Major Hobby Developments Over the Past Ten Years

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Posted By: John Spencer

As I was looking at some of my collection a few nights ago, I reflected on some of the major developments and changes in the hobby over the past decade. Here are a few that I felt merited mention and I would love to hear others that people feel should be included:-
1. The explosive growth of graded cards and proliferation of grading companies.
2. The demise of the small "Mom and Pop" card stores.
3. The reduction in the number of local card shows.
4. The rise in power and influence of major auction houses, eg. The House of Mastro.
5. The use of the internet to buy and sell cards.
6. The increase in dubious practices, such as altering of cards, as well as outright fraud, eg. Wigwag.
7. Increase in the number of price guides.
I am sure there are many others, so let's hear 'em.

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Posted By: Bill Stone

I would put Ebay as #1 --it is absolutely amazing the change that it has brought,not only in finding vintage cards, but in making the purchase of cards possible from anywhere in the world.

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Posted By: John S

ebay has also been a major driving force in establishing market values for collectibles. In the past dealers had a much greater influence in determining the market value of items.

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Posted By: Judge Dred (Fred)

Bill,

I believe that is number 5 on John's list but I think you're right, put a name to the internet behemoth and move it up a few notches... #1 doesn't sound unreasonable.

Without ebay I think that card prices would be a little lower and not quite as easiy accessible. It's made your everyday collector a potential dealer and it offers so many opportunities for collectors to fill the gaps in their collections. ebay has also offered opportunists the vehicle to commit fraud and cheat the collecting community (experienced and inexperienced alike). ebay is also a place where a gift is given by an unknowing seller of a rarity. Someone could write an article on this...

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Posted By: barrysloate

This is a bit of a digression but ebay has had a peculiar effect on collectables that vintage cards seem to be immune from. In many collectable fields, ebay has served to saturate the market to such a degree that items once thought to be rare have proven to be rather easy to find, thus decreasing their value tremendously. The demand for N,T, and E cards seems to proceed unabated. But take a look at post-1960's Topps cards, American stamps, or so may other areas where the ebay supply is greater than the demand. I remember collecting stamps as a kid (and again recently for a couple of years) and imagining that I would never have an opportunity to own some of the expensive American classics. Today, you can buy those stamps seven days a week, sometimes even several times a day. As such, prices have actually decreased in these areas. Vintage cards seem to be one area that at least for now is withstanding this trend. Ebay is a strange animal that has vastly altered the market for better and worse.

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Posted By: jP

I agree with Bill that # 5 is gotta be due to Ebay.

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Posted By: cmoking

Barry - I'm not sure if ebay has depressed prices as you have mentioned. Is it possible the prices currently on ebay were the true prices...and it was just the high dealer markups that were off-base? If you go to a show today to look for 1960s Topps cards in raw condition, I'll bet they aren't any cheaper than they were 10 years ago. Its just that ebay's marketplace has shown us where the true market is instead of just a dealer's price.

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Posted By: barrysloate

King- I think you are correct that ebay has separated the truly rare from the overrated. To use the example of stamps, when I was young your options were to go to a live auction, which occurred maybe once or twice a year and was certainly out of bounds for a kid, or get a retail catalog from one of the mail order companies. Yes, I am sure prices in catalogs were artificially high, but there were so few opportunities to buy rare stamps that you had little choice. Today, the rare stamps still are rare but many of the pretenders have lost both their mystique and a chunk of their value. I guess ebay is the most democratic of venues if for no other reason than the sheer number of items available proves to be the most accurate barometer we have ever had to assess true rarity. The first two American stamps, of Ben Franklin and George Washington issued in 1847, are really not that rare at all. This is something we may not have known 20 years ago but we now know today. As such, both are relatively cheap. The same can not be said of an E107 or an E97 or a nice T204 or an OJ HOF. There is a true rarity factor and a high demand. Ebay taught us this better than any catalog or price guide.

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Posted By: Alan

One of the areas where the hobby has also changed is when a collector wants to sell an entire collection. It used to be that you had a few options to "find a buyer" 1) set up at a show 2) advertise in newspaper or one of the hobby publications 3) sell to a dealer.

