Modern card collecting is very popular. Prospects are what people collect the most now, well invest in i should say. However even the "investors" usually have a player or team that they collect as well. The prospect buy and sell usually is what funds their personal collection pieces.
If you get on the blowout cards board or just look at ebay at modern topps or panini certified autograph card prices then you will see the hobby is alive in kicking and this side of the hobby holds a wide age group. Also a big bonus is I see a lot of parents that are involved with the hobby sharing it with their kids and doing the hobby together. Which is great!
I'm 26 and i mainly dabble in modern cards but my love for the history of baseball brought me to this board and started to get me into vintage cards as well. I think as people around my age learn more about the modern cards they end up looking into the vintage cards and wanting to learn and maybe collect them as well so I would say as long as card collecting on some aspect is happening then people will always end up supporting vintage cards as well.
I think the biggest movement we may see is people getting into vintage football cards instead of baseball due to the popularity of the NFL and modern football cards but who knows.
Between topps, bowman, panini and leaf there are well over 20 baseball products out per year. Same with football and basketball probably has atleast 10 products if not more and people open these by the case not just the box. I actually think the hobby is getting more popular in recent years thanks to things like case breaks. So again I guess to sum it up I think as long as modern card collecting is doing well their will be a steady flow of new vintage collecters as well. Just like most things, you start with the new stuff but you always go back to the roots.
-Adam
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