Monday, May 25, 2020

Not Vintage

*pours a cup from the freshly brewed pot*

Vintage is a word that gets thrown around out there loosely when it comes to older items and sometimes not used in the right context in my opinion when it comes to sport cards.

Here's a few examples of the definition of Vintage.
  • The definition for vintage for clothing is something that is at least 20 years old.
  • The definition for wine is 50 years or older.
  • If the item is no older than an antique which is 100 years or older, but not less than 20 years, it falls under the term vintage.
So where do we draw the line with sport cards?

To me, "vintage" in the sport card world is any card older than 1970. Which falls under the wine and final definition examples I gave above.

However, some believe, that cards from 1990's are vintage.

V....I....N....T...A...G...E.

That's very misleading to me. Cards from the 1990's are NOT vintage they are RETRO folks. Anything over 10 years old to 30 years old is considered retro. DO NOT USE THE WORD VINTAGE for cards back in the 1990's. Not even cards in the 1980s'.

*ranting makes me drink coffee faster, time for cup number two!*

Is this coffee mug that I am using this morning vintage because my wife has owned it close to 20 years? No. No it's not should be your answer (I like to use this mug as it's the bigger ones we have not that I don't have a sister)

Or how about this coffee, if I was to let this sit here for an hour per say, does that make this vintage coffee that I poured a long time ago? (by the way no plans to do try that)

But I bet some would consider both of those scenarios as vintage.

*quick sip*

For Christmas this past year, my sister-in-law grabbed me a box of "vintage" cards online. She knows I love to collect so she was trying to find a unique item for myself. Which she did, as I hadn't seen one of these before. So I expected the unexpected but seeing the word vintage I was drawn in and was excited to rip into it.

Until I found out that the wrong term was used for the product.

I didn't find vintage, I found retro packs. Not just any retro packs, but "junk wax" retro packs.

Those kind of packs I don't really ever open. They are more valuable to me being sealed than to be opened and trying to find a place to store them since most cards would be duplicate cards and I don't keep dupes in my collection.

Here is the pack variety I found in this box. There are 20 packs in every one of these boxes with some packs, the most common ones, having multiples of the same pack.


not the ugly yellow baseball, but still....


I have three base sets of these and close to 100 Hampton rookies
6 packs of these!
Could be a Favre rookie in here I guess
The final pack I was most excited about....
There you have the box breakdown of these "vintage"packs.

Did you see any from 1970?....I didn't.....

*Halfway through cup numero uno, time to weigh my breakfast options. I did make chocolate no bake cookies yesterday....*

I was curious what my sister-in-law dished out for one of these boxes and it appears they go for $35-$40 each. 😒😒😒😒😒😒😒😒😒😒

That's saying each pack would go for $2 each. I am sure you could buy multiples of some of these packs for $2. It's tough for me to see and definitely not something I would have grabbed for that cost.

I never told my sister-in-law anything negative about the cards because she bought them for me. I just opened the box in front of her, smiled and thanked her. She gave them to me as a gift she thought I would enjoy. So I will and will find a way to do so.

So my rant is over for the term vintage. I think I made my point. Now I better go eat my breakfast and pour cup number three before both of those and maybe even myself become vintage sitting in front of this computer.

14 comments:

  1. my sis did that for me a couple years ago. I didn't have the heart to tell her these were "junk." As far as retro or vintage- dang it, I'm no longer in the retro category. Time to add a little Kahlua to my coffee.

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    1. Haha! You could call yourself a throwback....

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  2. One of my biggest pet peeves is the overuse of "vintage", and I flat out hate the term "retro"! Seems like the biggest mis-users of these terms are the 25 and under crowd, if something is older than they are, they label it as vintage, and I really dislike seeing things from the 90's being labeled as vintage, not only is it asinine, but it also makes me feel really old :(

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    1. Yes. It ages me as well. Maybe that's what bugged me about this whole vintage thing.

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  3. Ugh..that's a bummer. my sister-in-law did the same thing a couple of Christmases ago (last year she bought me an Aaron Rodgers jersey - so you never know lol)

    These are definitely not vintage, though the last two packs are pretty cool. I was born in 1980 so I consider anything older than me 'vintage'. I've heard other collectors include 1980 Topps in that "vintage era" and start the "modern era" with 1981, once Donruss and Fleer entered the market.

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    1. I am from 1983 so I don't even consider the couple years ahead of me to be vintage. I really think it has to be at the very least early 70s to sound right. Maybe thats just me not trying to be old to lol

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  4. Yep, now you got it. 1980 is the border for vintage. Helps that I started collecting in 1978, but the end of the Topps-only era is a good endpoint for vintage as well. Because 1981 Fleer and Donruss are never going to be regarded with the reverance that 70's and 60's cards are now. Plus it's the beginning of modern white (yet still flimsy back then) card stock. Up until then, everything was grey cardboard.
    "Retro" to me means stuff that is produced in modern times but is styled like old stuff. Like Ginter, GQ, Goodwin, etc.

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    1. To me those products are throwbacks lol. I guess it's how we look at it and what age we are.

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  5. Totally agree about the terminology. The big question remains, did you at least open the ‘95 Collector’s Edge?

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    1. I have not. I may keep it sealed though the temptation is there to see whats in it.

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  6. To me, vintage is any cards older than me! ;) It's obvious those of us that grew up collecting in the "junk wax" era will never consider those cards vintage no matter how much time has past. Maybe our great-grand kids will be able to finally cash in on all those cards we never could.

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    1. Very true. By the time we have grandkids, yes it would be fine for them to call the 80s stuff vintage.

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  7. I love a solid rant to kick off my morning. Personally... I classify cards released in 1979 and earlier as vintage. As for that repack... I'm sure they're designed to target people like your sister-in-law and other family members who don't actually collect, but want to buy something special for their family members and friends that do collect.

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    1. Exactly. They marketed it to the right people and they fell for it

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Cards and coffee go together like PB&J, so don't you and leaving a comment below. Take a sip and let me know your thoughts!