1921 Koester's Bread Cards on E-Bay

bcbgcbrcb · #1 02-16-2010, 12:10 PM

I am guessing that many other e-bayers shared my doubts when making bidding decisions on these Koester Bread cards last night as the Ross Youngs sold for $70.99. Although it was hand-cut unevenly, the card still lists in the 2010 SCBC for $1,500, $900, $500 (these figures are approximate as I don't have the book handy) in varying conditions. I would think with this set being so scarce that a HOF'er would sell for far more than it did. I might have paid 4X the selling price if I knew the card to be legitimate.

DanP · #2 02-16-2010, 12:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bcbgcbrcb

I am guessing that many other e-bayers shared my doubts when making bidding decisions on these Koester Bread cards last night as the Ross Youngs sold for $70.99. Although it was hand-cut unevenly, the card still lists in the 2010 SCBC for $1,500, $900, $500 (these figures are approximate as I don't have the book handy) in varying conditions. I would think with this set being so scarce that a HOF'er would sell for far more than it did. I might have paid 4X the selling price if I knew the card to be legitimate.

Phil, I won 2 of the cards. I was also skeptical and emailed him. He sounded like he knew what he was talking about. The fact that he had a Burkett selling with these others made me feel like maybe they were Koester Bread cards. I thought the reason the Young(s) card went so low was that it will probably only get an Authentic grade, not sure. FYI. I spent 3 hours reading 5 years of N54 posts before bidding (back to the Hal Lewis days). I'm not sure how SGC will label them, of course, except the Burkett. As soon as I get them they are going overnight to SGC. Bottom line, after my research and email I trusted the seller. Dan

bcbgcbrcb · #3 02-16-2010, 12:48 PM

Dan:

It sounds like you put in the time and effort that I was too lazy to do and you were rewarded nicely for it! My guess is that as long as you are able to provide documentation of the Lew Lipset auction showing the cards cut from a sheet to SGC, they will probably encapsulate any/all of the cards from last night's auctions as "Authentic" only as they were all hand cut.

rhettyeakley · #4 02-16-2010, 01:03 PM

I actually have a major problem with the grading companies encapsulating anything as a Koesters Bread card that isn't one of the exclusive cards I wrote about earlier.

While these cards were all likely Koesters as they obviously came from the same sheet/find. The problem lies in that every W575-1 of Dave Bancroft leaping in the air could then be deemed to be a Koesters Bread card and then be "worth" multiples over what it should. Even though these have the provenance as being Koesters (in my opinion) they are all just W575-1 UNLESS the player was only made by the Koesters Company--

Provenance can be tricky, I can already see people buying up any and all Yankee & Giants W575-1 cards and sending them to the same grading companies and having them all encapsulated as Koesters. I don't really care whether the card was made by Koesters or not, if one can't tell by looking at it on it's own merits it shouldn't be encapsulated as such.

-Rhett

nolemmings · #5 02-16-2010, 01:15 PM

Rhett, can you verify that all of the w575-1s carry the exact same caption as Koester's except for what you call the exclusive cards, i.e. typeset and text are identical?

rhettyeakley · #6 02-16-2010, 04:09 PM

Todd, there are actually a few that have some slight variations but I am not ready to out these yet as I need to do more research to confirm my theory. That being said, the VAST majority (roughly 75%) of "Koester's" cards are simply W575-1 cards--one would not be able to tell one from the other (thus in my opinion they are the same thing).
-Rhett

I just wanted to add: To me it would be analogous to making a distinction between a regular Tom Barker game card a card that came out of the Fenway Brewery set. The only cards in the Fenway Brewery set that are any different are the Baker and the Scorecard/Instructions have had the red overprints on them. Any cards other than Baker and the Scorecard by themselves one would never be able to tell which "set" they originated from--thus they are the same thing (at least in my eyes).

rhettyeakley · #7 02-16-2010, 04:25 PM

Another way to think about these cards is this... we know that W575-1's were produced and distributed by many different outfits. I have seen many with caramel/candy stains and not to mention Henry Johnson & James Keating cards are simply W575-1's w/ their own rubber stamp on back. Thus, Koester's Bread was just another producer of the W575-1's--the only distinction is that we have surviving ads from Koesters and they decided to add a few players that were going to be playing in the World Series along with the already designed NY Giants and Yankees players that had been distributed via American Caramel, Gassler's, Haffner's, Witmor Candy, Clark's Bread, etc. along wth the other anonymous manufacturer cards (what we call W575-1). In other words since they already had many players' cards designed for these earlier promotions they added a few new guys to make the set the size they wanted consisting of only Giants and Yankee players.
-Rhett

steve B · #8 02-17-2010, 05:36 PM

Just a thought. Given the way printing was done then, It's unlikely the cards from a koesters sheet are exactly identical to W575s having come from a different printing plate. The key being "exactly". It's probable that there are tiny differences in the screening or dot pattern between the two sets. Inconsequential differences for most purposes, but still different enough to tell. If I owned any I'd do some 800 dpi scans and then I'd know for sure.

Steve

DanP · #9 02-17-2010, 05:43 PM

Steve, I have 2 Koester's cards (Burkett and Youngs) coming. I'd be willing to scan them at 800dpi and send you the images. However, I don't own any 575's. Maybe someone else could do the same? Dan

prewarsports · #10 02-17-2010, 05:56 PM

It is more likely that the same company that printed the W575 cards also printed the cards to be distributed by Koesters so the same screens, stock, ink and images were almost certainly used. There could be some differences in the printing, but it is likely that unless new poses or positions were used, the cards are probably as identical as other cards from the series with identical fronts and just different backs.

Rhett is the walking encyclopedia on this stuff and his knowledge on these sets is really unbelievable (especially since it is ALL from memory and he does not use Price Guides or other peoples research and catalogs) so I am not speaking for him. That is just my understanding on how these cards were made.

Rhys

rhettyeakley · #11 02-17-2010, 06:54 PM

What you have to remember about all these E121-like sets is that they are very much like the T205 or T206 set (or even the M101-4/5 or E135/H801-8 family of sets), but for some reason we don't think of them like that. As in those sets, there are many different backs... all of which were produced by the same people but the difference lies in what is (or isn't) printed on the backs. It would make more sense for the printing company to use the image/card they had already designed for say Dave Bancroft for example than to design a brand new image or change anything for a new client (in this case Koester's). For players they hadn't already made yet the image was designed from scratch and those are the exclusive cards I was talking about. I am really close to developing a rough time line for most of the E121-like backs. These Koesters cards were produced in 1921, after the initial printing of the E121 Series of 80 set, but before the Series of 120 which was a 1922 production. These sets began w/ the first series of Holsum Bread cards (a 1920 issue) and ended with the later printings of E121 series of 120 and the W501 set-- so from 1920 to late 1922.
-Rhett

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