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Who will be the buyer of our vintage cards in 20 years?
I have followed the boards for quite some time and this is my very first post. I find the boards to be informative, funny and full of varying opinions. Everyone has their biases and such is life. I have been a vintage collector for over 30 years(one of every Hall of Fame member as nice as I could find it since I started in 1976) and left investment banking to open a collectibles shop in New Jersey over 18 years ago. I always wanted my own business and why not enjoy going to it every day?
The past year was extremely rough and the majority of the kids have left the hobby for other diversions.( I used to actually have a club in the store with over 300 kids as members.) Today, when a child enters the store and sees an Al Kaline card he asks his dad, who's alkaline? With all the negative press in baseball and very few clean heroes beyond the likes of Derek Jeter, who or what will actually inspire these kids to collect the greats of the game beyond the obvious Ruth, Cobb, Gehrig, Mantle , etc.. Granted, you will always get the kid who loves the vintage and will collect it all, but baseball has changed forever and is very different from the days of "us" baby boomers. Baseball was pure and passionate when we were kids, or at least seemed so(I named my dog Gibby after Bob Gibson) and the extension to collect vintage material was a natural when we reached adulthood and wanted to continue our quests and obsessions with the national pastime. I do not see this in today's kids, not one bit (to many diversions, video games, technology, etc.), and I wonder, "who will buy our cards" in 20-25 years. After all, they are the buyers of all of our memorabilia/cards/etc. in the future. As previously stated, the best will always sell, along with the greats of the game, but what about the rest? Personally, my collection will be handed down to my son to do as he chooses. But what about those who would like to sell? I see first hand the apathy towards cards and collecting with today's kids. I try to explain the history but most just don't seem to care. Where does this hobby/business stand in 20 years, will these kids have half the passion to collect like we do? |
Couldn't this question be asked about most collectibles? Coins?
I think there will always be buyers.....but I also scratch my heads at the REAtype values some cards bring today. If I were a buyer at such levels, the question you ask would keep me up at night. |
Not a problem for some buyers
My guess is the REA type buyers in general are not all that concerned about the future value of their collections. Their cards do not constitute a major portion of their overall net worth. For those of us who have collections more valuable than our homes and our 401k's this is a greater concern.
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BBeck, where is your store
I was from Jersey until I moved to Dallas in 1990 to work for Beckett Publications and yes, that is something I thought/think about often.
Yet, when I read boards such as the Beckett message boards, most of the posters are in their 20-30's so there is a future generation that will, I believe move to vintage. And I would not be surprised if that move happens in the next two years. Regards Rich |
The Rub...
The rub here is classifying the best from the rest. I agree, that rare to scarce stuff will always have decent demand, but a 57 Al Kaline probably will come down in value over time. I still think it will have its place, but probably worth some percentage less. When I think of what a 57 Al Kaline may be worth, I don't think it will matter if is goes down 20-35% as the dollar amount will be relatively small. I think we have already witnessed this to some degree as I remember a Nolan Ryan rookie being worth more 10 years ago than it is today and so on.... I think Pre-war may have the sticking power, but post war will slide. Then of course the 80's and up never had its place with exception to unique insert type cards that may be scarce.
2 cents... |
I'm one of those guys in his 30s that has just started in the last few years to move to pre-war. I still collect 50s and 60s also. Have just about everything from the 70s and 80s.
It will be very interesting to see what collecting will look like in 20 years. Who would have thought 20 years ago that the internet would have changed collecting like it has. Stores and card shows are just about gone. For my sake I hope the bottom falls out and I can pick up T206 HOFs for a buck. :D |
I think we'll see a continued decline of most cards from the 1950s+ as in addition to fans of baseball history (who should always exist), those cards are currently collected by those who saw those players play in their youth. As that generation dies out, that demand will go with them and we'll be left with just the folks who collect across all eras. The pre-war market for the most part shouldn't suffer any such drop-off as there's no reason 20 years from now people will be less interested in Ty Cobb or Christy Mathewson then they are today. That's not to say it's a guarantee, but I see a strong reason to expect a fall in the 1950s stuff and no such reason for the earlier stuff; if anything, as people from the baseball card boom of the late 80s and 90s become wealthier, there should be a rise in the pre-war market as more will be able to get in.
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Detroit fans and set builders will care about Al Kaline, and HOF collectors. Post war has taken a pretty big hit in price over the last few years and could continue to slide but will always have spikes. When Nolan Ryan and other greats pass away they will have an immediate spike in price and then slowly come back down. Look at what happened when Ted Williams died, his cards shot way up and now they have dropped way way down in price, but over the past year his rookie is increasing in value. There will always be a buyer for whatever cards you may have, just maybe not for the price you were hoping for. I don't see prewar dropping in price anytime soon, if anything will keep rising as more and more collectors 25 and older get into it and have the income to support it. In a day and age of hundreds of channels to surf, the internet, and laptop cellphones, holding a piece of America's Pastime history is very peacful and entertaining in these fast times we live in.