Now, because of ebay & the MANY auction houses, it is almost simple selling your collection !!!

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Posted By: Jim Clarke

I think bringing in new investors/collectors into the hobby. Both young and old, some poor and some really stinking RICH! After Enron and other corp. America companies lost the American faith, many collectors have turned to other investments rather than the stock market... IE Baseball cards!!!!!

JC

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Posted By: leon

that there are less good hobby publications, not withstanding OldCardboard, and the internet has superceded them....

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Posted By: Brian

2,3,7 and some part 1 are due to 5

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Posted By: Jerry

Ebay made SCD obsolete, so now we don't have to look at Mr. Mint's Ugly Mug every week. and Thats a good thing.

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Posted By: Jim Clarke

I think Mr. Mint help SCD go way down in the rankings. Anyone that has been in the hobby more than 5 years should agree with that. Hopefully SCD knows their demographics. Mr. Mints works with Beckett now... Right? To bad these media companies do not learn, thus their stock gets pounded!! Look at primedia

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Posted By: joe

I agree with Barry, scarce or rare items still sell on the internet, but items that I sold 6-7 years ago sell for less now, 1960's, 1970'etc. Also, I don't think Mr Mint, Rosen brought down SCD. He certainly is not my favorite, but for other reasons. The internet and ebay did that, there is not much content in the magazine anymore.

Joe

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Posted By: Geno

As far as Price Guides are concerned, I'm still waiting for a good vintage one. Bob Lemke's is the best, but he won't take out the new stuff and make it a two volume publication. Has anybody got any updates on that guide since Bob has decided to leave? Is that the end of vintage checklisting??

Take Care, Geno

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Posted By: ralph

I too say that Ebay has been the biggest change in vintage card collecting in the past 5 years or so.
as much as I enjoy a good card show,..there isnt anything better then sitting down anytime you want..24/7..and finding a pretty rare or tough card in seconds !

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Posted By: Mark

When I returned to the hobby 5 years ago, the single biggest change I noticed was that there was a single buy/sell price for cards. 15-20 years ago, many price guides had both (i) a "buy" (a.k.a. "wholesale") price and (ii) a "sell" (a.k.a. "retail" price), much like the Kelley Blue Book. The "buy" price (i.e., the price at which a dealer would buy back your cards) was approximately half the sell price (i.e., the price at which the dealer had sold the card to you). Sure, you could buy a 1952 Mantle from a dealer, but unless the price of the card doubled (which wasn't expected in an era obsessed with modern material), you were going to lose money for the privilege of ownership. Part of what really hooked me when I returned to collecting, was the eliminination of the wholesale-retail price gap (largely brought on by the advent of eBay and the reduction in mom and pop stores and local shows) - today I can buy a card with the expectation that I will recoup close to 100% of my money and that makes it much, much more appealing to buy expensive cards.

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Posted By: Gilbert Maines

With some notable exceptions, virtually gone are the days when the hobby relied on a few experts (Wharton-Tigar, Bray, Burdick, Lipsett, Barker, et. al.) to generate the awareness of what we collect.

Current thinking is that we all share in this responsibility and that although no one of us can operate in the league of these pioneers, collectively we can, and we are.

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Posted By: Cobby33

Game-used cards.

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Posted By: edacra

You market is less regional, few cards are really rare, you can collect what you want and find it, there are better condition cards on the market for some reason, it's easier to get a second opinion on a cards authenticity, prices are tied closer to supply/demand, more interest in pre-war,pcl, southern league, there's more trading today then 20 years ago, grading is actually applied to pricing, collectors are less enamored with certain celebrity dealers, the large price guides actually include the oddball sets, less cards which are just overlooked or forgotten, and then everything everyone else said.

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Posted By: mcavoy

1. I think eBay increased the liquidity of cards, improving pricing both on the buy and sell side.


2. The acceptance of 3rd party grading by dealers is a major development.

3. I think the reduction in the number of shops reflects the lack of expertise and professionalism on the seller's side and the fall-out from the speculative nature on the buyer's side. Although, I wonder if the reduced number of shops has reduced the flow of collections into the hobby from leavers, estates, and heirs.

