OT: Coin collectors buying holders, not coins
 

Thought this article was interesting, and how it juxtaposes our hobby. I think many advanced collectors are turned off by “off-brand" TPGs.

https://www.coinworld.com/news/us-co...-the-coin.html

I dabble a little in coins and on the modern ones that are really just bullion there is a bewildering variety of "flips" some of which seem to command a premium.

I understand this to a degree, I only collect 1887 coins in old NGC holders (no prongs). I feel they display better this way, i.e. a consistent look. I'm glad I completed my run recently as the old holders are becoming fewer and far between. When I began collecting them ~15years ago it seemed half the graded coins were in NGC holder but now perhaps only 1 in 20 graded coins are found in the old style NGC holder/case/flip.

Not too surprising, and there are some threads that pop up from time to time about ISA, ASA, SCD, and PSA "SAMPLE" slabs as well. There are SGC purists that only want the green labels, while PSA has adherents that normally want the most current slab/flip combo, and at least one who loves the old dot matrix/rounded corner flip combo.
I paid $15 for a 2001 UD Tiger Woods in a PSA SAMPLE slab, that I probably wouldn't have bought if it was a PSA 10. The allure was in getting a sample slab into my collection.

Did anyone even read the article??? I used to try to collect the different slabs of the tpgrading companies that came and went...it's like a history of tpging. I still think it's a cool idea!!!

Like Pete, I had an idea years ago of collecting an example each of a slab from the many different grading companies other than PSA, SGC, Beckett and GAI. I have a list of 60 different companies that I saw images of on eBay during that time. I did end up picking up a few 80's rookies in some of the third rate grading slabs but didn't want to spend any more money of them after that. I just wanted to have a little of the history of the grading companies and thought it would be neat to have an example from as many different ones as I could get. I just couldn't believe how many different companies were out there.