Holiday Rack Packs?

[mferronibc]

I have seen a bunch of these Holiday Rack packs pop up on Ebay (the ones that have an image of Santa and Seasons Greetings written on them) anywhere from the early-60s to mid-80s and wondering what anyone's experience with them are. My understanding is they were put together by non-Topps entities second market therefore I assume they are made up of commons and unlikely to have a big hit if opened. That being said, I have seen a few mid-1970s rack packs going on Ebay with Aaron, Clemente and Ryan showing on the front so maybe this assumption is incorrect? Also doesn't look all that well protected in cheap cellophane so I doubt card grades end up super high in general (but better than years in bicycle spokes at least).

Has anyone ever bought these and found something worthwhile?

[Promethius88]

They are crap and still being made today. They go back to the 50's, have low to mid grade cards and they will put some stars in there to make them sell. I have seen "dealers" at shows trying to say how tough it is to get a 60's or early 70's rack. I move on and don't even look at the rest of their stuff as that shows me their general ignorance.

[ALR-bishop]

[ALR-bishop]

http://net54baseball.com/showthread....mas+rack+packs

http://net54baseball.com/showthread....mas+rack+packs

[1952boyntoncollector]

I almost made comment a few days ago about where is they next 'holiday rack pack' discussion going to start again..

we can just cut and paste the answers..

sort of like the NBA discussion about when a home team is up 2-0 in a series of best of 7 is it over for the other team

or for the divisional round in NFL whether a week of rest is better for the division winner versus the wild card team that played a round and isnt stale.

always the same discussion etc

[ALR-bishop]

They come up almost as often as threads complaining about 707, Dean and Yepdog prices

[jchcollins]

Would it be correct to assume that some of these are more badly done than others? The soft, smooth plastic almost like what team bags are made of today that I’ve seen used in some of these creations is not period correct. If real “cello” repacks were made in the late 50’s or early 60’s - wouldn’t it have been with that crinkly kind of plastic from that time period?


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[Balticfox]

Originally Posted by jchcollins

If real “cello” repacks were made in the late 50’s or early 60’s - wouldn’t it have been with that crinkly kind of plastic from that time period?

Yes - which is another of many reasons to believe that these Holiday Rack Packs aren't legitimate vintage period pieces.

[Exhibitman]

I recently sold a legitimate 1978 Topps rack pack. In researching the price to ask, I found dozens of these holiday racks, far more than the number of legitimate racks. That tells me that there is something rotten about these packs. I wouldn't pay any sort of premium for one.

[jchcollins]

No doubt I have said this before in one of the various other threads that always seems to pop up about the Holiday Racks -

But I have the impression this was something that was maybe tinged with legitimacy back in the day, maybe the 1980's - where someone found where this had really been done and there were a smattering of such creations actually from the 1950's or early 60's...

But since they proved so easy to duplicate, the scammer train ran rampant, and now today these are all generally discredited because there is just so much fake / bad product out there, which now dwarfs the numbers of anything legitimate which may have existed once upon a time.

And if that is true, I find the whole story just sad.

PS - the worst of these I've seen was a Youtuber who had what he swears is a "legit" one (from his source that sold the "only" legit ones...) that had a '56 Mantle showing. To be honest if anything was legit, it could have been this one, but I don't know - and it's of course impossible to tell just watching a video. (He didn't open it...) I later saw him trying to sell it, ostensibly just trying to recoup what he was out. I never found out how that story ended.

[ALR-bishop]

I read an article once that purported to tell you how the differentiate the "older' or "original" rack packs from the later ones. It involved the materials,the wrapping and staples used, and the positioning of the Christmas decorations on the wrapping. But you would have needed both versions in hand or have been smarter than I am to tell the differences apart from ebay scans. The older material was supposed to confirm those packs were from the 60s and 70s. But I have never seen any concrete confirmation these thing were actually from or sold in those decades