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Post by G on Aug 6, 2009 17:33:27 GMT -5
I was watching "Pardon the Interruption" tonight on TV and they had a 2 minute conversation on baseball cards. They indicated that baseball cards sales are down a whopping 80% since 1994.  They went on to further indicate that in light of this, Major League Baseball made Topps Trading Cards the exclusive purveyor of Major League Baseball and cut out Upper Deck. Then the question was ask. Do you think this will help the baseball card market?  The answer was a flat out.....No! Baseball cards are dead and done. They further explained that kids are not interested in buying cards and putting them away in boxes or albums for dozens of years and cherishing them for years to come. They are far too interested in holding things in their hands with buttons to press. They further lamented that this saddens them a great deal because not only is this a reality of baseball cards, but a reflection on newspapers and magazines, which they also indicated where dead and dying and will be gone and unavailable to future generations. As far as baseball cards is concerned, they said quote "No one under 50 cares about baseball cards". Now this was only 2 peoples opinions on a TV Show, but I have to admit that the conversation made me think of our beloved comics and further sadness that future generations will probably not care about comics and our industry will die to nothing as we ourselves as collectors die off. The future of printed media appears sad.  |
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Post by starbrand on Aug 11, 2009 18:04:21 GMT -5
I think those are good points, but there are a number of other companies still making sports cards besides Topps, so I'm not sure why those guys said that.
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Post by G on Aug 11, 2009 18:15:53 GMT -5
I think those are good points, but there are a number of other companies still making sports cards besides Topps, so I'm not sure why those guys said that. Well, Topps was THE card company when I was a kid and long before that. I think Upper Deck and a few of the others got big in the 1980s. I think the fact that MLB chose Topps over the rest made them the topic of the story. Because they were lamenting about how Baseball card sales were down 80% in just 15 years the question just naturally turned to "Can Topps save Baseball cards?" to which they said a responding "No.......Baseball Cards are Dead!" If Upper Deck got chosen by MLB they would have said the same thing about them. |
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Post by starbrand on Aug 11, 2009 18:38:00 GMT -5
I think those are good points, but there are a number of other companies still making sports cards besides Topps, so I'm not sure why those guys said that. Well, Topps was THE card company when I was a kid and long before that. I think Upper Deck and a few of the others got big in the 1980s. I think the fact that MLB chose Topps over the rest made them the topic of the story. Because they were lamenting about how Baseball card sales were down 80% in just 15 years the question just naturally turned to "Can Topps save Baseball cards?" to which they said a responding "No.......Baseball Cards are Dead!" If Upper Deck got chosen by MLB they would have said the same thing about them. The way Topps essentially got a monopoly for all those years is they signed almost all baseball players to exclusive contracts. They payed each player individually and had them under exclusive contract. It was really their own marketing that made the monopoly they had. In the late seventies a court ruled they indeed had a monopoly and those individual exclusive contracts they had with individual players were torn up. Anyway, that's how Topps did it. The sports card market crashed months before the comic market crashed in the early nineties. A lot of sports card dealers had tons of cash when this happened because they'd made bank when the sports card hobby flourished big time in the eighties. Many of the sports card dealers turned to comics after their market crashed. They were buying tons of Valiants, Images and stuff like Reign Of Superman and the like. I even knew one sports card dealer who tried to corner the market on Continuity. Sports card dealers played a significant role in crashing the comic book market by buying absolutely tons of the same books. I think sports cards will survive. One thing I was shocked to learn, though, is Beckett no longer puts out monthly price guides like they used to. Their market is really down. Steroids helped crash things also, as the baseball card market is still key to the sports card market and when steriods skewed so many important baseball records, which closely tie into why folks collect baseball cards, collectors got out in droves. Eventually something will bring some of them back, but I doubt the sports card hobby will ever be what it once was. |
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Post by G on Aug 11, 2009 19:05:07 GMT -5
The sports card market crashed months before the comic market crashed in the early nineties. A lot of sports card dealers had tons of cash when this happened because they'd made bank when the sports card hobby flourished big time in the eighties. Many of the sports card dealers turned to comics after their market crashed. They were buying tons of Valiants, Images and stuff like Reign Of Superman and the like. I even knew one sports card dealer who tried to corner the market on Continuity. Sports card dealers played a significant role in crashing the comic book market by buying absolutely tons of the same books. Yeah I know. I was there. I lived it. I seen it all happen before my eyes. As bad as it seems, it was also a great time for a period there because it wasn't just the sportcard folks buying up everything. Comics was just damn hot! They probably had a great deal to do with the crash though. But really everybody bought into comics including comic people and it just couldnt sustain that kind of money making forever. Too many people got into it at once and tried to cash in. When it was over, it got ugly fast. But you know, I would love to see comics that hot again just once. I remember so many fathers and sons buying comics together. It was a frenzy. I miss that frenzy. I think sports cards will survive. One thing I was shocked to learn, though, is Beckett no longer puts out monthly price guides like they used to. Their market is really down. Steroids helped crash things also, as the baseball card market is still key to the sports card market and when steriods skewed so many important baseball records, which closely tie into why folks collect baseball cards, collectors got out in droves. Eventually something will bring some of them back, but I doubt the sports card hobby will ever be what it once was. Great point about the steroids deal. Its hard to look up to these guys and want their baseball card when the back of their card has their record and you realize how tainted that record is. I agree that cards will survive to some extent, but it will be hard for them to get back where they was. I believe its good for comics when baseball cards do well. When collectibles are worth something, more and more people collect. |
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Post by starbrand on Aug 11, 2009 19:08:43 GMT -5
G, I found this article and now understand what you're talking about. Ya know, another thing I believe that hurt sports cards is they started making so many different kinds of cards it was confusing and even a bit depressing. Back when Topps made the only cards at least one knew which cards were rookies, etc. This is very interesting. Things have come full circle. This could help the market. www.nytimes.com/2009/08/06/sports/baseball/06cards.html |
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Post by G on Aug 11, 2009 19:44:23 GMT -5
Its interesting how they say Upper Deck can still make cards and they will, they just can no longer display team logos. I know that will be very damaging to them. I remember when I was a kid and collected Football cards, the helmets didn't have the logos on them. It was like they were colored out. It ruined good cards. Me and my friends were always into the action cards where they showed players in the game and not just static portrait poses. Having those logos just makes the whole card experience more authentic.
I had about 6,000 cards when I was a kid and got dumb as a young adult and sold them all for pennies. I never recovered from it and never collected sports cards again, although I do have a decent amount of comic related cards. Cards were cool to have when you had all the cards of your favorite team year after year. Me and my friends spent hours trading cards. I think that experience helped me trade comics when I got older.
Its kind of funny how this turned out. I remember when Upper Deck got big, it seemed they was going to put Topps out of business. Now its come full circle. I do like the eTopps idea. You'll have to keep me/us posted on how that works out for you. Whenever things finally turn around for me, I might check into that. I like the Trading Floor mentality they have on that. It seems that when a player gets hot and does well on the field, you could probably expect his card price to go up a little. Could be fun to have those eTopps cards. The #1 thing I like about it is you pick the cards. The #1 complaint many parents I knew who had kids collecting was kids never knew what cards were in the package and thus too many packs had to be purchased searching for cards to complete the collection.
I remember when I was a kid, my best friends parents would buy him boxes of cards and he had tons of packs to open one after another. I would get jealous watching him open so many. I always bought my packs with my money exclusively. There was a thrill going to the store and buying packs and opening them up. Watching my friend rip open boxes and pack after pack was too much sometimes. Some kids just had it made I guess.
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The answer was a flat out.....No! Baseball cards are dead and done. 
