I consider myself a new collector, even though I've collected baseball cards for many years. In fact, like many of you out there, my collecting dates back to a time when cards were numbered 1-796, and you simply bought pack after pack trying to get close to completion - or at least close enough until trading with your friends in your neighborhood got you even closer!
The reason I feel so new is the change in what is out there for the consumer to ummm... consume. Specifically, I am referring to insert sets - and it appears that this is where the "value" in cards lays. I don't really care about value, but I liked having all the cards, and for a budget-conscious collector, inserts make this basically impossible.
I THINK I understand why they exist, but that doesn't mean I love it - or love what choices they force me to make. For the last couple of years, I've simply admired the few inserts I received, and not bothered to do much about them. But this year, probably inspired by many of the bloggers out there - and also inspired by a Topps design which reminded me of my early baseball card days, I decided to try to complete a set. And inspired by Nick at http://baseballdimebox.blogspot.com/ I decided to attend a card show. More on that in a future post, but for now, this became my opportunity to actually complete an insert set!
At one vender, I picked up a loose pile of about 20 minis, 17 of which I needed. And then, as I was getting ready to leave, a vender had stacks and stacks of minis, allowing me to pick up the final 18 cards I needed for $4.
I left happy, and enjoy looking at my COMPLETED stack! Now - how do I store them?!?
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