Posted By:
DanWell, I see that nothing has changed since I left for Iraq 8 months ago. I returned last month and took some time off before getting back in to my hobbies and "normal" life. I must say that it saddened me to log back in to the N54 forum and discover that as collectors we are still missing the boat.
First off folks, this "idea" is an idea that can become a reality with or without your support. As with all collectibles, they ultimately are consumed by the people that have disposable income or at least a good portion of disposable income. Many of you fit in to this criteria as you have previously stated that your money for cards and vintage items came from inheritence or something similar; or you simply make a lot of money as a lawyer, doctor, hedge fund specialist, etc. Folks like myself, I happen to be military, do not make a lot of money. I do ok, so I buy and sell what I can to scrape by to put together my particular items of interest in an attempt to corner my small corner of the market. The folks out there with "the cash" would basically just prefer that the market stays with the "collectors" because what they are doing is slowly buying up the entire vintage mass one piece at a time, one auction win, one Ebay sale, etc. The big players are exactly that and whether or not this New York event occurs, everyone had better wake up and realize that one way or the other, the cards will hit the street one day or another. It may be your prized collection today, however, when you pass that on to your children one day... chances are good that your collection will be sold out from under your best desires and wishes.
Secondly, some of you claim to "keep it with the collectors" when in fact I think that it would be accurate to say that you are the ones that have the disposable income and are enjoying some great "buying" years, not necessarily collecting years. Obviously this is not accurate to everyone that says this, but close.
The last thing is; an event such as this will only aid in bringing more collectors in to the realm of things as well as push the vintage sports to an even higher level than it currently is. I say collectors with a sense of it actually being investors, because NO ONE pays that kind of money on a small scrap of paper if it weren't going to at least hold it's value or eventually go up in value. So the argument could be made that ALL of you are an investor as much as you are a collector and some of you are certainly only investors, either way, you are some variant of investor.
Have a great day, take care... and damn does it feel good to be home!