How many active collectors

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Posted By: Robert

I know that there are people entering into the hobby all the time but if you whre to make a guess how many active collectors are out there? Is it in the hundreds, thousands??? Also is there any type of guess or fact on how many t206's of a particular player are in circulation? For example are there 1000 red Cobbs, 10,000 any idea of the quantities of each card? I know the rare ones so please don't post those.

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Posted By: Marc S.

I've heard figures/estimates that say something like 1 to 1.5 million T-206 cards are presently out there, which would be about 2,000 to 3,000 of each player.

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Posted By: warshawlaw

There are enough T206 examples of all but the biggest rarities that any collector with the money could assemble a set very quickly.

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Posted By: James Feagin

That figure of 2000-3000 of each player sounds very very low. 1914/1915 Cracker Jack actually stated that they produced 15,000,000 total cards, for 150K appx. of each player. While Cracker Jack's are not rare by any stretch, they are far less common than t206.

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Posted By: Marc S.

<<That figure of 2000-3000 of each player sounds very very low. 1914/1915 Cracker Jack actually stated that they produced 15,000,000 total cards, for 150K appx. of each player. While Cracker Jack's are not rare by any stretch, they are far less common than t206.>>

James - I understand the question as to how many were currently extant - as opposed to how many were actually produced.

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Posted By: James Feagin

If I was to wager a completely unscientific guess, I would say that most common t206 cards have 20-25K per. Heaven knows I've already seen more than 2000 of some of those commons!

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Posted By: identify7

The number of active collectors = the number of cards listed for sale on ebay (150,000) x the number of purchases made by the average collector in a week (1) = 150,000*.
One percent of whom buy pre-1930 cards.

Edited to add: * assumes that the definition of active collector does not include those who primarilly or exclusively trade cards.

Further edited to add: I guess the relationship between these factors is one of division rather than multiplication.

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Posted By: Darren J. Duet

How many red cobbs to green cobbs?
How many black hat matty's to white hat?

I'd guess 2.5 to 1 on the cobbs, and 3 to one on the Matty's.

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Posted By: barrysloate

I always felt there are a couple of million T206 surviving. I think more survived than Cracker Jack because of their size. They fit very snugly into cigar boxes. Cracker Jacks, also partly because of the thin paper, didn't hold up as well.

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Posted By: Anonymous

What about the american caramels? and standard caramels(e93)? i think there are even less there.

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Posted By: Dave

I think there are many more T206 cards than caramels. The prices seem to agree with this. I've heard it said that the T cards were generally bought by adults, while the caramels had a large population of kids getting them. So, the T cards had much better chance of being kept in decent condition.

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Posted By: Scot Reader (ebay: sreader3)

Circulation

The total number of T206 cards circulated is anyone’s guess. However, cigarette sales data published in the U.S. government’s Report of the Commissioner of Corporations on the Tobacco Industry, Part III Prices, Costs and Profits (GPO 1915) provide circumstantial evidence that the number could have reached an astounding 370,000,000!

In 1910, the total number of cigarettes produced in the U.S. was roughly 10 billion. Cigarettes were divisible at the time into three classes: domestic, Turkish blend and Turkish. Domestic cigarettes were made from the bright yellow domestic tobaccos of Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina. Turkish blend cigarettes were made from a mixture of these domestic tobaccos with Turkish leaf tobaccos grown principally in Turkey. Turkish cigarettes were made entirely from Turkish leaf tobaccos.

Most of the 10 billion cigarettes produced in 1910 were in the domestic class. And here, ATC was the dominant player. ATC sold fully 5.3 billion domestic cigarettes that year, under major brand names such as Piedmont, Hassan, Mecca, Fatima and Sweet Caporal. While the popularity of the once dominant Sweet Caporal brand was waning, the output of some of the newer domestic brands--Piedmont, Hassan, Mecca and Fatima--exceeded 1 billion cigarettes each.

Using the one billion production number for Piedmont cigarettes in 1910 as a marker, one can extrapolate a T206 circulation number in the neighborhood of 370 million. In particular, it is known that there were 10 cigarettes in a Piedmont pack, and that a Piedmont pack contained one T206 card. Assuming pack-only distribution of Piedmont cigarettes, and further assuming every Piedmont pack had a card, the number of Piedmont-backed T206 cards produced in 1910 is estimable at about 100 million. Furthermore, it is known that Piedmont backs are on approximately half of all T206 cards. Thus, one can assume that the total number of T206s produced in 1910 was in the neighborhood of 200 million. Assuming an additional seven months of production in 1909 and three months in 1911 at equivalent rates to the 1910 production, and the total production estimate for T206 cards nearly doubles to a whopping 370 million.

Survival

While T206 production quantities likely dwarfed those for most if not all other card sets ever made, the high production volume has been offset by a low survivability rate. A low survivability rate can be assumed for several reasons. First, T206 cards were distributed as a premium rather than as a primary product. Most early 1900s cigarette purchasers were interested in a smoke, not a small cardboard insert depicting a baseball player. As painful as it is to ponder for those of us who love T206, tens of millions of T206 specimens were probably discarded without so much as an initial viewing. Second, T206 cards were distributed to an adult population. Most adults are far less interested in saving novelty items than kids. Third, baseball cards had no economic value at the time. There was accordingly no economic incentive to keep them. Only those who had developed a passion for a relatively new sport--or at least knew someone else who had--would have bothered to hold on to the cards.

All this is not to mention the significant obstacles to survival posed in the near-century bridging original distribution with the present day. These include the passing of several generations of T206 owners, countless moves, harsh storage conditions and World War II paper drives, to name just a few. It must be remembered that T206 cards must have survived all this despite their fragility and worthlessness from an economic standpoint until only recently.

