We've had many discussions about this over the years. Some collectors have found red to be the hardest, but everyone has a different experience. I've also collected the master set and green was a bit tougher for me. Even with a few of us accumulating a hundred and fifty to two hundred cards over the years, it's hard to do a study with a large enough sample size. Many of the same cards have been recycled into different collections.
I believe the the "Old Puts" (and the Black Swamp find) show that it's likely certain colors could be more difficult to find.
If only red (and a small smattering of blue) were included (given out) with that product, it's very likely that other colors were exclusive to one product. Or that, for example, red E98s were included with Old Put Cigars and 4 or 5 other products.
If it was a retailer who stamped the Old Put E98s, he probably chose the red background cards from a salesman. The Black Swamp find was mostly red, but it shows that whomever was selling those cards did have different colors with them.
If this is true that each color might be exclusive to a certain product, then the popularity of the product might determine how many survived. It seems likely that the same number of each were printed, but how many were actually purchased by retailers or shops and how many customers purchased them as a premium?
E98s might not be candy cards. There's really no proof, except for what appear to be orange stains on some of the cards. (By the way, I've seen more stains on green and orange cards) "Old Put" stamps seem to be something closer to proof that they're not candy cards, but again the cards were probably used to support different products. The Black Swamp find story mentioned that the family owned a meat market, not a candy store or cigar shop.
E98s are more common then E94s as we know. I would assume that E98 was a broader scheme that was fairly successful regionally and that E94 followed, but was on more of a local level.
E94s appear in my experience to show a much more unbalanced survival rate between the different colors.
Rob
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