Collectors of baseball cards striking out

[Flee-Marquette]

I sold my childhood collection of baseball cards in the early 80's to buy guitar gear

thinking that someday I would replace them. Now just might be the time.

[steveinthecity]

I think its already happening, although the decline is not as pronounced as it is in the sports card hobby. i don't see an ounce of interest with any of my kids or their friends. My son would rather play Batman on his PC than read it in a comic.

 

When I think back, we didn't have the internet, video games, or cable TV as kids. Comics and Baseball cards (which I bought for the gum as well) were my escape from the monotony of chores and homework. Kids have more and better options today.

 

Plus, when was the last time you saw a spinner rack full of books at your local convenient store?

Good point that today's young folks have better and more varied options to occupy their time. And I can't recall the last time I saw a spinner rack or comics in a convenience store/newsstand. My grocery store sells Archie Digests, but that's the extent of anything that resembles a comic.

[jools&jim]

 

The demographic reality of the situation is that ANY hobby without kids to sustain it is a hobby without a future.

 

Anecdotal evidence aside, the real number of young people (say, ages 8 - 15) active in the comics hobby today is unknown and probably unknowable. But let's assume for the sake of argument that the rest of the world isn't a whole lot different from my kid's 6th grade class. Care to guess how many of those 11-12 year-old kids read comic books, let alone "collect" them in the way that most of us do? A grand total of 1 out of 32 or so in her homeroom: my kid, and that's because I stuck them under her nose at an early age. And even then she only really cares about Archies (though some progress has been made towards more sophisticated fare with the Claremont-Byrne X-Men, again at my urging).

 

So let's be generous and estimate that there are 2 kids for every 10 adults currently buying and reading comics. Or, let's be even more bold, and conjecture that 5 new kid collectors are replacing every 10 that die off. Does that really sound like an encouraging projection for the future health of the hobby?

 

 

 

[Dmac538]

Thanks for posting this, it means i really have to throw my card collection away, instead of trying to sell them. The great thing about comics is that new fans can come on to from movies, and tv shows. Without comics where would the movie business be now, documentairies?

[Kevin.J]

I can see this happening to our comic marts now in the North of England, over the last 10 years they get more and more depressing, with less dealers and even less customers. ( The further south you go the better it gets )

This has also happened with British comics in general.

I only collect American comics but I remember going to see a collection and along with the US stuff, I bought an old collection of British comics dating back to the 1920s and earlier.

Not knowing much about them, I did a bit research only to find the market was flooded with them and they were almost worthless.

99% of the people who collected this stuff was now very elderly or dead and the relatives have long since cashed the collections in.

Massive supply and no demand = game over.

I collect American comics for myself and will continue for the rest of my life, but no one else in my family is interested in them. I can see them getting cashed in when I am gone.

There is a poll for ages of readers elsewhere on here and I think it was coming out that the average age was 36-45 with the under 20s almost none existant in comparison.

I think that this is not only likely to happen, I think it is only a matter of time.

 

[Walls]

I think its already happening, although the decline is not as pronounced as it is in the sports card hobby. i don't see an ounce of interest with any of my kids or their friends. My son would rather play Batman on his PC than read it in a comic.

 

When I think back, we didn't have the internet, video games, or cable TV as kids. Comics and Baseball cards (which I bought for the gum as well) were my escape from the monotony of chores and homework. Kids have more and better options today.

 

Plus, when was the last time you saw a spinner rack full of books at your local convenient store?

 

+1

 

Plus, even for those kids who are into comic books I think they are going to want them in a digital format on their device du jour.

 

Shoot even as an adult who grew up in the 80s with comics, outside of my CGC slab collection, I see the long boxes of that I purchased in the late 80s and 90s and I kind of want it out of my basement.

 

Great subject though.

[Trev]

I wish it would hurry upand die so I can start buying the comics I love for pennies in the dollar.

 

 

part of me definitely hopes for this. The up side is that the books you want will be cheaper. The downside is the money you've put into it, if you hope of getting that money out someday.

 

SDCC is more than 50% television, film, and video games now. And not just those things related to comics.

 

Definitely kids are priced out of the hobby -- at least for the highly collectible stuff, but when I was a kid, I was priced out too. $1200 for an AF15 in NM was a ludicrous price when I was 12 and the average issue was 50-75 cents. So, I collected X-Men and other current books. When I bought back issues they were the $1-$5 variety. If kids today become collectors and follow their favorite characters then maybe when they are adults, they'll fall in love with the old issues and pay prevailing prices.

 

Very few kids are going to take the $50 grandma gave them for their birthday and buy a single comic over a video game. That's something for collectors like us.

[USArmyParatrooper]

Boy that card show looked depressing! Think NYCC or SDCC will ever look like that?

 

No way!

 

NYCC and C2E2 are getting bigger every year. On the Sunday of NYCC, I couldn't even walk the floor. There were too many people. I see no reason that it should ever reduce in size. Geeks aren't a dying breed, like card collectors.

