The big deal with AFA, was the way that it was set up, Tom invested a huge amount of time and money to set up cloudcity, over the years they gained a large amount of customers, and also contacts of both dealers and ex employees of toy companies, their reputation was built up over years of trading, then they set up AFA, which offered a service that was missing- to thier exhisting client base, to grade items, so that everyone knew exactly what a grade meant, and also to authenticate rare items, as by that time tom had seen more in both quantity and varying quality than most, so he had an opinion on legitimacy that not many others could claim, then he set up cib, to specialise in such high end pieces.
For another company to try and compete, they would need a similar history.
otherwise they are just a 'boxing/framing' company
and what sort of history do the graders have, i would want to know who they were, and how much they knew, could they spot a fake? or know if a certain variation of figure came on a certain cardback? or would they just seal it in a case without question?
