A friend's thoughts about the 90s boom and crash. 0

[kav]

Having a conversation with fellow collector-he's a board member but never visits or posts-he said:
The sports card industry collapsed right before the comic book industry died. Sports card dealers had a ton of cash and started speculating in comic books. Then the market collapsed. Obviously there are other elements that were involved, but that was a huge factor that nobody ever talks about.  Liefeld helped bring people into comics in the 90s.

I dont know enough about this to give it a thumbs up or down but I know other boardies do.

[kav]

He also just said, when I told him I made a thread:
"I was big into both markets when that happened. I was there. I give no credence to anyone that disagrees".

[WolverineX]

14 minutes ago, kav said:

Having a conversation with fellow collector-he's a board member but never visits or posts-he said:
The sports card industry collapsed right before the comic book industry died. Sports card dealers had a ton of cash and started speculating in comic books. Then the market collapsed. Obviously there are other elements that were involved, but that was a huge factor that nobody ever talks about.  Liefeld helped bring people into comics in the 90s.

I dont know enough about this to give it a thumbs up or down but I know other boardies do.

So you are saying it is happening again?

[kav]

Just now, Wolverinex said:

So you are saying it is happening again?

no

[Deadpoolica]

All the makings of a great Friday thread

 

 

 

[kav]

I dont wanna start another thread so I'll ask it here-does anyone know the % difference between a slabbed book and a raw book in the same grade?  Looking at ebay it seems like a 300% difference eg a raw book worth $100 is worth $300 slabbed.

[NoMan]

Kav can you please tell your friend that I am beginning a collection of "Up With People" memorabilia. Records, videos, VHS copies of Super Bowl Half Time appearances and the like.

I'm wondering how he feels about venturing into this new collecting area. I'm thinking it doesn't seem like a lot of people collect it so it's a good time to get stuff cheap and sell for high dollars when the speculators come around.

[kav]

8 minutes ago, NoMan said:

Kav can you please tell your friend that I am beginning a collection of "Up With People" memorabilia. Records, videos, VHS copies of Super Bowl Half Time appearances and the like.

I'm wondering how he feels about venturing into this new collecting area. I'm thinking it doesn't seem like a lot of people collect it so it's a good time to get stuff cheap and sell for high dollars when the speculators come around.

He says you should buy everything you can get-no matter the price-now while you can.

[NoMan]

12 minutes ago, kav said:

He says you should buy everything you can get-no matter the price-now while you can.

Copy. Things are cheap now. Shouldn't have let the word out.

 

Edited July 24, 2020 by NoMan

[WolverineX]

2 hours ago, kav said:

Having a conversation with fellow collector-he's a board member but never visits or posts-he said:
The sports card industry collapsed right before the comic book industry died. Sports card dealers had a ton of cash and started speculating in comic books. Then the market collapsed. Obviously there are other elements that were involved, but that was a huge factor that nobody ever talks about.  Liefeld helped bring people into comics in the 90s.

I dont know enough about this to give it a thumbs up or down but I know other boardies do.

 Can u tell your friend I have a michael jordan rookie card cgc 9.9 waiting for him to buy?

[Lazyboy]

2 hours ago, WayDownLow said:

Yes the origin of the 90s crash was sport card dealers. Does he think this is some big discovery? Why is he so defensive about it?

Yes. Hardly a secret, but people usually talk more about the things the comic industry did. Also, although they often are not singled out, the sports card dealers are definitely part of the speculators that are always mentioned.

[Gatsby77]

Yeah - but what was cool about the sports card dealer influx, was they were (temporarily) well-capitalized, so they had the hot books in stock.

I lived in suburban Philly. My LCS is still there, 25+ years later.

But it was impossible to find super-hot books at the normal LCS's like that one, whereas the sports card comic shops had them, even if you had to pay through the nose.

Only place to find Superman 75 the week after release? The sports card-run shop. At one point, the pricing changed hourly (like, $30 at noon but $40 by 3:00 pm), but they had it.

Alpha Flight 106 or ASM 361 at cover, long after everyone else had sold out? Yup.

Copies of books like Shadowhawk 1 at the height of the Image 0 craze ($12 please!), or books Solar 10 ($30) or Shadowman 1 ($15), 5-6 copies deep, when *no one* else had them?

Yup.

The sports cards dealers hooked me up with my first copies of X-O # 5 and Solar # 14, simply because they were the only places in town that had them in stock.