 

I actually agree.

 

It's hard to say what will eventually happen with our hobby. On one hand it has the benefit of mass media outlets such as cartoons, movies, video games and toys. On the other hand the lack of children and teens does raise an eyebrow. How many of us here collectors did not collect as kids? How many kids today collect?

 

I'd like to see Marvel and DC make a $1.99 kids line, with kid friendly content and good moral lessons. Kind of like the moral lessons in the old GI Joe cartoons, "And now you know, and knowing his half the battle! Geeee IIIIIII JOooooooe!"

[asteroid-comix]

It was a pretty poor report by CBS. That baseball card show was a hole in the wall. That`s like me going to a local comic show with a camcorder around my area and showing just a bunch of dealers set up waiting for collectors to show up. The National drew 30,000 fans last year. Sure it`s not like the heydays of the 1990`s, but what is?The quality vintage baseball cards are still in demand and mass produced cards are undesirable. If you do a completed Ebay search you will find cards like Babe Ruth,Mickey Mantle and Ted Williams constantly sell in the thousands. For every one Walking Dead modern comic that sells in the thousands there are at least 5 to 10 hot modern chase sports cards going in the thousands. Baseball set attendance records last year.Everytime I went to sold-out Fenway Park I saw thousands of young people and women rooting the Red Sox on.The best way to sum up the CBS news report is how after they said baseball card collecting was dead that they ended their piece with the news that a T-206 Wagner sold for $2.8M.

 

Well said

 

I have not collected sport cards since I was a kid, but love baseball. All things come and go with regards to massive popularity.

 

Comics are at a high now, but will see a dip eventually. It could take years or decades, but it will happen.

 

Baseball cards are no different, nostalgia will make them attractive to collectors at some point in the future and the frenzy will repeat itself.

 

[asteroid-comix]

I'd like to see Marvel and DC make a $1.99 kids line, with kid friendly content

 

I think they already do this one. I know there is a spinner in my local shop that has all kinds of cheap kids titles. When I took my daughter down for free comic day last year, she grabbed a few. One was an Iron Man book, so I know Marvel was at least represented.

[goldust40]

I can see this happening to our comic marts now in the North of England, over the last 10 years they get more and more depressing, with less dealers and even less customers. ( The further south you go the better it gets )

This has also happened with British comics in general.

I only collect American comics but I remember going to see a collection and along with the US stuff, I bought an old collection of British comics dating back to the 1920s and earlier.

Not knowing much about them, I did a bit research only to find the market was flooded with them and they were almost worthless.

99% of the people who collected this stuff was now very elderly or dead and the relatives have long since cashed the collections in.

Massive supply and no demand = game over.

I collect American comics for myself and will continue for the rest of my life, but no one else in my family is interested in them. I can see them getting cashed in when I am gone.

There is a poll for ages of readers elsewhere on here and I think it was coming out that the average age was 36-45 with the under 20s almost none existant in comparison.

I think that this is not only likely to happen, I think it is only a matter of time.

 

Good post. As the saying goes, just because it's old doesn't mean it's valuable.

 

However the under 20s just don't have the disposable income that thirtysomethings have, nor would they necessarily seek out sites about dedicated collecting such as this one.

 

Granted, comic shops from the late 80s onwards began to rely more and more on peripherals and merchandise, so not that much has changed. However comic shops generally still aim to be near campuses or at least be in a trendy area - Gosh Comics for example have done very well with their move to Soho, with a lot more late teens / early 20s customers in there buying monthlies.

[ComicConnoisseur]

Thanks for posting this, it means i really have to throw my card collection away, instead of trying to sell them. The great thing about comics is that new fans can come on to from movies, and tv shows. Without comics where would the movie business be now, documentairies?

More people went to major league baseball games last year then bought comic books. 73,425,568 million fans went to Major League Baseball games last year,and millions of those fans were children and women.Baseball is still popular with mainstream audiences. So baseball is not dead.

MLB has its highest attendance since 2008.

In fact my Red Sox continue to set sellout records.

Red Sox sellout streak continues from 2003!

[bug33fouf]

[Westy Steve]

I've studied this intently. I know that being serious in this forum is frowned upon , but I don't see this happening in our lifetimes. I'll tell you why.

 

I'm in my mid-40's. I collect coins. I did a study of demographics and found that I'm in the bottom 25% by age. Yes...75% of all coin collectors are older than me. And coins can be beautiful, but they aren't nearly as cool as comics. Comics by the way, are easier on the eyes...I can't see the details I could see in coins back in the day, but, by GOD, I can see a comicbook and grade it!

 

I did the same demographic study on collectible currency. There, I am in the middle of the pack. 50-percentile of age. That hobby is going strong.

 

So think about it...coins and currency are both STILL going strong. And coins have some absolutely upside-down demographics. Plus, coins are far more plentiful that comics. For example, if a coin had the same rarity as the number of surviving issues of....say...Spiderman #1....it would be far, far, more expensive.

