Ok. I'm A Nerd. Please Help?

I have all three. But I love the Coopsertown Collection. I have the 12-inch Nolan Ryan one, too. Told you, I'm a total dork.

One of my favorite shows.

 

When baseball cards became so hot in the 80s, I wonder if it eventually ruined collecting for a couple of generations. Now everything is so over-produced and everyone's hanging onto them so much that nothing is really rare.

Collecting can be a real fun thing to do as a kid when it's for the sake of collecting. Eventually, the money made it an industry instead of a fun hobby.

And the markets for things can drop out and never come back.

I remember fondly collecting beer cans as a teen in the mid '70s. A family vacation in the car always included walks to look for different regional beer cans along the road. My brothers and I had a pretty huge collection back then. We all moved out and they ended up in boxes in mom and dad's attic, then they got thrown away when mom and dad sold the house.

In the 40s and 50s, collecting of cigar bands was somewhat big. My dad still has a good-sized collection of them in books. But he checked a few years back and there's zero market for them. And I don't think there will ever be one, either.

 

Read Mint Condition by Dave Jamieson...details the industry's collapse. In 1990, the average age of someone buying a pack of baseball cards was 12. By 1994, it was something like 38.

The trick to all memorabilia buying is finding rare things that will be loved by future adults, not current adults. That is why 1970s Star Wars toys, 1950s baseball cards, etc. did well. Men grew up and wanted to recapture their childhoods.

 

Yeah, I should note, I as a teen in 1990s I was swept up in card collecting. But by about 1997 I was buying only cards pre-1980 and of hall of famers. Partially because I love baseball and love reading about the 50s, 60s and 70s baseball and partially because I thought, "hell, if I'm going to buy these things, may as well buy what I like and what MIGHT be worth money some day."

 

When I was a kid I collected Star Wars stuff, mostly Yoda action figures. I had a lot of them in packages for years, thinking they were going to be worth money or something. Then one day I had the realization that I was never going to sell them because I like Yoda. So I opened them up and I now have a shelf with a rather large Yoda collection. Altogether it's probably worth $50 open, but I wouldn't sell the lot for $1,000 if someone offered it. I just like being able to see a shelf of cool Yoda stuff every day. Maybe you and your son will feel the same way about actually putting those things to good use and enjoying them.

 

Good point Lobster. That's the thing. I have programs, media guides, these action figures, baseball cards, all kinds of what my wife calls crap.

But I know I'll never get rid of them anyway.

So, like you said, I should open them.

I think I'm going to.

 

"cool yoda stuff"?

 

I admit you have an excellent point.