Comics multi-pack memories

Remember these?

For me, the preferred way to buy comics when I was a kid growing up in the 1970s was off a spinner rack, where you could browse through titles and pick out the individual comics you wanted.

But sometimes, I'd need a comics fix, and the only thing available at a convenience or grocery story were these things: Three comics bundled in a sealed plastic bag. And you could only easily make out what the top comic was.

Sometimes, you could managed to manipulate the comics without damaging the bag and peek at the bottom two comics, but it was always a bit of a gamble.

And that was part of the fun.

Sometimes you'd end up with stuff you just didn't like (or, worse yet, already had). But sometimes you'd get exposed to new titles, writers and artists that you did like.

Though I'm not sure, and didn't have a clue or theory about it when I was a kid, I figure this was a way for the publishers to unload overstock.

Possibly, they chose the "top-featured" comic as a sort of loss leader for lesser-selling titles hidden below.

In any event, I sort of miss them, as I do the entire era when comics were everywhere and nearly every kid read them.

Share your memories, if you got 'em, in the comments below!



4 comments:

  1. LOVED LOVED LOVED multi-packs.

    In my day, they were almost always coverless. Opening the bag at home was very exciting & often produced some sweet surprises. Didn't even mind getting the occasional Sad Sack or Richie Rich as the "unknown" middle comic.

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  2. In my day, there were four books in the "Comicpac" for 47 cents! My recollection is that the comics were pretty current. The Comicpac was a DC product and you can see an image of the 47 cent version on Dial B for Blog #510. CC

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  3. I used to love buying these. The DC books were usually Whitman reprints (which kinda confused poor young me), but I found all sorts of cool stuff in these multipacks.

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  4. The first multi-packs I encountered were Marvel packs with four comics in them - that were around a year old. This would be around 1971. . . I recall getting the Avengers # 89, X-Men # 64 (Sunfire issue) and a Hulk comic with The Leader as the villian. Classics Illustrated Junior were sold this way, and DC had them, and later on, Whitman had Gold Keys -- some of the last Gold Key/Whitman comics were apparently sold exclusively in multi-bags. . . one dealer at a comics show I attended last weekend had one of these Whitman Donald Duck comics going for $ 150 -- too rich for my blood! But I loved the multi-packs and obsessed over finding a regular source of them.

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