One speculation-laden analysis would place the surviving number of T206 specimens somewhere in the 1.6 million range. Such an analysis extrapolates that figure from an estimate of the surviving quantities of two rare subjects, Demmitt (St. Louis) and O’Hara (St. Louis). These subjects are known only with the Polar Bear reverse; however, they are not notably scarcer with that back than other 350-only subjects. The Polar Bear back is seen on about 6.6% of the total population of 350-only series subjects. Thus, if one assumes that roughly 200 of each of these rare subjects remains in existence, and further assumes that survivability rates for these subjects conform with those of other subjects, the surviving quantity of a typical 350-only subject is somewhere in the neighborhood of 3000. Finally, assuming for the sake of rough-and-ready calculation uniformity of survival among series, the total number of T206 specimens in existence today is estimable in the general vicinity of 1.6 million. Of course, if one assumes there are 400 survivers each of Demmitt (St. Louis) and O'Hara (St. Louis), the estimated total number of T206 cards under this analysis doubles to 3.2 million, or about 6,000 examples of a typical subject.

Accordingly, of the likely hundreds of millions of specimens initially produced, the number of T206 cards in existence today may reside somewhere the low millions (maybe half of one percent of the original production), with the vast majority of these survivors being in lower grade.

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Posted By: JimB

Scot,
Thank you for the interesting analysis and calculations. One other consideration that might be put into the mix is that not all the inserts in those packs were baseball players (i.e. T206s). Some were flags, birds, etc.
JimB

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Posted By: T206Collector

Thank you for the analysis. I have no idea where you got most of your numbers.... and I don't care. It was a very entertaining and persuasive read.

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Posted By: pete

actually counted all of the t206's owned by board members, regardless the player...how many members are we, 50? 75?
i could tell you now that i have about 70 t206s

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Posted By: Cat

...and I own 10 t206s.

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Posted By: Robert

I have about 500 T206's and in the process of selling quite a few of them. Nobody answered my original question. How many collectors are actively out there?

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Posted By: Alan

there is a fine line between collectors and "venture capitalists" is this hobby. and is a kid buying packs at a store as a pre-teen considered a collector? semantics, i guess. in truth, there are more collectors out there then we think. the national's attendance indicates that. and, while we are speaking of the national (well i am), i think it is horrid that it is in anaheim next year. i LIVE in LA and i still think it is a terrible spot. i think most of the collectors live east of the mississippi. i guess they are trying to tap another market and give the dealers a vacation. but i think the national should remain in the east or the midwest, where the travel isnt as difficult and long. my thoughts. YOURS?

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Posted By: pete

wait a minute, it would cost me hundreds of $ to travel anywhere other than anaheim, i live in west covina 25 mins and im going! dont try getting it cancelled just yet...and to answer the original question, there is really no way of knowing how many collectors are out there...i was a collector in the '80's and early '90's then i left, then i came back so do i count as 2 collectors or just 1??

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Posted By: RC McKenzie

I thought I saw a post about the number of different/individual 'hits' to this site per month. The number of serious collectors is that number. I don't know how many catalogues Mastro sends out, but I bet it's a lower number. Safe to say it's not alot of folks for the vintage cards, Hence, Lemke smiling at creating a vintage only book for sale. GL

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Posted By: jay behrens

I seem to remember Leon saying one time that there were over 800 unique hits to the site one month, and this was a while back. I am sure Leon or Brian could update us.

Jay

If you can sue a band for making you want to commit suicide, can I sue Barry Manilow for turning me into a wuss in the 70s?

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Posted By: Hal Lewis

That was going to be MY question:

HOW MANY REGULAR USERS DO WE HAVE ON THIS SITE??

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Posted By: Scot Reader (ebay: sreader3)

JimB,
You are right to point out the non-baseball inserts. Do you know if the non-baseball subjects were inserted in lieu of baseball subjects during the T206 distribution run? That is, if you opened up a Piedmont pack manufactured in July 1910, was there a chance you could get a bird or flag card instead of a baseball card? I have never been sure whether these non-sports inserts came before or after the T206 distribution run, or whether they were distributed as contemporaneous alternatives to baseball subjects.
Scot

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Posted By: jay behrens

I've heard from some truely old timers that many packs came with 2 cards, one a ball player, the other a non-sport card.

Jay

If you can sue a band for making you want to commit suicide, can I sue Barry Manilow for turning me into a wuss in the 70s?

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Posted By: Ted Zanidakis

There is old advertisement for HINDU cigarettes that displays TWO
premium BB cards in each pack. The price of this pack is 5 Cents.

Prior to the T206 BB inserts were Movie Stars inserted in the HINDU
packs.

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Posted By: Richard Dwyer

Bird Series cards were distributed 1910-1911. Same factories used by T206:

Old Mill Factory 25, 2nd District VA
Piedmont Factory 25, 2nd District VA
Sovereign Factory 25, 2nd District VA
Sweet Caporal Factory 42, 4th District N.C.
and maybe more.

Fish Series were distributed Summer of 1910. Same factories used by T206:

Piedmont Factory 25, 2nd District VA
Sovereign Factory 25, 2nd District VA
Sweet Caporal Factory 30, 2nd District NY
Sweet Caporal Factory 25, 2nd District VA
and maybe more.

Mutt & Jeff also was distributed between 1906-1911.

Sovereign Factory 30, 2nd District NY
Sweet Caporal Factory 30, 2nd District NY
and maybe more.

Info from American Tobacco Cards by Robert Forbes.