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"...holding a piece of America's Pastime history is very peaceful and entertaining in these fast times we live in."
Couldn't say it better. |
Who will be the buyer of our vintage cards in 20 years?
Me. :D
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Hi Bob- nice to see you on the board, and hope you are well.
You said what I have been saying for a long time. The hobby is changing, the world is changing, and there will surely be a different landscape twenty years from now. My guess is there will always be collectors of vintage antiquities of all kinds, but there may in fact be less baseball card collectors than we have today. We baby boomers collected cards as a kid, and it was a rite of passage. That no longer exists today. A great many 8-12 year olds never even bought a single pack of cards in their lives, so when they become adults they will have a different perspective on collecting them. Yes, it will change, not necessarily for better or worse, but different for sure. The issue I have is that everything in the world changes too quickly. Look at technology, everything becomes obsolete in a year or two. I can't keep up with that, and really have no interest in doing so. So my point is we should expect things to change. |
To quote T206 Collector:
Me :D I'm 43 and plan on being around at least another 20 years. I figure collecting will continue to dip given the current economy and then there will be a resurgence with more collectors. I just plan on riding the wave. |
Vintage Collectors
Hey Bob,
Interesting topic. I think there will always be vintage collectors. I was thinking the same thing as you and Barry S. a while back while ruminating about some of my vintage cards. My 9 year old daughter started watching me and looking at the various vintage cards laid on the table in front of me and she actually discovered that you could connect the miscut cards and assemble them like a jig saw puzzle to determine the order of the printing sheet. I had never thought of this until she pointed it out. She started asking questions about the various players and we a number of fun evening discussing old players from the deadball era. The key was not pushing her - but let her take the questions where her interests lay. Zach |
Good vintage will always have devotees but where the line is drawn between classic and crap in the future is unpredictable. I think enough people collect cards older than they are now and will continue to do so in the future that good stuff will always be chased. I don't think you need to have been a card collector as a kid to collect now but you probably needed to be a baseball fan. And baseball is booming, football even more so and even with the economy in shambles.
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It's
a very sobering thought. Kids today do not need a photographic image on cardboard to remember their heroes like the good old days. With one click they can look up an image, and even print out a picture themselves if they need to. Come to think of it, many of them don't idolize these players. With all the scandals (Woods, McGwire) for the whole world to see this cannot be good for the sports collectibles industry. In short, technology has killed cardboard collecting for most youngsters.
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I'm counting on advances in medical science keeping current adult collectors alive for more than 20 years.
Buy only generic meds so you can afford my cards. |
welcome and
First of all, welcome to the board, Bob.
I like the answer of "who is going to buy our cards in 20 yrs?" as being "me", the best. That being said I believe like the rest of the folks have said, it will be the people that migrate backwards from today's cards as well as those people that like the game, are collectors by habit, and start to have more disposable income as they mature. It's certainly true that kids today have a ton more options for stimuli :) available to them, than us baby boomers did. I still get a kick out of all the excitement which that recently shown 1937 Kendall Gas game of baseball players advertised, by only collecting the stamps!! It's classic. best regards |
Not to take the purity out of it...
...but I started collecting baseball cards with force when I was 13 in 1987 because I learned that they had monetary value. Opening packs was a legal form of playing the lottery for a teenager. Plus it kept me up to speed on the players I was watching on TV.
The value inherent in these old pieces of cardboard is a lot of the reason why they will continue to attract attention. In other words, it was never about capturing a picture of my idol on cardboard. And since at least the 1980s any kids putting down cash for cards have been doing it with an eye on the potential value. I expect that trend to continue with the vintage stuff for at least another generation or so. |
I'll be buying your cards in 20 years!
But the question for me is who will buy mine? I worry less about the stars and HOFers, and more about whether the accumulation of my other tastes and interests will be desired in the future by anyone other than me!
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JLange stated:
"But the question for me is who will buy mine?" I can't resist a line like this so my response is what do you have? |
Baseball has attractions that will win over future generations. As for the worry that people who recall certain old players will die off and never buy their cards, I think that this has been belied by the continuing interest in pre-war cards. We don't need to have seen a player to learn about him and admire his work. All we need is access to records, books, cards, and film.
