[90feetaway]

Originally Posted by Tao_Moko

Didn't own, but did work at and sometimes solely ran one as a kid in OH. The late eighties were solid and specifically up to the 1989 Upperdeck release (Griffey brought a lot of folks to the hobby). We sold prewar to modern and the shop was diversified to include vinyl, regional indigenous artifacts, comics and some odd ball antique items. It was still a time when shoe boxes of cards walked into the shop. Was not a surprise to have large amounts of 1950's come in, and occasionally back to prewar cards. The celebrity of the Wagner had everyone going through attics and basements, especially in a poor coal mining town. Probably the best walk in discovery was a box of late fifties football containing pristine Brown RC's. However, my personal favorite was multiple 1939 Play Ball sets that contained more than a dozen combined William's and DiMaggio's. Of which two ended up in my personal collection. I'd say the flood of production began to negatively impact the shop by the early '90's. Same for the regional shows.

I had a somewhat similar experience helping a family run a store and with shows during the same period. The market really saturated around 1990 with many stores nearby, granted this was in Brooklyn, so heavily populated. I remember a flood of people coming in looking for U.D. Kevin Maas rookies and I think we were charging $25 or more for them.. fun times. Store closed around 1996 as interest died down and rents went up.