It would be interesting to see what has been found. I for one would love some of the older cards. Not that I might not already have them...

quote:

I for one would love some of the older cards.

I've tried to get older sets, 50-60 but cant afford them. Also looks like you'd have to piece them together one at a time.

quote:

I've tried to get older sets, 50-60 but cant afford them. Also looks like you'd have to piece them together one at a time.

I've got cards of that era on my WANT list. Some for as long as 25 years. In a sense I hate completing a vintage set. I then take the set out of my binder for safer keeping. My last completed set was Good Guys, Bad Guys in about NM condition or better. It is still in the binder because I want to upgrade 3 cards. It took 7 years (and counting). In many cases I'm paying less per card than many are paying for the latest and greatest but soon to be common Promo.

quote:

Originally posted by Raven:
[QUOTE]Originally posted by desertcoast:



Just slap a $5 per box price tag on them and leave. Titles with current recognizable names will sell as long as its a bargain. Marvel in particular should do well because comic characters never go out of fashion.

Hey, I'm IN at $5/box! And I agree that if the price is right, just about anything will sell.

quote:

Originally posted by wolfie:
My immediate thought was that your best course of action would be to set fire to the warehouse.

I can't even begin to imagine what dumping this amount of cards on to the market will do to the hobby. I also can't even imagine a warehouse with this many cards in it that hardly anyone knew about, it's Inkworks all over again.

My second thought was that for most of the cards from that era they would cost more to post than you could actually sell them for which brings me back to my first thought.

Haha...the fire idea might be a good one YEah, I've been talking with a few interested parties and the subject of "easing the inventory gently" into the market is very present. Starting that process 10 years ago and selling it in chunks might have been a good strategy. Selling it ALL at one time has some people concerned ( and rightly so). By the way, the 131 million is not just wax cases; it can be large bulk vending boxes with 10.5k cards in each, so it's dense. About 80 million of those are uncut sheets, which are another animal altogether. Star Wars or Marvel uncut sheets are pretty cool...10 million Ghostbusters 2 doesn't have the same effect. I appreciate the discussion. It's an interesting situation and I'll be happy to update here as events dictate.

I just can't process these numbers. 10 million uncut sheets of Ghostbusters 2? If that's how many left lying around, how many were made?

Manufacturers used to let the presses run overtime, but in this volume this stuff truly isn't worth the paper its printed on.

Back then, just about every kind of store sold Topps picture cards, from department stores, to grocery stores, to liquor and convenience stores, even ice cream trucks stocked them for years, so the print runs would've been absolutely massive, for sure. They were cheap for the retailers and usually sold through (I remember buying the first series 1978 Superman cards at a skating rink!). Even so, where I lived, you had to act fast to get that year's sports cards, especially the football cards. Those would sell out immediately, and I don't remember ever seeing the stores I went to re-stock those during the season, even though I wished they would. (Careful what you wish for, football cards are now released non-stop, year round, by multiple companies).

Even the 1977 Star Wars sets were made by the millions, certainly, but the continued popularity of the line and that they were the first of them is what keeps those sets afloat. Uncut sheets Topps '77 Stars Wars cards would have to be valuable, with Empire and Jedi less so due to even more production and waning popularity with collectors which started almost immediately after Jedi was released in 1983. The Star Wars line of things was pretty much completely dead by 1986. I've seen uncut Jedi Topps sticker sheets fairly inexpensively not so long ago.

Garbage Pail Kids and Wacky Packages sheets would garner some interest, too, I'm certain, but definitely the 70's stuff would be king out of this horde, should it go back that far.

To be clear, there are close to 10 million GB2 cards total, not that many uncut sheets I was rounding...but still, no small number.

Some titles such as Dinosaur Attacks really did seem to run 24/7 on the uncut sheets.We have over 20 million cards of that title on uncut sheet alone. It's pretty crazy.
chesspieceface: your observations are verified by our inventory: Star Wars uncuts are fairly small in our warehouse; the numbers of ROTJ and Empire are in much greater supply. That certainly implies the first Star Wars series sold through easily.
I suspect it's the bulk boxes of untouched Star Wars and GPK items that really drive this particular inventory. Obviously the highly graded untouched cards in SW and GPK are pretty in demand. There have been some surprises too; titles that buyers seem to want: WWF, Nintendo, 3s Company, Alien, Fright Flicks, Rocky Horror Pic Show, Beetleguise. Some of those are real head scratchers.
I do tend to check in on ebay "sold" searches to keep in touch with values, but they appear to fluctuate wildly.