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in values. |
People like myself will be buying your cards. I'm a 27-year-old professional who has been collecting for almost 20 years. My dad bought me my first pack when I was 8 (ah, the 1991 Topps Frank Thomas) and it quickly became a hobby that brought us closer together. He collected as a youth in the 50s and 60s (one of those unfortunates whose mothers tossed their collections) and enjoyed re-living a part of his youth with me. As I've gotten older and could afford it, I've moved into collecting higher-end items (Cobb, Ruth, an e95 set I'm slowly trying to build, etc.). As my earnings, presumably, continue to increase, the scope and depth of collection will increase and, hopefully, I will be able to enjoy the same type of bond with my son (should I have one) that my father and I had. I'm sure there are people out there with situations similar to mine who will end up the same way and probably own your cards someday.
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According to the U.S. census there are currently 310 million Americans. It it expected to reach 439 million by 2050. From a pure numbers standpoint, I just don't see how their could possibly be fewer card collectors in 20+ years. It's a simplistic view, but to me it sums-up the reality of the situation.
Lovely Day... |
Like Jason, I am a younger vintage collector (28 yrs old) and I plan on doing so for as long as I can. I wish I knew more collectors around my age near where I live...
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20 years
Welcome aboard, Bob.
In 20 years, some of us will be happy to be buying cards, at our advanced ages! best, barry |
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Easy one. I'm taking the cards with me, and I'm going into an unmarked grave. Too many years reading this forum to take foolish chances...
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And there is a parallel question to this
Namely; in 20 years will we as a society even be interested in "stuff":
I use book replacements such as "kindle" and "nook" or IPods which have replaced old records, etc. as examples Regards Rich |
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I still try to buy CD's and not just get downloads unless there is no CD release or if I'm trying to get one rare track without paying for a full album. |
Here's an example about one area of collecting that has done poorly in recent years. As some of you know I collect rare baseball books, and when I wrote my article in 1995 in issue #3 of VCBC, baseball books were a hot collectible. Today, fifteen years later, many rare baseball books can be bought for 50-75% of their 1995 levels! Not only has there been no price appreciation in nearly a generation, but prices have actually come down.
Why? Because there are less serious book collectors today than there were then. When the big collectors sold their collections, there was nobody to take their place. I can recall buying a very nice copy of Peverelly's 1866 America's Pastime in the early 1990's from a private collector for $3100, selling it some years later, and then buying the exact same copy a couple of years ago from a major auction house for $1675! Today it might even be worth less than that. Now the baseball card market is deeper than the book market, and it is likely that the same thing won't happen with cards. But it goes to show that if the pool of collectors got smaller, it would have a major impact. |
Who will be the buyer of our vintage cards in 20 years
I really do not think things are starting to change more now than say five years ago, my perspective is that you will have less and less kids coming into the hobby. What I do feel is many will start collecting later in life such as most of us do now. I started collecting vintage items because I did not know much about it, so later in life I kept getting more interested and learning more which as kept me going. The crazy thing is I still feel that way and will continue in the years to come. The best thing we can do is at least introduce our kids to hobbies and let them decide on their own what they would like to collect, and hopefully someday they can get the same pleasure we all enjoy today.
Jimmy |
maybe...
My 3 year old daughter was watching me put a bunch of 50's and 60's cards in 9 pocket pages the other night. I mean watching intently. I can't say she understands baseball or my interest in cards yet, but she loves to sort stuff into containers of every kind (pots, bags, ziplocks, boxes, etc.). I think I saw a glimmer of interest in her eyes as she watched me sorting those cards. Maybe she'll be one of the people buying cards when she grows up.
Or not... who knows? :) |
"The one constant through all the years, Ray, has been baseball. America is ruled by it like an army of steamrollers. It has been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt and erased again. But baseball has marked the time. This field, this game, is a part of our past, Ray. It reminds us of all that once was good, and that could be again. Oh, people will come, Ray. People will come most definitely come."
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What fueled the early hobby boom in the late 1970's more than anything was nostalgia. Kids who collected cards avidly in the 1950's and 60's were now adults earning a good living, and the prospect of reacquiring childhood baseball cards was irresistible. Now that will certainly be missing from the next generation of collectors, as virtually none of them will have those memories.
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Who will be the buyer of our vintage cards in 20 years?
This is a great question.
