Quote:
Originally Posted by deweyinthehall
Pretty much. The only thing I might quibble with is the use of the terms "demand" and "collectors". The hobby has created at least some of the demand themselves in the same way the tobacco industry creates "demand" for that next smoke or the gaming industry creates "demand" for that next spin of the wheel or roll of the dice. Like an earlier commenter said, few if any "collectors" were sitting there saying - "what this hobby needs are some hyper expensive offerings and an end to real distribution". Though I have strong personal feelings on this, I really don't mean it prejudicially when I say the people in the market for these $$ things and for the lottery mentality aren't collectors in any sense of the word as it's been used in this hobby. They're investors or, perhaps less kindly, if not more accurately, gamblers. A Venn Diagram would should show some overlap between them and the traditional collector base, but I'm not certain it's significant.
It would be interesting to see what would happen if, after Fanatics takes over and does whatever they're going to do, some company could get the rights to produce a single, comprehensive (say, 800 or so cards) with wide and varied distribution channels, a handful of inserts, a few autos, a few parallels, and a traditional, almost Topps Heritage-like quality - I think there'd be a HUGE market for it.
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I think you're Venn diagram comment is spot on. In earlier times, there was much more overlap between collectors (the majority) and investors/gamblers (the minority). But as $$ have flowed into the hobby, those two circles have separated and now the overlap is much smaller. And if the investors become disillusioned with their returns or distracted by some other shiny object, their money will flow out of the hobby, distressing prices. I think the modern market (and somewhat the high end vintage market) is the most prone to this occurrence. And it's not a matter of if, but rather when.