Urulókë wrote:

Fishing for desperate collectors in the USA, I guess.

100% accurate. Although no one should be desperate for this edition IMO.

EmilK wrote:

Edit: Okay, it is now at 265, so this kind of analysis is not really reliable as it can jump at any moment.

In my experience with these sorts of counters, they are rarely accurate in a “live” setting where lots of buying is happening quickly. If it were a situation where you’re checking it over time (several days) or there is not much buying going on and checking every few hours, then perhaps it would be more helpful. But 10 sales (or more) could come in within 10 minutes and they simply aren’t going to have quick, accurate updates that reflect what the current stock is.

Most of the fanatical collectors would have jumped on this right away, so I'd imagine sales will slow down from hereon in. I doubt it will sell out especially quickly, assuming the counter has any bearing on reality. HarperCollins shot themselves in the foot with CoH and S&G by being too greedy. I wonder if they will do it again here (probably not as Tolkien is much more popular these days).

The late Stu wrote:

Most of the fanatical collectors would have jumped on this right away, so I'd imagine sales will slow down from hereon in. I doubt it will sell out especially quickly, assuming the counter has any bearing on reality.

If the current number of sales (still under 300) is accurate, I think this is probably true especially because there just wasn't much new on offer with this set. There were two recent releases very similar. One, with Folio, was higher quality. The other, the simple deluxe boxset was approximately the same quality (some might even prefer the quarterbound imitation leather/cloth, whatever you want to call it, I know there was controversy about the material).

Either way, all 3 of these sets have basically identical contents in slightly different packaging with the exception of the regular deluxe lacking Alan Lee's non-rare signature, give or take 2-5 illustration differences. Each time they just added minor additions (one or two new illustrations, or some new pencil sketches) to say "never been done before!" Buyers happy to pay this set's high price likely already have Folio and you're only capturing the smaller subset that want to be completists or really love the clamshell. Buyers who aren't as eager to pay super high prices for the signature and to say they have a "limited edition" are content with their already-purchased regular deluxes. Price aside (and that is probably a big part of the deterrent), this was just too similar to two other recent releases.

If they had done something different - maybe done a clamshell version of LOTR but as with the previous deluxe Unfinished Tales brought in John Howe and Ted Nasmith to add variety or more illustrations, maybe that would generate more interest. Or maybe an even gaudier 3-volume version of the illustrated-by-the-author edition. I know my favorite illustrated edition is the one with Tolkien's illustrations but the one-volume deluxe is both somewhat unwieldy to read and not the highest quality binding.

Mr. Underhill wrote:

remy wrote:

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The Lord of the Rings Signed Limited to 1000 Edition Harper Collins JRR Tolkien

326850849992

Seller: ixth_legion_vault

(702)

Buy-It-Now:

£1,499.99

First Ebay listing already!

Quite the mark up!

The photo shows the number 1! I think that it explains the price. But not how the guy was able to get their hands on it. They must be the typesetters themselves buying the first book before it left the factory

UPDATE: On the second thought, it's probably the picture with number 1 from the youtube video. They just forgot to mention in the listing that the number on the photo is just for illustration.

Newcomer wrote:

The photo shows the number 1! I think that it explains the price. But not how the guy was able to get their hands on it. They must be the typesetters themselves buying the first book before it left the factory

That is just a (stock) photo from the Harpercollins website. Seller does not yet have book as stated at the end of the description.

Strider wrote:

Trotter wrote:

Disappointed that your YouTube history does not appear to include TolkienGuide videos 😍

That's great. Hope you like the content.

If one doesnt log-in to harper collins and just purchases as a guest, it seems you could order more than one?(note: i have not tried myself and do not necessarily condone doing so. Just an observation)

Foxrook wrote:

If one doesnt log-in to harper collins and just purchases as a guest, it seems you could order more than one?(note: i have not tried myself and do not necessarily condone doing so. Just an observation)

The one-per-person rule is easily and obviously circumvented. HarperCollins just want to sell the books. The ‘one-per-person’ is just marketing to create FOMO.