Topps Venezuelan Question

[quitcrab]

Does anyone have a wrapper to post?
Did Topps really authorize the printing of these cards ?
If ever year have an album to glue the cards into ?
Thanks Scott

[Cliff Bowman]

The albums started in 1964 and continued for 1966, 1967, 1968, and the 1972 ‘stamps’. That is why 1959, 1960, and 1962 rarely have damaged glued backs and the years after often do.

[quitcrab]

Thanks…. Anyone have a wrapper? I assume they where distributed in packs.

[Cliff Bowman]

I have seen a few pics of cards with pieces of the wrapper stuck to the back but I didn't keep any of the scans.

[ALBB]

yea,
id love to see a wrapper from any of those years

[here2havefun]

I've never seen a pack or wrapper from any of the Topps sets. There are unopened packs from the Venezuelan league sticker sets from the 70's and 80's, they were paper packs. Here's two:

1972:
https://bid.robertedwardauctions.com...?itemid=104444

1987:
https://bid.robertedwardauctions.com...e?itemid=88006

[quitcrab]

Thanks for the pictures of the packs.
Now we need to find a 1959-68 wrapper!

So did Topps put out the Venzualen cards, or are they a black market product of Venezuela with no permission from Topps ?

[Cliff Bowman]

If it was bootleg and unauthorized I would find it odd that Topps let it go on for ten years (1959-1968) and that would also mean that someone was backdooring all of the materials needed to print those sheets to Venezuela.

[raulus]

Originally Posted by quitcrab

So did Topps put out the Venzualen cards, or are they a black market product of Venezuela with no permission from Topps ?

Found this article, which suggests that the production was a deliberate partnership:

https://lifetimetopps.wordpress.com/...lan-1959-1968/

This article was also enlightening:

https://oldbaseball.com/m/refs/Venezuelan.pdf

[here2havefun]

1967 set is an anomoly, it's been speculated for years that Topps had nothing to do with it. It's most likely that set was produced by Sport Grafico, a sport magazine in Venezuela. Here's a great blog post about the set: https://sabrbaseballcards.blog/2020/...the-caribbean/

[toppcat]

It is my understanding that all of the Venezuelan sets from 1959 to 1968, with the exception of the Retirado and VWL cards in 1967, used images supplied and licensed by Topps. Not sure about the 1972 and 1977 releases. Topps had a long relationship with some Venezuelan firms and people, going back to at least 1952, where the US high numbers were released down there and which continued for several seasons afterward. The relationships were likely formed earlier than that in terms of confections, as Topps was working on international trade even before World War 2.