Thoughts on CGC potentially "Restoring" Cards

[steve B]

Originally Posted by jchcollins

Short of TPG's investing a ridiculous amount of time, money, and resources in a move towards becoming something more like forensic examiners than people who rate pieces of cardboard on a 1-10 scale (not ever going to happen...),

Why not? It's not expensive to at least begin, and that's what has been done in stamps for over a century.
Very early experts marked the back of the stamp with their mark, a practice that has been fading for decades and is now pretty much gone. Certificates began sometime before 1930.

A similar service for cards wouldn't be all that difficult.

[swarmee]

Yeah, they could use a glue or ink or paper that fluoresces under black light, as part of their restoration.

[jchcollins]

Originally Posted by steve B

Why not? It's not expensive to at least begin, and that's what has been done in stamps for over a century.
Very early experts marked the back of the stamp with their mark, a practice that has been fading for decades and is now pretty much gone. Certificates began sometime before 1930.

A similar service for cards wouldn't be all that difficult.

Don't get me wrong; it's do-able, and I would agree from a startup perspective would not be over-the-top difficult out of the gate. The Philatelic Society is what I'm assuming you are referring to with stamps - I think that's great.

I meant that current TPG's have no market incentive to do this, so why would they? Aside from the noise that has been made on Blowout and here and in a few other spots, other collectors and investors largely don't care about the alteration scandal.

[steve B]

Originally Posted by jchcollins

Don't get me wrong; it's do-able, and I would agree from a startup perspective would not be over-the-top difficult out of the gate. The Philatelic Society is what I'm assuming you are referring to with stamps - I think that's great.

I meant that current TPG's have no market incentive to do this, so why would they? Aside from the noise that has been made on Blowout and here and in a few other spots, other collectors and investors largely don't care about the alteration scandal.

Yes, APS and PF and others.
My club had a talk by an expertiser, and while most of what he talked about was stuff I knew, there were some things I had never heard of.
Like one of the 1870's-80's papers being detectable because it's ever so slightly flourescent under a blacklight.

There's an outfit that's doing some very advanced work studying stuff like color and paper scientifically.
Someday I hope Something like X-ray diffraction is available affordably enough for hobbyists.

https://www.analyticalphilately.org/index.php

But a blacklight usable for cards is around $10, and decent magnifiers and measuring tools can be had for well under $100 total.
Going with a really good dual range blacklight, magnifier and measuring tool would be possible for under 500.

[perezfan]

Originally Posted by jchcollins

Don't get me wrong; it's do-able, and I would agree from a startup perspective would not be over-the-top difficult out of the gate. The Philatelic Society is what I'm assuming you are referring to with stamps - I think that's great.

I meant that current TPG's have no market incentive to do this, so why would they? Aside from the noise that has been made on Blowout and here and in a few other spots, other collectors and investors largely don't care about the alteration scandal.

So then why do these people pay such an enormous premium for a card graded "9" vs. one graded "A"?

Why even have a grading scale if nobody cares? What's the point of it all?

[jchcollins]

Originally Posted by perezfan

So then why do these people pay such an enormous premium for a card graded "9" vs. one graded "A"?

Why even have a grading scale if nobody cares? What's the point of it all?

Not really a valid comparison. I'm saying they don't care about the scandal, and in many cases will continue to buy vintage graded 9-10 range, despite the fact that some cards there probably should be in "A" slabs.

"A" to many people implies alteration / skulduggery. PSA will put "Altered" on the slab itself; SGC puts A without an explanation on whether or not the card is altered, is for some other reason intact but cannot grade on a numbered scale - or whether or not the grader simply wanted it encapsulated as authentic and not rated on the 1-10 scale. I have a '56 Mantle I've had since I was a kid that I knew SGC would refuse to grade, because they have before. So I sent it in just to get an "A" tux. They slabbed it for me quickly and sent it back with no questions.

I digress. The point of it all is that consumers in the vintage sportscard marketplace don't always act rationally.

[ClementeFanOh]

Hi all- a couple days ago, I made a comment on this thread about CSG and a lack of specifics regarding their launch date and grading fees. I finally got specifics on the fees (no launch date though). Highlights include:

1) "economy"- $15 per card, max card value $500- FORTY DAY turnaround
2) "standard"- $25 per card, $1000 max card value - 25 day turnaround

There is an option for subgrades, $10 extra and 5 more days waiting. They also add a $5 "handling fee" for online submissions and $10 for paper form submissions.
The biggest groin punch is that they flatly state, WITH NO BACKLOG YET, that the turnaround times are "approximate"; however, I don't think they'd agree if you paid an amount "approximate" to their fees but not quite what they want.

There are other details, I merely selected some for brevity's sake. Website is www.csgcards.com

I think these prices are high and that they are wringing every dollar they can- while naturally refusing to be held to their stated turnaround times. These are not the "droids" I was looking for", for Star Wars fans. For those who are not, I am underwhelmed by these details. I thought the idea was to compete rather than to conform...

Trent King

[jchcollins]

Originally Posted by ClementeFanOh

I thought the idea was to compete rather than to conform...

Agreed. I can live without grading, but for those who can't - that would lead me to sticking with the devil I know.

[stlcardsfan]

I collect both comics and cards. Comics that have been restored and are slabbed by CGC are clearly labeled as such. They are essentially red headed step children among the comic collecting group. Comic collectors refer to the restoration labels as PLODs (purple label of death). If they would get into restoration of cards I would anticipate they would similarly label cards as such and the perception would be even worse with cards than it is with comics.