Posted By:
Jon CanfieldNo problem - glad to be of help. As for the question regarding opened vs. unopened - the price of $50.00 on the website was meant for an opened pack dating to the correct year (1896). However, the pack offered for sale is not the correct year for cards (and I don't believe to even be the correct style for the cards). As such, I would apply the $50 value to that pack as well. (To be honest, the range would probably be somewhere in the $50-$100 range for the unopened pack on eBay, depending on the day the item was sold and who was bidding.) I admit that this was not clear at all in my initial post.
That being said, assuming for the moment that this unopened pack on eBay was correct in all aspects and may possibly contain a card - then my guess as to value would be somewhere in the $200-$300 range. The value of unopened cigarette/tobacco packs dating to the correct year of card issues is all relative to the popularity and scarcity of the cards that they may contain. While an unopened Mayo Cut Plug pack dating to 1896 may be very interesting, the die cut cards are not all that valuable and certainly not widely collected. Therefore, the value of the pack, itself, will not be that great (however keeping in mind that the unopened pack would still be worth nearly 6 times what an opened one would be by my estimations.)
Now, let’s say we found an unopened lunch pail from 1895 dating the pail to the N300 series… that would be a truly amazing discovery and worth possibly 5 figures. I know you mentioned seeing one in your original post but I have to admit, I’ve never seen or heard of an unopened Mayo lunch pail from any year existing albeit new discoveries are made daily!
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