Mall shows

[D. Bergin]

One of my most vivid memories setting up at shows when I was a teenager as a weekend warrior, during the late 80's, was being set up at the Danbury Fair Mall in CT, the same week the Billy Ripken FF card was discovered.

89 Fleer had just come out, and between the FF card and the Griffey Jr. and Gary Sheffield Rookies, everybody was going nuts over it.

Looking back in hindsight, there was absolutely no shortage of it either. They were selling for over 100 bucks a box...but seemingly EVERYBODY had them......and this was just the first run of them, before they corrected or hacked the rest of the Ripken cards in the print run.

The FF card probably sold Fleer an extra 1/2 a million cases of cards that year.

Thing was, if you pulled an FF, you could throw it out on your table for $100 bucks, and less then 10 minutes later it would be gone, basically paying for your box. People literally thought, this was going to be the next 52 Mantle.

That was a wild weekend.

[Tao_Moko]

I stumbled upon one by chance a few years ago. I've been to a mall maybe 3x in the last 30 years. So, thought I was lucky. It was about 20 tables of reflecting, refracting shiny things. One guy had a '58 Aaron in vg for $1200.

The late eighties shows were a blast. Even small towns had more than one show to go to. Start at the flea market, head to Ramada or Holiday Inn and then hit up the mall on the following day. The '63 Fleer checklist was for some reason a hot commodity. I found mine at a mall show and traded a '58 Clemente for it. Thought I had scored big.

[bigred1]

Got back into collecting at the one at Arundel Mills Mall in Maryland, met the only large vintage dealer there and have been working shows with him since, Mall show has been gone for a while, but made some long term friends doing shows with him.

[obiwan1129]

Originally Posted by bigred1

Got back into collecting at the one at Arundel Mills Mall in Maryland, met the only large vintage dealer there and have been working shows with him since, Mall show has been gone for a while, but made some long term friends doing shows with him.

Went to a few of those. I never really hit many mall shows other than Arundel Mills. Bought my first T206's there. There were some for a short time up at the mall in Westminster, MD. These were both circa 2009-2011 or so.

It was mostly LCS shops for me. I would hit an occasional show at the VFW in McHenry when I was in high school. That was small, but a lot of great dealers there.

[glynparson]

In pennsylvania we have a mall
Show almost every single weekend.

[BobC]

Around me, most of the malls have closed or turned into strip plazas.

[SteveWhite]

In the mid-80's Columbus, Ohio at the Westland Mall. Remember one of us was old enough to drive probably four or five us of to the show. Great days looking for the any Reds cards we could get our hands on.

[jingram058]

In looking back on the "good old days", to me they were the good old days. At the mall shows back then, as a buyer I fealt like I was the one with the upper hand. I would see something I wanted, and made an offer. You could negotiate. If someone was unwilling to dicker, I would walk away and move on. Really, really good deals could be made, and more often than not, were. It's pretty clear with the way cards are priced today that I would not have a great many of the great cards I have if not for the mall shows back in the "good old days".

[ClementeFanOh]

Yep, they were cool. Upper Valley Mall in Clark County, Ohio in the 1980s.

Trent King

[JollyElm]

We had one here last month at a mall in a pseudo-free CA county. No masks required, held inside a former (huge) Forever 21 store. It was awesome, especially since there was a food court 100 feet away, and they had some quality autograph signers for people into that area of collecting.

[mr2686]

I always loved those mall shows back in the day. In fact, I got back in to the hobby after going to a mall show to see Duke Snider in the late 80's. Fun times.

[frankbmd]

Originally Posted by JollyElm

We had one here last month at a mall in a pseudo-free CA county. No masks required, held inside a former (huge) Forever 21 store. It was awesome, especially since there was a food court 100 feet away, and they had some quality autograph signers for people into that area of collecting.

Bingo! I'm going to a food court today and try to sell my autograph and offer fries with it. Honestly I've never had any success selling my vintage quarter pounders and PSA will not grade them.