And I’m off again

I’m going to make a change in my collecting again.  I am still collecting what I’m currently collecting but I’m going to add something.  Something rather huge.  But I’m doing it Jeff style, or cheap.  Did I just call myself a cheap bastard?

Let me start by saying, and you may have noticed, but I like vintage.  And every time I pick up some vintage, I get more excited.  A lot more excited than I do with any newer products.  I still plan on picking up newer cards as far as my collections go, but I’m also going to start picking up all vintage cards for the right price.  Let me rephrase, vintage and then some.

Back when I was a kid, I wanted all cards.  If I didn’t have it, I wanted it.  When I gave up collecting (high school) I had ten’s of thousands of cards.  I never tried to complete sets, even thought I probably had some and didn’t know it.  But I wanted everything.  And that’s what I’m going to do with vintage (and then some).  Only I’m not going to buy just because I don’t have it, but rather if I come across something that is cheap, then I’ll pick it up.  I’m going to collect everything from vintage thru 1987.  I know, your thinking 1987?  Really?  But that was the last year I was really purchasing the crap out of cards.  So I’m going to collect all the way thru then for memories sake.  The 1990’s just didn’t do much for me.  I collected some again in 1993 and 1994 then stopped.  And again in 2000 thru 2002 and stopped.  And then again at the very end of 2010 thru today.  I have found the joy of collecting again, thanks to all of you bloggers and I don’t think this will be a 2 year binge and then get out again.  Here are some of my rules for this collection, but we all know rules are made to be broken.

• As I already stated, anything vintage thru 1987.
• I’m only collecting base, I may pick up odds and ends but I’m really only going after base cards.
• As far as brands, the big 3 (back in the day)  Topps, Fleer, Donruss.
• I’m only going after 1 of each, I don’t need stacks of dupes.

Pricing rules.  These will mainly apply to online purchases.

• Vintage thru 1980, max of $.54.  I always add $.04 on bids in case someone bid’s $.50, I outbid them with the $.04.
• 1981-1985, max of $.29.
• 1986-1987, max of $.19.

So as you can tell by the max bids above, this collection is going to go very fast.  But it’s not about speed, it’s about having fun.  And that’s what this hobby is all about.  I’ve already started bidding on some stuff, we’ll see if I win it.  I even picked up a few vintage at my LCS about a month ago at a $.25 a piece.  When I picked them up, I didn’t even know why I was picking them up.  They were a quarter, and they were vintage, that’s all I knew.  I guess I knew back then what I wanted to do without really knowing it.

That, my friends, is a great purchase for a buck.  And a nice start to the vintage collection.  Maybe this weekend I’ll take some time and create a page and show my progress for each year. 

note – I’m not asking you to send me all your vintage, I certainly don’t have much to trade with but I am starting to pick up a few cards to trade with in the future so hopefully I’ll be able to start doing some small trades again soon.