As anyone who’s been collecting anything for more than a month knows, the condition of a collectible significantly impacts its secondary market value.  As anyone in the habit of buying collectibles in online auction, or via online retailers knows, a lot of what gets advertised as "mint condition" isn’t mint condition at all when it arrives at your door. Mind you, we’re not talking about product damaged in shipping, we’re talking about product being purveyed by sellers who either don’t know the difference between a "C-9" condition item and Shinola — or worse — a seller that does know the difference but is misrepresenting the condition in order to garner a higher price. Does this happen all the time?  No.  Many online sellers of collectibles are very knowledgeable about the product they’re dealing in, and most are scrupulous.  But, it has happened often enough to become a problem that screamed for a solution. Well, there is a solution. On the periphery of the action figure hobby marketplace is a grading service that’s time has come.  It’s clear that its time has come because it’s becoming more and more of a presence in the marketplace, and more and more relied upon by collectors wanting to value their collectibles and collections; a service for collectors who are willing to pay a little money for a lot of peace of mind. 

    AFA Grading has been offered as a service to toy, doll, vehicle and playset collectors since 2000.  "We provide a grading service for collectors which enables them to value their collection, and also guarantees that what they’re buying online, for all intents and purposes sight-unseen, is as advertised," said Chad Thompson of AFA Grading.  "We evaluate action figures, dolls, vehicles, and playsets that collectors send us. We examine them, grade them with respect to condition, and fabricate acrylic cases for them that protect them and enhance their display," said Thompson.  

     "The grading service is necessary because we all know that eBay is one of the greatest marketing tools out there, but there really hasn’t been a way to guarantee the condition of a collectible based on the online description," said Thompson.  "Something designated ‘C-9’ could arrive at your house half crushed, with box tears, creases and punctures.  Our grading service provides a guarantee that something you’re buying is indeed in the kind of shape you’re anticipating receiving.  It offers peace of mind if you will, or we hope so anyway."  

So how does it all work?  Suppose you have a collectible or collection you want graded?  How do you start?

     "We’ve got an online submission form which is user-friendly," said Thompson. "It walks you through filling out the form, helps you calculate shipping, and insurance.  You complete it and print it out, and then put it in the box with your collectible.  You also get a description of exactly how to pack your item for shipment so that it gets to us in the same condition as it was when it left your hands."  Those without online access or a printer can call AFA and they will be shipped a copy of the form.  We can also walk customers through the process on the phone if they’re more comfortable doing it that way.  

   

     "We get the question all the time — ‘Can I just send you one piece and have it graded?’  The answer to that is yes," said Thompson.  "In fact, you can send us one piece or a thousand pieces.  That being said, we have different prices for volume breaks.  The more you send the bigger a discount you get on the overall service."  

     Pricing at AFA is broken down into two categories, modern and vintage.  "We see modern as anything 1990 or newer, and vintage as pre-1990.  Depending on what fair market value for the item or items happen to be, we then break our service down into four tiers, Standard, Express, Premium, and Archival.  The standard tier is our slower tier, which means we offer a 30 to 40 day turnaround, for grading on items with a fair market value under two hundred dollars.  Our express tier offers a 10 to 15 day turnaround on items with a fair market value between two hundred and four hundred dollars.  Our premium tier offers a 4 to 6 business day turnaround on items valued at less than one thousand but more than four hundred dollars. We also have our walk-through service, or archival tier, which offers our fastest turnaround on grading for items with a fair market value between one thousand and twenty-five thousand dollars," said Thompson.

     Customers can use any of the faster service tiers on any size order.  "Even if you have just one item, with a fair market value of $10, you could use the fastest, walk-through archival service if you wanted to do it that way.  But the reason we have the different tiers of service is to accommodate varying needs and expense accounts," said Thompson.

     From the get-go, customers will have to come to some understanding of their item’s "fair market value," in other words, what is its average sales price on the secondary market.  To ascertain secondary market value for an item, collectors can resort to long-established toy price guides, like the one in this magazine, and there are certainly others available.  Thompson suggests the Internet as a pricing resource.  "We generally tell our customers to check eBay," he said.  It’s important to note here that if you’re going to use eBay or any other Internet auction site to obtain a quick and dirty estimate on secondary market prices, you’ll want to look at "completed sales/auction" figures, not asking prices, or "buy it now" prices.  Completed sales figures give you information on what was actually paid for the item by end of auction, not simply what the seller hoped to get for it.  What a seller hopes to get for any given item online could be anywhere on the vast map of hopes, dreams, and wishes, from way too low (due to inexperience or high motivation to sell) or way too high (due to inexperience or greed).  So, always take the "completed sales" figures and average them to determine fair market value.

     More and more online, collectors are seeing items in auction and for sale via online retailers, that are "AFA graded," and they’re being sold and purchased at a premium over non-graded items.  We asked Thompson to speak to that.  "I think the reason AFA-graded items draw higher sales is that it allows the buyer to have some piece of mind with respect to grading — they know at the outset what condition it’s going to be in.  Say, if I were to buy an AFA-graded item rated ‘85’ I know exactly what condition it’s in," said Thompson.  "What we see as typical grades from factory sealed cases we’re calling ‘85’.  On any modern era item we consider an ’85 grading as ‘case fresh’.  On vintage items we give it a little more lea-way, grading what we see as case fresh at ’80’," said Thompson.  How do these grades compare to the traditional "C-ratings" given to action figures and die-cast since 1990?  "We consider a ‘C-9’ rating as equating to an ‘85’ on modern or an 80 to 85 on vintage," said Thompson.  

   

    











"Our Collectible Grading Authority is our mother company.  Action Figure Authority, Collectible Doll Authority, and Die-Cast Authority are all divisions of CGA," said Thompson.  "In AFA we grade carded and loose action figures, opened 3.75" and 12" figures, sealed vehicles, and playsets.  We do not grade loose vehicles and playsets yet.  Under die-cast we only grade sealed items right now.  We’re looking to grade loose Hot Wheels in the future, but we don’t offer that yet.  With dolls it’s the same, we’re just doing factory sealed packaging grading," said Thompson. 

     To learn more about AFA, visit the company's web site at http://www.toygrader.com/