Memorabilia vs Cards and trends...

[jbsports33]

Prices have taken a hit on many items - 15-20 years ago there was a fair amount collecting both memorabilia and cards - now it seems most are looking for cards. I agree some really undervalued items out there and if you enjoy items other then cards - you may find some great items!

Jimmy

[Butch7999]

The question, as posed, seems to us too impossibly broad to answer. If it were asked whether card prices
were rising, falling, or stable, the answer might be different for 19th-century cards versus post-war vintage,
or T206s versus modern shiny gimmicks. Similarly, does "memorabilia" mean everything under the sun,
or only autographs, or only photographs, or game-worn uniforms, or bobbleheads, or stadium seats,
or trophies, or... or... or...
Each genre, each niche, seems to have its own set of collectors, and its own market fluctuations,
prices rising, falling, spiking, sinking, usually returning to some more typical level.
Or maybe we misunderstand the question.
Just sayin'.

[Shoeless Moe]

There definitely has not been a drop in memorabilia prices, most areas are either steady or have increased (photos, tickets, etc.).

[Scott Garner]

Originally Posted by Shoeless Moe

There definitely has not been a drop in memorabilia prices, most areas are either steady or have increased (photos, tickets, etc.).

FWIW, I think that Paul is definitely correct here when it comes to tickets.
Difficult vintage milestone tickets continue to ratchet up in price.
Common tickets are holding their own or losing their pricing strength.
Supply & demand definitely seems to drive pricing.

I may be wrong here, but it seems to me that more collectors are collecting tickets and theme collecting is as popular as ever.

[Mark]

The only memorabilia that I follow closely is pre-war, pro-model bats. It seems to me that high end bats of the big pre-war players, Ruth, Jackson, Gehrig, Cobb, and Wagner, are commanding very strong prices---well into 6 figures. These are legendary players, and I suspect that people who don't collect bats as a hobby-obsession want to own these bats. I have heard people say that demand for bats of less well-known hall of famers is languishing, but the prices of some these bats has been rising. High grade bats of players like Same Rice have been exceeding estimates. In 2019, Goldin sold a PSA 9 Eddie Collins bat for $36K--surpassing the $28 K that Heritage got for a t206 Eddie Collins PSA 9. Even some non-hall of famers’ bats have done well. 3 years ago, there was a Heinie Zimmerman bat that sold for $3750 and a Wildfire Schulte model that went for $13K. That sounds like healthy demand! Still, a t206 PSA 10 of a common player might sell for $50K. Why don’t pre-war bats sell for more? As others have said, it is probably because there are very few pre-war bats to be had, and so there aren’t many of us trying to have them. It’s hard to build a hobby community when only a handful of people can build collections.

I am wondering about post-war, modern bat collecting. It was my impression that values have been going up, but not exponentially. Is the market for Arron and Mays bats flat? Or is it just that they haven’t been going through the roof in the manner of baseball cards?

I think that cards have an allure because nearly every boy collected them, they come in sets that can, in principle, be readily completed, and because it’s easy to get started collecting them because they are plentiful. Almost anyone can get a 1968 Topps Aaron. If you have some money, you can pursue better and better versions and rarer cards. But with bats, I would guess that there are only a few dozen Aaron or Mays bats to be had, and it’s not cheap or easy to begin collecting those bats.

[hcv123]

Some of these points have already been mentioned

1) Basic supply and demand and I would sadly have to argue that there are is a lot greater demand for the "hot" rookie cards of the games greats than let's say a game used bat form any of them - in part that begs the question why? Onto #2


2) The 3rd party grading companies (love them or hate them) and the ease of finding up to date pricing (think Ebay history, PSA database, VCP, etc) in addition to the fact that there are ongoing regular sales of most of these cards make it easy for less experienced collectors to enter this market. That I'm aware of there is no "one stop" source for a history of memorabilia sales? Bottom line information is alot easier to find for cards than for memorabilia creating a much easier entry into the market.


3) A lot of collectors I would argue are drawn in some way because they were exposed to baseball cards in some way as a kid so they come back looking to build on a piece of their childhood.

That's all I've got for now.

[Snapolit1]

Memorabilia is undervalued as compared to cards, and I see the prices as largely flat the last 2-3 years. Last night I was watching Heritage for the Gehrig Luckiest Man ticket stub that was on the block. I've seen a few of these the past few years and then all went around 30k, which is what last nights did. There are 7 or 8 of them graded. (Maybe another 7 or 8 ungraded?) From one of the most historic sporting events in American history. Yet some Jeter or Trout mass produced card will sell 4x that. Is very odd to me. Yet, there is nothing intrinsically cool about a ticket stub. In fact it's pretty damm boring. So I get that part of it. I don't collect bats, balls and gloves but to my mind there are literally thousands of them for sale every month. Some truly amazing pieces but many pretty pedestrian.

Fact that certain pieces of memorabilia are scarce or one of a kind likely ends up cutting against them at the end of day for creating a vibrant market.

[mcgwirecom]

Originally Posted by Scott Garner

FWIW, I think that Paul is definitely correct here when it comes to tickets.
Difficult vintage milestone tickets continue to ratchet up in price.
Common tickets are holding their own or losing their pricing strength.
Supply & demand definitely seems to drive pricing.

I may be wrong here, but it seems to me that more collectors are collecting tickets and theme collecting is as popular as ever.

I agree with Scott. There are MANY more people who entered ticket collecting. It is my main focus and 5 years ago I din't know too many folks collecting. Now there are facebook pages where I sell more tickets than on Ebay!

