https://sportsillustrated98.com/Sports Illustrated Blog #66 – Vintage 40’s 50’s and 60’s SPORT and BASEBALL Publications – The “Next Big Thing”  Welcome to my Sports Illustrated/TIME magazine blog – Your collector’s guide to the latest hobby updates and insight into what’s trending now.  The Next Big Thing – It’s what we’ve been chasing since Mom threw away our baseball cards.  Our hobby is in a constant state of change – growing, expanding and creating opportunities.  Paperboard/Magazine collecting seems to follow the yin and the yang or the zero sum game.  For every winner, there’s a loser, and for every loser there’s a winner. The allure is to be the guy that hangs out in the winner’s circle more than the average.  My goal is to help you be one of those guys.  Collectors can be laser focused on “their” interests and miss the evolution of the hobby and opportunities.  Case in point, if you were a card collector in the 80’s, you know baseball cards were king.  Every now and then you might find a hard core guy that liked hockey, basketball or even football.  Over time, collectors moved into other major sports vastly increasing the demand and quickly driving values upward.  Opportunities followed for those that were paying attention early. New card manufacturers emerged to follow the same path.  Topps was king and their values were too – two/three times the competition – but the hobby still wasn’t satisfied.  The “next big thing” became – quality, population, and competition.  With the 80’s came Donruss, Fleer and Upper Deck and card values were determined more by population and quality than by manufacturer.  Hobbyists that recognized these evolutionary changes and were open enough to the “next big thing” market around them, were able to capitalize on this movement by being early to adopt. The point I’m making is opportunities arise more from change than from conviction.  For example, I am a diehard SI fan and collector.  In the past four years I have written 65 informational blogs in an effort to promote what I believe to be the best sports publication ever produced.   But just like Burger King and Wendy’s, there is a market for #2. Sports Illustrated was late featuring covers of Mantle, Williams, DiMaggio, Robinson, Musial, Mays, Chamberlain, Koufax, Unitas, and many more.  Who’s going to fill that void?  SPORT, BASEBALL,  Baseball Digest, TIME, etc. etc.  Other pubs were a bit ahead of the game as you will see below.  Future collectors will create a demand for the first Mantle, Aaron, Chamberlain, Unitas and so on and on and on….  Watch and see. Below you will find Mantle’s first ever cover from 1951 and many other one of a kind, none higher, POP 1 CGC grades. These issues offer a chronology of sport like nothing else.  Take a look at what kind of pub I’m talking about.

These are the covers other Pubs are chasing.                                1956 Triple Crown                      1962 First Major Pub for Clemente None Higher  First ever pub for Mantle – None Higher POP 1              1953 – None Higher POP 1 1953 – 3 years ahead of SI                                       1959 Unitas – previous to SI 1951 – 4 years ahead of SI None Higher POP 1           1947 – 8 years ahead of SI None Higher POP 1 1955 – Only major pub of Skowron                               1964 Clay – None Higher POP 1 1963 – None Higher POP 1                            1951 – Cy Young – None Higher POP 1 1957 Mantle Berra – None Higher POP 1                1965 Koufax None Higher POP 1 1957 Mantle – None Higher POP 1                       1957 Mantle – None Higher POP 1 1953 Spahn – None Higher POP 1                     1957 awesome esthetics – None Higher POP 1 1966 Koufax – None Higher POP 1                            1953 – Roy Campenella None Higher POP 1 1958 – Nellie Fox – None Higher POP 1    1964 – Mays DiMaggio None Higher POP 1 1957 First ever pub for Chamberlain – None Higher POP 1   1959 Unitas – None higher POP 1 This is just a sampling of the early entries now available.  It is my prediction that these covers and others like them will “Be The Next Big Thing.”  Feel free to contact me if you have an interest in procuring or have questions on any of the above.  Thank you. I hope you are enjoying the reads on the history of TIME and SI magazines as well as an insight into relevant magazine collecting. Great collecting to you and best fortunes with Sports Illustrated/TIME!   For a complete review of previous blogs, please visit  www.sportsillustrated98.com

Welcome to my Sports Illustrated/TIME magazine blog – Your collector’s guide to the latest hobby updates and insight into what’s trending now.

As our hobby evolves, new buying patterns of the largest and most avid collectors are beginning to emerge.  You will read about it here so you may take advantage of knowing where the deep pockets are trending. 