Of course, these were the shops that failed first in the fall 1993 crash, but man - was it glorious to be a teenager during this time.

[littledoom]

Should make a collecting in the 90s thread.. I would follow.. seems to be a decade w many stories 

[Hollywood1892]

I remember how I stopped collecting around those times...I was 15 so I knew nothing of day trading, stocks, market crashes, inflation, collectibles crashes. I'm 41 and I still no very little about it...

12 hours ago, kav said:

The sports card industry collapsed right before the comic book industry died. Sports card dealers had a ton of cash and started speculating in comic books. 

But I do know this...when something dies as the OP has said, it generally stays dead...so did the comic book industry die until movies started coming out? Or did CGC help resurrect it?

[Poekaymon]

5 hours ago, Hollywood1892 said:

I remember how I stopped collecting around those times...I was 15 so I knew nothing of day trading, stocks, market crashes, inflation, collectibles crashes. I'm 41 and I still no very little about it...

But I do know this...when something dies as the OP has said, it generally stays dead...so did the comic book industry die until movies started coming out? Or did CGC help resurrect it?

I'm a few years older than you and stopped around the same time.  It was variants, and Liefeld, that broke me.

For me, CGC actually did play a large part.  I don't think I would have had the confidence to jump back into the raw game.  So I probably would have just stuck with getting omnibuses of my old titles, which I'm also doing now. 

I also used to collect baseball and basketball cards.  For whatever reason, I have zero interest in returning to that.  Turns out I just didn't have as much of an emotional attachment to that stuff.

Edited July 25, 2020 by Poekaymon

[Poekaymon]

15 hours ago, Wolverinex said:

 Can u tell your friend I have a michael jordan rookie card cgc 9.9 waiting for him to buy?

A Jordan card is probably the only one I wouldn't mind having today.  I had one back in the day in one of those massive card holders.  The two massive slabs of acrylic with the four giant rivets in the corner.  Not sure if that thing was any good but it sure did look sweet.

[500Club]

18 hours ago, kav said:

He also just said, when I told him I made a thread:
"I was big into both markets when that happened. I was there. I give no credence to anyone that disagrees".

He's right.   From '91-'93, if you went into sports card stores, you started to see stacks of that week's hot new releases showing up on display tables, and sections of the card stores being devoted to comic books.   Things like Valiant, the Batman back breaking issues, the Marvel hologram covers, and the polybagged return of Superman books were everywhere.

[500Club]

6 hours ago, Hollywood1892 said:

I remember how I stopped collecting around those times...I was 15 so I knew nothing of day trading, stocks, market crashes, inflation, collectibles crashes. I'm 41 and I still no very little about it...

But I do know this...when something dies as the OP has said, it generally stays dead...so did the comic book industry die until movies started coming out? Or did CGC help resurrect it?

It didn't 'die', per se.  It just took a huge haircut.  By 1996, the gimmick books, the supply glut, the distributor wars, the cover price increases and the drop in quality of the books had chased many long time collectors away.

As the decade ended, some collectors crept back, with the rise of eBay, CGC, the movies, and pockets of increased quality.

[Hollywood1892]

17 minutes ago, Poekaymon said:

I'm a few years older than you and stopped around the same time.  It was variants, and Liefeld, that broke me.

For me, CGC actually did play a large part.  I don't think I would have had the confidence to jump back into the raw game.  So I probably would have just stuck with getting omnibuses of my old titles, which I'm also doing now. 

I also used to collect baseball and basketball cards.  For whatever reason, I have zero interest in returning to that.  Turns out I just didn't have as much of an emotional attachment to that stuff.

Me too

I had a Pavel Bure RC

Luc Robitaille 

Juan Gonzalez

Frank Thomas Leaf

Thought I hit the jackpot on them

Was also paying down on a Ken Griffey Jr upperdeck with by $.25 allowance (needless to say I never got there) and no offence to card shop owners ers but they were the stingiest, I remember going into a shop with this guy who had about 6 Bure RCs and I had a $40 Griffey card and he wouldn't trade for 1 but he offered me two packs of Upperdeck 90-91 high series!

[Mercury Man]

I feel like in the 1970's to mid-1980's the comic shops that were around, were comic specific.  Sports card shops (the few I knew of) were sports specific.  Then in the late 80's/1990's both store models started crossing over.    Today, it feels like we've gone back to many comic stores focusing solely on comics.  I can drive to 5 comic stores in a 1/2 hour and only 1 does sports cards as well.