Last week I went over to my grandmas house to finally organize some boxes that had been there since my university days. At the bottom of one such box was the majority of my hockey and baseball card collection from the late 80s and early 90s. In fact, I probably have around 5 or 6 smaller boxes of cards, many of which come close to being a complete set.
If you were around in those days, you probably remember how hockey cards went from being considered little cardboard things that came with gum to investments basically overnight. Most of us starting selling transformers and whatever else we could get our hands on in order to fuel the craziness. First there was Score, then Upper Deck, then the OPC Premiere set. In a move of sheer marketing genius, Beckett came out with a book that showed us how much all these cards were “worth”, and most of us spent our lunches back then sorting cards and dreaming of all the mountains of cash we would one day exchange for our cards.
Of course, back then none of realized that prices aren’t determined by little books, but by what other people are willing to pay for an item. That’s why a house in Florida can be worth $20,000, and that same house in Vancouver at close to one million. So while Beckett said a lot of these cards were worth money, if nobody wants to pay anything for them they are essentially worthless.
Looking through my old cards, I had put some of the more valuable ones in plastic protectors with a little piece of duct tape indicating the price from the Beckett book in 1990. I found a few Eric Lindros rookie cards, marked with $22 back then. After doing a few searches, the actual price that card is trading for is more like $5 these days.
Other than the rookie cards, everything else is trading for about 10 cents or so. Given that it’s already been 20 years since those days, and the cards haven’t appreciated at all, I’m fairly certain that they will never be worth anything substantial.
So I basically have six boxes of mostly useless cardboard, and I have no idea what to do with them. Sure, I can put them in storage for another 20 years, but I doubt they’ll be worth any more. Option two is to maybe throw them on Craigslist and hope to get $100 or so for the lot. Or option three is to simply throw them all in the garbage and kiss that era goodbye.
Option three actually appeals to me the most.
Yep, I had the same dilemma about 5 years back. I ended up tossing ’em. Hurt for a second, but no regrets at all to this day.
Uncle Garth would probably have something to say about this scheme (or at least, I read your Florida reference as a nod in his direction).
I have comic books at the parentals. Whenever I pull them out, I end up reading them, which is the reason I bought them in the first place: to read.
Books for reading, houses for living in. Amazing 😛
that sucks but- not to sound like Moral Mary-when did a collection have to be worth money to be worth something? isn’t the point of collecting for the shear thrill of finding cool shit? otherwise,why would geocaching even exist?
i say CL Free section,you never know who’s day you’ll make. ;o)
We were dumb kids, and that’s what everyone did.
As someone who has worked at a card store on the side in some capacity for more than 4 years, I can guarantee you that any cards other than maybe (and its a big maybe) a small few are basically worthless. The cards in that era were so mass-produced that there’s no rarity to them, which means there’s no value to a collector. A Gretzky is as rare as a Kevin Lowe. There are boxes and boxes in the store I work at that will never see the light of day unless they are used as filler in “starter boxes” for new collectors. Just by reading that you collected in that era, I can tell you that you’ll never get $100 for them.
I had a couple of boxes of that era myself, getting caught up in the craze like everyone else, but other than some memories, they’re gathering dust in a box and I know that they will never gain value. One of these days, I’ll toss most of them (or give them to some young kid starting out), keeping the Linden and Sakic rookies I have and maybe a few others for novelty.
My mother would shoot me should I get rid of mine. She holds on to stuff like that.
Email me as a last resort. I’ll take ’em before you toss ’em out. I’m not one to collect junk, but I too have an old stash of cards from collecting in this era. I’m still holding out that 50yrs from now, most people will have done the same (thrown them out) and there’ll be some value, even if nostalgic for my kids as a hand-me-down.
I would love to keep them for kids, but I just don’t think any kid who grey up with Xboxes and computers will want to sit around all day playing with cardboard! But I’ll let you know.