Who is the biggest culprit?

[barrysloate]

This is a good question and a complicated one, and it's not possible to isolate a single event or two as the cause for the hobby's decline.

I certainly wouldn't blame the price guides, because it's a fluid hobby and the marketplace ultimately determines prices . Rare cards always sell for more than common ones, Babe Ruth always sells for more than Joe Schmo, pristine cards always sell for more than beat up ones. Over time, given enough transactions, the more desirable cards will always rise to the top.

Third party grading is somewhat of a factor. With the goal of helping the collector solve problems, it at the same time created a host of new problems. Certainly it caused a huge spike in the price of high grade cards, putting them out of reach of most collectors. But TPG is not the reason for the hobby's decline.

If I wanted to simplify the answer and pick a couple of causes, I would say it's a combination of a very poor economy, and the maturing of baseball card collecting. In the 1970's, baseball cards were a well kept secret that only a small group knew about. As publicity brought droves of new collectors into the hobby, it grew in leaps and bounds. But no industry can grow forever, and ours eventually reached its saturation point. While there are always new collectors coming in, we've now reached the point where alot of collectors are getting older, or losing interest, and dropping out. The net result is there really isn't enough growth anymore.

And while the economy may get better one day (I'm not holding my breath), the rapid growth that we experienced from roughly the 1970's to the 1990's is over forever. We are likely to see prices more stable, without huge increases, and there is a distinct possibility we will even see the industry get smaller. I guess we'll have to stick around to find out.

[Bicem]

the widespread fraud hasn't helped!

[WhenItWasAHobby]

Originally Posted by Bicem

the widespread fraud hasn't helped!

Yep. Personally that's been my biggest issue. That's why I only spend only about 1-2% of what I used to on vintage cards over a given year with no expectations of the cards that I buy having any investment value.

[Chesbro41]

It's not because of lack of interest in baseball... there is still a ton of interest, much higher than even the 80's when collecting started to boom. Baseball revenues are very very high. More competition from football... but they are the only game in town during the summer, and that means interest and money. Kids still love the game.

And frankly, it's not because of the shiny new stuff that is being put out. The card companies were forced to go that route once the hobby became monetary. It's like people who say MTV should be playing music videos all the time... trust me, if playing music videos got the ratings... MTV would still have Guns & Roses in rotation. But the game changes and businesses have to adapt. The companies saw how rarity was driving demand in vintage (and prices) and adopted that model to compensate for the lack of interest as a "hobby"... but instead of genuine rarity, it is manufactured rarity. And that is what drives vintage collectors nuts on top of the bulk of products. If those companies could survive on one set, trust me they would out of efficiency (it's just a better business model). Example... the Billy Ripken F-Face card showed a 15% increase in Fleer packs in 1989 vs 1988 so what if we had that possibility every year on multiple sets! Not factually meant to be correct but you get my point.

Kids stopped collecting for the passion of the game the minute a price guide was issued. That is a fact. If you want to find the day this entire thing was turned on it's head, look for the 1st price guide. That gave birth to everything the "hobby" is now including slabbing.

Will kids come back? Probably not in the numbers it saw prior... but as long as the cards have monetary value there will always be "collectors". So really... it doesn't matter. It's the evolution... and some might even say it's the American Way. The money will always create the demand and the demand will always create the money.

Find something of value and exploit. End of story. The "business" no longer needs the kids.