The correct answer is: Not individuals, but GROUPS! That's right. Conglomerates, Associations, Cabals, Corporations, Organizations, Syndicates. But they won't be looking to buy every card. No, no. Only the elite. The chosen. The select few on their tough want list. The rest, they will look down and spit upon. Aah, just kidding. I'd guess that in 20 years, the average collector will look much like he does today. We have plenty of young collectors on this board. And if you go to The National, you see lots of young collectors in attendance. (Albeit, you also see many older collectors who look like they're one more Prime Rib dinner away from a coronary, myself included.) I think there is a collecting gene in some people. If you have it, you're going to collect something, cards, coins, stamps, toys, antiques, etc. I don't think that will change. Besides, most of us have gone through periods where we took time off from collecting. I collected as a kid. Stopped from age 15-30, and then started up again 20+ years ago. I don't think I can look at my 20 year old son and know if he'll collect when he's 40. |
Who will be the buyer of our vintage cards in 20 years?
I predict, that as the baby boomer generation retires and ages gracefully, all organized hobbies will experience a prolonged growth period. While I have collected baseball cards for 36 years, I've had little time to enjoy other aspects of the hobby. In two years I hope to retire and enjoy this hobby to the fullest. I can't wait. Also, I plan on living much longer than 20 more years and collecting cards will help me do that.
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Jim- in the sense that there will always be someone collecting baseball cards at any point in time, then I would agree that it will be no different twenty years from now. But some aspects of the hobby will likely be very different, and it may be something we can't even predict right now. Perhaps the lower grade pedestrian material will languish and be out of favor, while the rarer and better quality material will become so valuable that it will be out of reach of 99% of collectors. Nobody knows for sure, but things change so quickly these days that I have to anticipate in some way it will be a different landscape.
Perhaps somebody will invent a baseball card so realistic, and so technologically sophisticated, that it will collect us. Maybe robotic baseball cards will enslave the human race and keep them hermetically sealed in lucite and mylar. You never know.;) |
Why not throw a survey up asking the ages of Net54 visitors/users? Do a second survey of how long each person has been collecting vintage material.
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Who will be the buyer of our vintage cards in 20 years?
Barry,
I'm enjoying this discussion. It's fun to speculate about the future. The past 30 years of growth in the prices of vintage baseball cards in unimaginable. Had I only known, I would be a rich man today. It's continued through ups and downs in the economy with hardly a blip. it seems impossible that it can continue, but I think it will. How, I don't know, but it will. Now for those pedestrian material, in time they have lost most if not all of their value. For guys like me it was th best thing to happen. I love all of the improved printing techniques of the 1990s and I enjoy now going to weekend mall shows routing through boxes of cards to find cards that previously sold for fifty dollars languishing in a dollar box. It doesn't get any better than this. Yes, as time goes on I'll spend less on vintage and more on modern, but someone else will come along to fill that void. One threat to our hobby is people loosing interest in the sport of baseball. As long as baseball is our national pastime, many will study the history of the game and collect and invest in cards. |
As a younger collector also (27), I have always had a interest in baseball, I played for 13 years and after I no longer played I started to collect vintage baseball cards because of the look of the cards and the history to keep me connected to baseball. I always have enjoyed history and with vintage baseball cards it is way to connect to that time period for me to actual have something from that era. I hope future generations will always be able to make some kind of connection to history in general.
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Fetamore- first off, welcome to the board. Looks like you made your first post on this thread. I agree that cards have appreciated at an enormous rate since the boom began thirty years ago. But I don't think they will continue to appreciate at that rate anymore, with the possible exception of great rarities, and exceptionally high grade cards. I'm willing to bet that a T206 common with two creases in it may not be all that much more expensive twenty years from now than it is today. Somewhat more, perhaps, but not greatly so. But an E94 Wagner in near pristine condition may be a million dollars one day, who knows. Now that the hobby has matured it will start to resemble the coin and stamp trade, where great pieces are still in high demand, but the ones you see every day selling for about the same as they did ten years ago. Again, these are just educated guesses.
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I've enjoyed reading this discussion -- it's certainly an interesting question, and while baseball card collecting has certainly seen a decline in popularity recently, I think it'll always be around. Sure, childhood pastimes are changing and kids are now occupied with video games and Disney indoctrination, but a drive through springtime suburbia will reveal plenty of wiffleball games. My sister babysits the kid across the street from us (he's six years old, I think) and whenever she's there he likes to show her his most recent baseball card acquisitions and flip through his binder. The hobby might be a bit unhealthy, but I don't think it's dying.
