T205 Gold Border Education: How important are the Backs???

[notfast]

Originally Posted by hcv123

Imo a large part of the reason for this is that PSA has not "recognized" the backs on the holders..

i think this is the biggest factor as well.

Sgc gives you a rough guide on how rare different backs are and allows you to compare fairly easily.

Psa really needs to start differentiating them as well.

[MR RAREBACK]

[Harford20]

I, like several others have mentioned, feel that the T205 backs may be more critical to future collecting. I have been slowly working on a T205 HoF master set over the past two decades. Of the approximately 212 HoF front/back combos, I currently have 137 variations. Of the remaining, about 30 combos are extremely rare to see, and about 10 are only “1 card known to exist” (yes, most of these are Drum, Hindu or Broadleaf). There are still several unconfirmed combos as well.

As a variation collector, for me, the back is EVERYTHING.
Dave

[Jobu]

I think Hindu and Drum bring big premiums, with Broadleaf bringing a big premium but a bit less of one. Then Cycle, Piedmont 42, and American Beauty can bring small to medium premiums - medium if two people need it or it is a very nice example. Then the rest all sell about the same.

[brianp-beme]

Something that hasn't been mentioned but is part of the 'T205 backs are less pursued than T206 backs' equation are the back designs themselves. For T206 cards, the cigarette ads encompass the entire back, and not considering the tiny factory designations on the bottom for certain brands, each brand has a completely different design that makes it visually distinct and memorable. In comparison, I find that when briefly glancing at a T205 my mind barely registers the brand name on the bottom, and only the Sweet Caporal and Sovereign brands, due to their use of different ink color, and the Cycle brand, with its stylistically prominent 'Cycle' name, stand out at all. I think the prominence of the back design, coupled with the larger design variety is a small, but not insignificant, factor in the larger emphasis placed on T206 back brand collecting.

Having said this, being a collector typically more interested in the fronts of cards, overall I prefer the T205 backs because of their biographical writeups. They just give you more to read.

Brian