[Huysmans]

To gauge the comparison between memorabilia and card sales/values, you have to first a) contemplate what type of "memorabilia" you're considering - game-used items will of course always maintain higher values compared to "generic" memorabilia, and b) recognize cards as simply what they are - pieces of cardboard that are an industry onto themselves.

Those stating that memorabilia prices traditionally trend closely with cards are with all due respect, completely wrong. While game-used items, just like vintage cards, continue to rise in value, and are currently now reaching appropriate value in the market, generic memorabilia values are arbitrary, with numerous examples of items actually selling for less now than 10 and even 20 years ago. Many memorabilia item values are cyclical, with some areas burgeoning (as Scott mentioned with ticket collecting), while others are extremely lagging (19th century items such as Heubach figurines, figural napkin rings, ceramic mugs/plates, etc have monotone values and have not risen over time).

Also, as mentioned previously, card collecting is an industry onto itself. There are numerous collectors who just love cards and card collecting and have very little to no reverence for baseball or sports in general, including any "memorabilia", game-used or otherwise. This is how as Mark stated, we have a hobby where generic pieces of cardboard that just happen to have a player's image sell for more than any item that player actually used. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE cards, but this is the only way to rationalize their exorbitant values compared to actual historical memorabilia items.

[Hankphenom]

Originally Posted by Huysmans

To gauge the comparison between memorabilia and card sales/values, you have to first a) contemplate what type of "memorabilia" you're considering - game-used items will of course always maintain higher values compared to "generic" memorabilia, and b) recognize cards as simply what they are - pieces of cardboard that are an industry onto themselves.

Those stating that memorabilia prices traditionally trend closely with cards are with all due respect, completely wrong. While game-used items, just like vintage cards, continue to rise in value, and are currently now reaching appropriate value in the market, generic memorabilia values are arbitrary, with numerous examples of items actually selling for less now than 10 and even 20 years ago. Many memorabilia item values are cyclical, with some areas burgeoning (as Scott mentioned with ticket collecting), while others are extremely lagging (19th century items such as Heubach figurines, figural napkin rings, ceramic mugs/plates, etc have monotone values and have not risen over time).

Also, as mentioned previously, card collecting is an industry onto itself. There are numerous collectors who just love cards and card collecting and have very little to no reverence for baseball or sports in general, including any "memorabilia", game-used or otherwise. This is how as Mark stated, we have a hobby where generic pieces of cardboard that just happen to have a player's image sell for more than any item that player actually used. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE cards, but this is the only way to rationalize their exorbitant values compared to actual historical memorabilia items.

Although I feel a bit silly even pursuing this matter, which is something like arguing the number of angels on the head of a pin, with all due respect, most of what you just said is ridiculous. I will certainly agree that the game-used area generates the really big numbers like the best cards, but the original proposition specified only "rare and unique" memorabilia trends vs. card trends. Awards do pretty well, too, should they be in a separate category, also? But your main point, that generic memorabilia hasn't gone anywhere while cards were rising in value must have taken place in a different universe than the one I have lived in. I'm not a 19th century collector, but even those items you mentioned, do they really go for what they did 35 or 40 years ago when cards started to take off? And please cite some of the other "numerous examples of items that sell for less than they did 20 years ago." Everything I can think of in the memorabilia realm I've collected and dealt in since then now sells for multiples--in some areas many multiples--of what it did back then. Photos? Ad pieces? Pennants? Pins? Tickets? Player notebooks? How do you think Negro League stuff has done compared to cards, percentage-wise, over that period? I'll give you bobbin head dolls--not that they're not still in great demand, I just think it turned out everyone had a box of them in the closet. Of course, cards are the 800-pound gorilla in the hobby, and why shouldn't they be? There were billions printed, they were every kid's first collecting passion, and they lend themselves to formal organization, cataloguing, and grading like the other gigantic collecting arenas of stamps and coins. Autographs would come second for many of the same reasons. But memorabilia some kind of neglected stepchild compared to those? No way, it's huge in its own right, and growing in popularity, just about every area of it. In my opinion, it will continue to hold up with those others just fine.

[Huck]

Originally Posted by Mark

I think that cards have an allure because nearly every boy collected them, they come in sets that can, in principle, be readily completed, and because it’s easy to get started collecting them because they are plentiful. Almost anyone can get a 1968 Topps Aaron. If you have some money, you can pursue better and better versions and rarer cards. But with bats, I would guess that there are only a few dozen Aaron or Mays bats to be had, and it’s not cheap or easy to begin collecting those bats.

Agreed.

The hobby is built around cards. Everything else is a niche. The hobby psychology is tied to cards. Has there ever been a "black swamp" find of bats, pennants, jerseys etc.? Who gets excited over a cache of game used bats found in the attic of this old house? Over the decades there have been plenty of finds of cards. Maybe it has to do with the picture on the front and stats on the back. Perhaps the collective is always on the hunt for the next big find. Cards were available to everyone, buy a pack and see what is unearthed. A collection of cards is far more portable, than bats, jerseys, pennants, fans (ok pin guys, pins are portable as well). Bats, jerseys, pennants and other memorabilia are cool as heck, but few collectors (Halper excluded) had the foresight to collect memorabilia by the truckload. The market for cards is just bigger than the other collectibles. For most, cards are the gateway drug to the insanity of collecting.


I always amazed at the non-card memorabilia on this site that collectors managed to save. Check out the pennant or man cave thread, there are some incredible items there.