1914 CJ and 15,000,000

[Archive]

Posted By: Matt

On the bottom of the backs of 1914 Cracker jacks, in discussing the issuing of the cards, it says, this first "issue is of 15,000,000 pictures."

Does anyone have any insight as to what that means?

[Archive]

Posted By: barrysloate

That likely refers to the total number of cards intended to be produced. Whether that number is accurate or not is anyone's guess.

[Archive]

Posted By: Matt

Obviously that was my first thought - but I just can't believe that actually intended on producing 15 Million cards!

Furthermore, do we know of any reason that they wouldn't have finished the run? They were a highly successful company who certainly didn't lack for funds to finish production.

[Archive]

Posted By: Steve Murray

seems like a modest amount and who is to say they didn't print out that many? Just a thought.

[Archive]

Posted By: MVSNYC

doesn't seem like a huge amount to me...

didn't they print close to 300,000,000 T206 cards over the 3 years, according to Scot Reader?

[Archive]

Posted By: Matt

These numbers are difficult to fathom - the entire US population was less then 100,000,000 back then, which would mean, on average, EVERY SINGLE US CITIZEN would have 3 cards if the 300,000,000 number is correct.

Let's look at it differently - how were the cards distributed? How often did people buy CJ/tobacco and what percentage of the population did?

Maybe one way to answer that last question is how much did CJ charge for a box and what was their annual gross income? There should be some way to get at least those numbers.

edited:
It seems CJ charged a nickel a box back then. If they actually produced and expected to sell 150,000,000 cards, that would mean they expected to gross 7.5 Million that year in CJ sales.

[Archive]

Posted By: Chris

I am sure Cracker Jack sold quite a few of those boxes. Same for the tobacco. The numbers don't seem so far fetched to me.

[Archive]

Posted By: Corey R. Shanus

If 10% (a (very) conservative guess) of the population smoked cigarettes around 1910, that equates to about 10 million smokers. If 300,000,000 cards were produced, that's about 30 cards per smoker. The cards were produced over a 2-year-plus period, so that equates to less than 15 cards per year per smoker. Given that there was at least one card per pack and that the average smoker probably went though 15 packs in less than one month, each smoker probably accumulated 15 cards per month. So even taking into account that cards may not have been inserted into packs in the off season and that subjects other than baseball might be in the packs, this analysis still suggests the 300,000,000 figure to be not only realistic but maybe even conservative.

[Archive]

Posted By: Matt

Corey - all packs of cigarettes smoked contained cards?

[Archive]

Posted By: Rob

didn't many of the backs read "10,000,000 pictures"

Rob

[Archive]

Posted By: Corey R. Shanus

Matt,

Don't know, but the point is that even allowing for the fact that packs either did not contain cards or contained cards that were of a subject other than baseball, I still think that there were more than enough smokers to support the distribution of 300,000,000 cards.

[Archive]

Posted By: Jason

Here is what happened:


300,000,000 subjects were intended to be produced, but the printing plate broke for Plank and Wagner got pissed he didnt get more $$$ so he had his card pulled. Ao actually 299,460,000 were produced of which 227,000,590 were either birds, flags, or other depictions and that leaves 72,459,410 actually baseball players. Now given time and consideration of the straggling cowboys that mostly smoked these brands.....65,330,000 were lost to bullet holes, toilet tissue, and victims of unicycle spokes....the left approximately 7,129,410 of which 4,900,000 or so are in circulation today. The other 2,229,410 cards are still left pristinely wrapped and stored away in their original packs waiting for a MR. Mint warehouse discovery left to hapen in 2010.


Jason

edited for spelling

[Archive]

Posted By: Matt

Jason - thank you for your explanation. I can now sleep better at night.

[Archive]

Posted By: Matt

I'm not exactly sure how this factors in, but in the midst of the baseball card craze of the early 90s when CJ included mini baseball cards with their product, they produced only about 70 million cards each year for the 4 years they ran the promotion.

[Archive]

Posted By: Brian

Some 1914's actually have 10,000,000 not the 15,000,000 as listed above. Looks like the high numbers have 15m, and the low numbers have 10m.

[Archive]

Posted By: MVSNYC

even though i mentioned the 300,000,000 number for T206, it is actually a little hard for me to get my head around...i quoted Scot Reader's book (who i have the utmost respect for)...

maybe he can further explain his numbers...?

Best-
MS