Cool stuff! 80's horror is BIG, so that would explain "Fright Flicks" cards selling. Original videotapes of horror movies from 1978 or so (when VHS first began) through the mid 1980's are very collectible, as are even bootleg horror card-sized stickers from vending machines featuring many of the same characters shown in the Fright Flicks set. Most horror fans have the Fright Flicks cards and stickers (I got mine when they were newly issued), but probably not too many have uncut sheets of them.

Wrestlers from that era are still popular, 80's Nintendo (especially the games themselves) is highly collected and "Alien" is a classic with sci-fi and horror fans alike. "Alien" is a sort of oddity as a Topps set from that era since not many were ever based R Rated movies. "Fright Flicks" also features R rated subjects as did "Robocop", but those were from 1990 or so with Alien going all the way back to 1980.

Longtime cult favorite "Rocky Horror" isn't from Topps (I think it's from FTCC), so those sheets were undoubtedly made in significantly smaller quantity. As with Rocky Horror, with any of these subjects that one particularly enjoys, to see them all on one full sheet is a thing of beauty, terrific for collecting and ideal for display.

My card collecting interest (along with "Star Wars") is the "Simpsons" TV show. While Topps got the very first set based on the show out in 1990, as single cards, that set is basically a dreadful affair. The card fronts are screen grabs in dull color with bland borders. Half of the card reverses have simple trivia. But the remainder of the card backs save the set as they contain, in puzzle form, a giant size painting of Springfield, art newly created for the card series. (Topps showed it off at Comic-Con about 10 years ago. It was going up for auction.)
The image, is great, and hint of the better art that was to come on the show itself, but it loses something as single cards assembled into the puzzle, since, short of taping them together, the can still be little gaps between the pieces spoiling the cool factor, and sometime cards were miscut so not all of them line up correctly anyway.
But to see that Springfield painting as one complete image on the back of an uncut sheet would be most welcome to many Simpsons collectors, I would think. Hopefully you have some of those!

I forgot Robocop; that did turn up on someone's "want list". There's a lot of Michael Jackson product, and it seems there's a short run where he had very red lips on the cover art..that he later nixed. Those are sort of rare. Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders is another odd title. One cool one is the Topps Movie posters; they have Jaws, Star Trek, Animal House, Airplane.
Regarding the uncut sheets, I think for someone who loves the underlying title they can make very cool framed art ( I do have a Wacky Pack Uncut framed in my kid's room...makes me smile everytime I see it).
Funny you mention the Simpsons uncuts; we're considering doing a fundraiser with a large national charity if we can enlist FOX to join in. The Simpsons Uncut will be involved ( if it happens at all..still iffy). We're trying to get Groening to sign them, which would be cool.
Yeah, the card set is just ok, but the scene on the back is what makes it interesting.

I would love to buy some of these uncut sheets!!

quote:

Originally posted by desertcoast:
Some titles such as Dinosaur Attacks really did seem to run 24/7 on the uncut sheets.We have over 20 million cards of that title on uncut sheet alone. It's pretty crazy.

. . . I'm not sure how many uncut sheets that is, but let's guess 100 cards per sheet that would mean you have 200,000 uncut sheets of Dinosaurs Attack -- I don't believe there are any where close to 200,000 non-sport card collectors in the world.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: webjon,

quote:

Originally posted by webjon:

quote:

Originally posted by desertcoast:
Some titles such as Dinosaur Attacks really did seem to run 24/7 on the uncut sheets.We have over 20 million cards of that title on uncut sheet alone. It's pretty crazy.

. . . I'm not sure how many uncut sheets that is, but let's guess 100 cards per sheet that would mean you have 200,000 uncut sheets of Dinosaur's Attack -- I don't believe there are any where close to 200,000 non-sport card collectors in the world.

yes, 132 per sheet. Even if there were that many NS collectors, that title doesn't move them.
There are a fair amount of Simpsons; one way or another those will be getting out on the market soon enough. I will let the board know about where this stuff lands.
I do appreciate the input; other than my Wacky Pack ( and possibly Creature Features when I was real young) history, I'm learning as I go along.
I did collect some NBA cards in the Jordan era, but that's another world from this NS stuff.

Depending on condition, I'd be interested in a discussion on how it would affect the grading market. I mean a big influx of cards that (I assume) hasn't sat around in a kid's wheel spoke, then alot of minty cards could enter the market and really change the grading curve.

quote:

Originally posted by desertcoast:

quote:

Originally posted by webjon:

quote:

Originally posted by desertcoast:
Some titles such as Dinosaur Attacks really did seem to run 24/7 on the uncut sheets.We have over 20 million cards of that title on uncut sheet alone. It's pretty crazy.

