a “Sale Promotion” (see below) from Black Friday through Cyber Monday, we will give you $0.25 of FREE processing!  We will send you a processing voucher that can be used on our One Month, One Week, or One Day services.
  2. New Sale Promotions – We are creating a new Classified Ad type that is called a “Sale.”  Starting Friday, we will let you create a “Black Friday Sale” for FREE.  A Sale is not just a Classified Ad; it will actually adjust your visible asking prices so that people browsing the site will see SALE stickers with your lowered prices.  Sales will be very easy to create, you just specify a base discount percentage, and then we let you customize the discount percentage for any of your items.

We want this Black Friday to be the best one yet!  Our goal is to increase sales by 10 times!  We have launched an extensive online and print ad campaign, including Beckett, Facebook, Google, Bing, and more!  We also want to empower you to help us get the word out with our new “10” Referral Program.

$0.10 -> $10.00 Referral Program

Use the new “Share” command, and we will give you $0.10 store credit for each new visitor you send our way.   If s/he creates an account, we will record you as the referrer.  Once s/he spends $100 on either purchasing items or processing items, we will give you $10.00 store credit!

Achieving a “Perfect 10”

There is a lot to strive for this Black Friday Weekend, summed up in our “Perfect 10” Special.

  • We are approaching item #10,000,000
  • We have 10 days until Black Friday
  • We want everyone to rate this Black Friday Weekend a “Perfect 10”
  • We are launching a 10 Million Penny Giveaway
  • We are giving free shipping for buying 10+ items
  • We are giving buyers 10¢ for each item purchased & shipped on Black Friday
  • We have a goal to increase sales by 10 times
  • We are giving you $0.10 for referring a new visitor
  • We are giving you $10 for referring a $100 user

Mark your calendars for this Black Friday to make history with us.

Canada Update

As we previously announced, we are opening a warehouse in Canada!  This is one of the projects I have been working on since my arrival.  We assembled a great team and found an ideal space from which to launch.  Unfortunately, there have been a few more hoops than initially anticipated in order to secure the space for November.  Due to this and our current focus on Black Friday, we won’t be opening the new Canadian warehouse until December.  Nonetheless, we are still on track to process items received for the Canadian Pilot Special by December 31st.  We received a number of submissions at the Vancouver Fanfest and the Toronto Expo.  We are still receiving submissions for the Canadian Pilot Special – postmarked by December 1st.  You can send these submissions to our temporary PO Box:

COMC
PO Box 50062
South Slope RPO
Burnaby BC V5J 5G3

Shipments must be sent only from Canada and only by Canada Post.