I do think that the vintage baseball cards collected by most of the people on this forum are a whole different ballgame than modern cards (pun intended). The people willing to spend thousands on old cardboard is incredibly small to begin with, and that small group might become smaller -- but it only takes two people with money to drive the price of something up into the stratosphere in any given auction. I'm only 20, so I certainly plan to be buying things twenty, thirty, forty years from now, and I'm sure there will be others like me. Most importantly, there will always be a market for things of aesthetic value and historical relevance, and vintage baseball cards represent both of those things. With any luck, though, the market will collapse and I'll be able to snag a PSA 7 Cobb Bat Off for a couple hundred bucks ;) |
Barry-nice to hear from you also. I have thought about this question for a few years now. My store is still relatively solid but I slowly see the handwriting on the wall. My customer base is now 80% adults and 20% kids. 5-10 years ago the percentages were the exact opposite. I have always dealt heavily in vintage because that is what I love but have always had a nice selection of the current era. As you stated, everything is changing and I can witness it first hand in the store. Their will always be collectors of coins, cards etc.. and I am not really referring quite as much to the 25-35 age group (they grew up with a more positive collecting atmosphere) as I am sure they will pick up some of the slack. I am in my 40's(the later half) and will always collect as long as I am capable of doing so. I am really referring to the 10-20 year old age group, who are growing up with virtually no interest in cards plus a tainted era of baseball. I do not have a crystal ball and maybe they will gravitate towards collecting vintage cards in their adult years, trends do change, but my gut does not see that happening. With the slow demise of card stores and shows, collecting will become more impersonal through the computer and auction houses, which I personally perceive as another negative. Back in 1976 I purchased my 1933 Goudey Babe Ruth with my dad at my side for $35 at the hotel Roosevelt in NYC. We could not believe we had spent that much on a card and it is memory with my dad I will always cherish. A few weeks back a young boy around age 13 purchased a Ted Williams card (over a t205 Joe Tinker) with his dad at my store and I told them my story. It was a really nice moment that still does happen but it is a true rarity. Again, the best of the best and the true legends will always be collected, I just think it will be tougher for today's kids to overcome their childhood collecting apathy and gulp down all the vintage we have cherished.
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Bob- as you know I met your dad a number of years ago and he and I spent the day talking about his love of the New York Giants. He was a collector too and if I recall correctly he was a big Carl Hubbell fan.
One of your most striking points is the lack of kids who are now coming into your store. That of course would not bode well for the future. |
Kids today are rarely interested in anything not video game related. Not good for the future of traditional collectables.
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I don't think "the tainted era of baseball" will have anything to do with cards. 75 million people went to MLB games in 2009, and how many more went to the cheaper minor league stadiums. I would wager that only a small portion of the baseball following public cares about steroids/PEDs.
I am 33 years old. I am at age where all my friends are having or have had kids. Guess what? All the boys play baseball, all the boys collect cards of today's players. All their dads are teaching them the history of the game. If they stay interested in cards, they'll find the vintage stuff. Concerning what the future holds.... 1. Commons are called commons for a reason. Nice to have but when my friends are over and I pull out my Ruth, Gehrig, Cobb, etc., eyes open wide. Not just my friends, but my father's friends have asked me to bring over vintage stuff. 2. The internet has been a godsend. A. Cheap and easy way to trade and buy. B. Without the internet, we wouldn't be having this discussion C. Opened markets where there wasn't a market before 3. The future A. Big names will always sell B. Rare items will always sell C. High grade will sell D. The internet is the future, no more store fronts E. Shows will continue to happen just not as often F. Card will be viewed as a commodity for today's "older statesmen." Today it's a collection & hobby, tomorrow the commodity will be sold off for retirement, to pay for medical bills, etc. G. Something will come along to replace Ebay as the main sales venture. To add: I am not concerned about going to a store. I would rather sit at home, and compare prices and have something delivered. Search Ebay and use VCP to find what I want and if I don't like the price, wait. This isn't a generational thing any more. This year at Christmas I had 3 people come up to me at family parties saying they did all their shopping online like I do (We talked about it the year before) and they will never go to a store again. PS. I also play video games. |
Barry,
I agree with you. That T206 common with creases will probably not increase in value over time accept for inflation. I venture a guess that 50% of the increase in such cards over the last 30 years was do to inflation. The other 50% was appreciation from increased demand. I must tell you though, one of the things I have gotten from reading this board is an appreciation for these lesser conditioned cards. There is so much to be learned from them and you guys have studied them well. I'm embarrassed to admit that years ago I would throw lesser conditioned cards away, including T and E cards with multiple creases, tares and the like. Dan, My advice to you is when to see a card that you really want, you think it's priced fairly, and you can afford it, buy it. Your young enough and will collect long enough to realize a nice increase in your collections value. I have so many stories over the years of cards that I regret not buying. |
Barry- he was a huge giants fan. Before he passed away he bought Carl Hubbell's 200th win trophy presented by Horace Stoneham and the N.Y. Giants, I have it now. When I had Bobby Thomson in the store as a guest he was in his glory. Barry Halper came that day with Bobby Thomson's high school yearbook for him to sign.
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