. . . I'm not sure how many uncut sheets that is, but let's guess 100 cards per sheet that would mean you have 200,000 uncut sheets of Dinosaurs Attack -- I don't believe there are any where close to 200,000 non-sport card collectors in the world.

yes, 132 per sheet. Even if there were that many NS collectors, that title doesn't move them.

Actually Dinosaurs Attack is a pretty well regarded set. . . It was just ridiculously over printed.

Yes, over-printed is probably a kinder way to characterize the Dino title. Actually, it's kind of interesting in their use of Topps employees in the illustrations.
I know all kids love dinosaurs; if there were a way to reintroduce a product like this to young kids, it would be a goldmine in the quantities we have

Regarding grading: only 2-3 million are "sorted" as in employees created sets by hand. So minimal..the rest are untouched. The suggestion that just *knowing* that this quantity of potential highgrade cards is out there could move the grading market is an interesting point. Do the PSA/DNAs of the world take this into account or is it just "this fits criteria for a 9 so it's a 9".
This is probably a loaded question, but is eBay sort of a love/hate topic in the NS world? I seem to be running into very few brick & mortar dealers. Maybe it's boon to collectors and death to the dealers.

quote:

Originally posted by desertcoast:
This is probably a loaded question, but is eBay sort of a love/hate topic in the NS world? I seem to be running into very few brick & mortar dealers. Maybe it's boon to collectors and death to the dealers.

It has always been my contention that eBay destroyed more collectibles than it helped. I don't mean just cards, I mean coins, stamps, plates, figurines, Barbies, Hallmarks, you name it.

Yes, it made things available to a wide public, but it also served to show how easy it was to get things that were thought of as limited, or hard to find. Then it took those things and brought them down to the lowest price, with all sellers rushing to underprice each other.

In the process brick and mortar hobby stores and local shows closed down because it was easier and cheaper for sellers to limit their overhead and make deals from their living rooms rather than show tables.

It's not a love/hate relationship for me, just hate/hate.

quote:

Originally posted by desertcoast:
This is probably a loaded question, but is eBay sort of a love/hate topic in the NS world? I seem to be running into very few brick & mortar dealers. Maybe it's boon to collectors and death to the dealers.

I think there are a few different angles here. . .

First, there never were many brick and mortar dealers. At one point you could find comic and sports card shops that had a little corner of non-sport stuff set up, and that's still true, but in general comic and sports card shops are fewer and further between. In that regard I don't think non-sport cards fared much differently than comics or sports cards. Mass merchant sales have been more variable though -- seems like lately there are a lot of non-sport cards hitting mass retail. . . In the 1990s there was quite a bit, but it died off and for a long time there was very little non-sport in mass channels -- except for stuff directed at kids.

As for eBay. . . well. . . that's an entirely different ball of wax. I don't think eBay is to blame for the death of dealers. . . and realistically I don't think the hobby would exist today without eBay (or another online venue). I don't think the hobby has evolved to take advantage the way collectors collect in 2014.

Is there reliable data anywhere to quantify the "hobby" or how much is has grown/contracted? Some businesses...that analysis is easily done; I'm not sure how to do so in this case.

Interesting statement about the hobby not evolving to how collectors collect in 2014. Exactly how have they changed...and is eBay cause or effect of that change?
As a kid, Wacky Packs were a lifestyle. I anticipated the new release; it was social as we all went to a Walgreens and bought the new series...we didn't even wait to get home. We sat down outside the door of the store and ripped into them...it was tactile; smell; feel.
Fast forward...Topps has a virtual trading card app.
New collectors aren't loitering outside Walgreens..they're setting up saved searches with text/email pings and completing sets with efficiency.

And..new collectors will never know the taste of that crappy gum Then again, we probably have some of that too.

quote:

. . . I'm not sure how many uncut sheets that is, but let's guess 100 cards per sheet that would mean you have 200,000 uncut sheets of Dinosaurs Attack

I would love a couple of uncut sheets of Dinosaurs Attacks. It would look great framed and hanging in my den. I know it wouldn't be feasable to mail out 1 or 2 at a time but maybe someone at NSU like Harris could store and sell.

If anyone hears about these hitting the market please let us know. I picked-up a few boxes off ebay for under $10 but the box itself was torn-up and had heavy black marker strike outs all over the top.