4. I do not know if the auction house prevalence is a development from the last ten years, but the continuation of this trend is all good, even if I rarely win a lot. Nice catalogs!

5. The lack of publications may be a long term problem, but a decent vintage magazine has been available from one publisher or another for the past 25 years, if one considers trader speaks, old judge, OK nothing during the hyped up hey day of the late 1980s and early 1990s, then Becket Vintage, VCBC, and Old Cardboard.

6. I think the purchase & sale of cards has moved from catalogs, shows, and SCD, more to eBay, this board, & auction houses.

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Posted By: Brett

I blame ebay for the rediculous prices.

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Posted By: BcD

of Albert Pujols rookie cards!

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Posted By: Glen V

Not sure when it changed, but in the past there was more emphasis on high numbers and MVP seasons and much less on rookie cards. In an old price guide (1980?), Steve Garvey's rookie card was $6, the high-number '72 card was $25, and his '74 card from the MVP season was slightly more than his '73 card. The premium for the player's MVP season card is gone. We all know what's happened with rookie cards. Garvey's high-number card probably costs about the same as from 25 years ago, if not less. While high numbers are still pointed out, price guides used to have 4-5 levels of pricing depending on the series. Now only the rarest of series are given a premium.

Also, today the back of a card is much more important. A few decades ago, what would be the price different between a T206 Sweet Cap. vs. Lenox? A Broadleaf 350 vs. 460? Years back, they even wrote on the backs of cards or stamped their name on them. Now, a card with a NM front gets trashed in the grading process for having a small piece of paper loss on it's blank back...

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Posted By: Rich Klein

And this is only suspicion that because Topps both in 1961 (10th anniversary) and in 1975 (25th anniversary) featured either

1) New photos and a recap of everyone who had won MVP's in the 1950's -- in the 1961 Topps set.

2) Two "reprinted" cards honoring all the MVP's 1951-1974 in the middle of the 1975 Topps Set (It must be noted a few of the cards were "cards that never were")

That fueling of nostaglia helped keep these cards very popular as that became an important "topical subset" for collectors to hone in on.

Many years later -- the Rookie Card has taken over more of a central stage.

Rich

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Posted By: Bob

Ebay may be aprtially responsible for the high prices but it has been a blessing to those of us who have no card shops in a 500 mile radius and no card shows to attend, other than the National. I had never even seen a D311 until ebay, nor a Crofts Cocoa, E103, E107, Zeenut, etc. Ebay is definitely the good, bad and the ugly, but mostly it has been berry, berry good to me, to paraphrase Chico Asqualia from Saturday Night Live.

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Posted By: Alan

Another hobby major development are that kids are not that much interested in cards, much less vintage material.

For those of you going to the national, just look around & you will see a lack of kids at the show !!!

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Posted By: Richard Masson

Nationals at Anaheim are usually packed with kids. At least that was true of the last two.

For those of you who have tables at the show, don't be afraid to engage any kids showing an interest in vintage stuff. A little patience goes a long way.

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Posted By: peter ullman

ebay is most significant in my mind...a close second would be the extent and sheer # of forgeries that laser/scanner technology have helped to create.

pete in mn

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Posted By: Joann

The move by major card manufacturers to create artificial scarcity via chase cards. It's completely deemphasized the "regular" cards for kids now, and has put almost all attention on value and rarity.

Maybe even created a bulge in the market for vintage cards - where rarity is set and buyers can't be manipulated by set designers.

It's also made little gamblers out of kids - rip open the pack and ??? Chase card - yeeehaaa! None? Shoot. Loser pack, throw it out. No joy in opening the pack to see all cards in it - only looking for certain "winners".

Who knows? Maybe in 50 years the truly valuable cards from today will be the boring old commons and filler cards that kids are dumping, and there will be so many chase cards saved for their "rarity and value" that they will be a dime a dozen. Dare to dream!

Joann