 

No...I went to MegaCon and saw all those "kids" dressed up like comic and Manga characters. Even if they were there to buy kimonos and samurai swords, at least they walked past the comicbook tables and paused to reflect on our hobby. The coin world doesn't have that kind of daily exposure.

 

I do think we'll see some kind of morphing...a blurring of the lines between comics and manga. I think that the trade paperback will play a large role...but Spiderman's first appearance is still found in a comicbook and if you want it, that is what you must buy.

 

We have nothing to worry about.

 

WC

[oakman29]

I remember the 1991 National Sports Collectors Convention in Anaheim. It took me seven hours to get in the front door. I sold 12 cents worth of football cards for $300 to pay for my hotel room and gas. It was down hill for sports card from that high point. Card companies started packaging used sports memorabilia with cards in a lottery-like system. Card packs cost more than a comic book. I feel sorry for all those amateur investors who were expecting to send their kids to college with all the sports card that they bought.

 

I was there too! My friend and I were in line,and I had a briefcase full of rookie cards from Sandy Koufax,Nolan Ryan,Johnny Bench to the current batch of rookies at the time.I think one big one that year was Ken Griffey Jr.Just Like with my comics I was a completist,and had every rookie card from the 60s on,and was showing them to the guy ahead of me in line.Up walks a man,looks over my batch of cards and wants to buy the whole lot.I gave him a price and he pulled out 15 thousand dollars out of his briefcase.I was floored just like that! in ten minutes I was 15K richer.Then he asks if I had more cards like this at home,I said yes.He came over that evening and cleaned me out with another 10 thousand dollar purchase.That was the last time I had baseball cards.

[HouseofComics.Com]

Oakman, that's an amazing story!

[vane]

Isn't DC and Marvel kind of doing the same thing by printing all these variants??

 

I collected baseball cards and comics in the early 90's. And I had more emotional connection to comics than baseball cards.

[HouseofComics.Com]

That's an interesting point. New comics aren't going strong per se but the demographics, at least in Berkeley, seem young. Certainly younger than back issue collectors. I still run into tons of collectors in their 40s and some in their 30s. But the new comics seemed more aimed at a hipper, younger crowd than they are at 50-year-olds. (Even though a huge pct. buying them are people who like silver age references, etc. Still seems aimed at a younger, snarkier audience.)

 

I'm in my mid-40's. I collect coins. I did a study of demographics and found that I'm in the bottom 25% by age. Yes...75% of all coin collectors are older than me.

 

I did the same demographic study on collectible currency. There, I am in the middle of the pack. 50-percentile of age. That hobby is going strong.

[ComicConnoisseur]

I remember the 1991 National Sports Collectors Convention in Anaheim. It took me seven hours to get in the front door. I sold 12 cents worth of football cards for $300 to pay for my hotel room and gas. It was down hill for sports card from that high point. Card companies started packaging used sports memorabilia with cards in a lottery-like system. Card packs cost more than a comic book. I feel sorry for all those amateur investors who were expecting to send their kids to college with all the sports card that they bought.

 

I was there too! My friend and I were in line,and I had a briefcase full of rookie cards from Sandy Koufax,Nolan Ryan,Johnny Bench to the current batch of rookies at the time.I think one big one that year was Ken Griffey Jr.Just Like with my comics I was a completist,and had every rookie card from the 60s on,and was showing them to the guy ahead of me in line.Up walks a man,looks over my batch of cards and wants to buy the whole lot.I gave him a price and he pulled out 15 thousand dollars out of his briefcase.I was floored just like that! in ten minutes I was 15K richer.Then he asks if I had more cards like this at home,I said yes.He came over that evening and cleaned me out with another 10 thousand dollar purchase.That was the last time I had baseball cards.

Great story! I bet you had lots of Upper Deck back then.

[MisterX]

I remember the 1991 National Sports Collectors Convention in Anaheim. It took me seven hours to get in the front door. I sold 12 cents worth of football cards for $300 to pay for my hotel room and gas. It was down hill for sports card from that high point. Card companies started packaging used sports memorabilia with cards in a lottery-like system. Card packs cost more than a comic book. I feel sorry for all those amateur investors who were expecting to send their kids to college with all the sports card that they bought.

 

I was there too! My friend and I were in line,and I had a briefcase full of rookie cards from Sandy Koufax,Nolan Ryan,Johnny Bench to the current batch of rookies at the time.I think one big one that year was Ken Griffey Jr.Just Like with my comics I was a completist,and had every rookie card from the 60s on,and was showing them to the guy ahead of me in line.Up walks a man,looks over my batch of cards and wants to buy the whole lot.I gave him a price and he pulled out 15 thousand dollars out of his briefcase.I was floored just like that! in ten minutes I was 15K richer.Then he asks if I had more cards like this at home,I said yes.He came over that evening and cleaned me out with another 10 thousand dollar purchase.That was the last time I had baseball cards.

 

Did you spend it all on Pop Rocks and Slurpees?