Initially graded collections were all about the most famous athletes in the highest grade.   The athlete on the cover and, of course, the year, were the most important value considerations.  The value would increase as the grade would increase but what happens when there are no more (or relatively few) 1956 SI Mickey Mantle, 1963 SI Cassius Clay or 1977 SI Larry Bird covers surfacing at any grade?  What do we buy?  Where do we look for the next value plateau?

The answer was high grade, second tier, first cover issues – Jeter, Brett, Schmidt, Henderson, Elway, Marino, Montana, and hundreds more.  These covers included our favorite players, our home team heroes, but most importantly, they were available.  This trend allowed the hobby just the right amount of availability to satisfy demand but not too much or too little to suppress interest.  

As demand increased so did value.  In the past year, a high grade of any one of these second tier first covers has conservatively doubled and often tripled in value.  (Value = recent sell prices.)

But also over the past year, even these second tier covers have become harder and harder to find and collectors are moving again into another value plateau.  This value plateau is driven by GRADE over cover athlete.  Buyers, and I know this first hand, have begun buying graded magazines that they know will be the highest grade into ad infinitum.  The thought process is – the highest grade of any issue has value – especially first covers and subsequent covers of popular athletes and major sports.  Jordan is a great example but all of the famous, popular athletes have followed this trend.

This new GRADE buying trend has really allowed the hobby to expand by appealing to a more diverse audience.  It has made more issues of interest, available, more often and on a sustained basis.  

The key to our hobby – Issues for everybody.

That is today’s update – high grades are hot.  Use this knowledge to your advantage.

I hope you are enjoying the reads on the history of TIME and SI magazines as well as an insight into relevant magazine collecting.

Great collecting to you and best fortunes with Sports Illustrated/TIME!

For a complete review of previous blogs, please visit 

www.sportsillustrated98.com

Welcome to my Sports Illustrated/TIME magazine blog – Your collector’s guide to the latest hobby updates and insight into what’s trending now.

Interested in my opinion as to currently undervalued, graded SI’s?  You’ve turned to the right blog.  We talk a lot about the best of the best, the Crème de la Crème, and the 9.8’s.  Sure, we all want the best – the 9.6’s and 9.8’s (because CGC doesn’t include 9.9’s and 10’s in their magazine grading scale) – but there are many collectors and only very few of those grades are being doled out.

The good news is, the push to own the highest grade has opened a gap between first and second tier pricing.  As a consequence, there are many “diamonds in the rough” that are available in the mid-grades (many in the none higher, POP 1 grade) whose pricing values have not kept pace with their Tier 1 graded brethren – yet.  I believe the steady influx of new buyers into the hobby will create more of a demand for Tier 2 mags and, in turn, increase their values. 

So here is our hobby’s next opportunity – Mid-grade covers meeting the following criteria.  These undervalued issues typically are

1. A first cover or the subsequent covers of the biggest stars. 
2. A POP 1 or 2 with none higher
3. A recognizable name with HOF or significant event credentials
4. Esthetically pleasing
5. Scarce in higher grade (for ex – there is a universal characteristic that keeps the best condition mags from surviving long term)

Here are a few covers that, in my opinion, make the opportunity list.

1. SI #2 – Exclusive Mantle Baseball Card
2. Hank Aaron 1970 – 2^nd cover
3. All Clay covers between 1963 thru 1968
4. Bobby Clarke – 1974
5. Steve Carlton – 1973
6. Bob Cousy – 1956
7. Whitey Ford – 1956
8. Bob Greise – 1973
9. Catfish Hunter – 1972 and 1974
10. Al Kaline – 1956
11. Any Mantle between 1956 and 1967
12. Mays – 1959 and 1962
13. Lower grades of Montana – 1982
14. Nowitzski – 2002
15. Oliva – 1965
16. Carew – 1974
17. Rosen – Baseball Cards – 1955
18. Duke Snider – 1956
19. Warren Spahn – 1956
20. Jim Taylor – 1962
21. John Wooden SOY – 1972
22. Eric Dickerson – 1983
23. Sadaharu Oh – 1977
24. Thurman Munson – 1977
25. Doug Flutie – 1983
26. Don Mattingly – 1985
27. Gary Carter – 1980
28. Franco Harris – 1976
29. Lynn Swan – 1976
30. Walter Payton – 1976 – 1985

I could easily add another 25-50 to the above list and if you’d like to write me with your suggestions, I’d love to hear from you.

I hope you are enjoying the reads on the history of TIME and SI magazines as well as an insight into relevant magazine collecting.

Great collecting to you and best fortunes with Sports Illustrated/TIME!

For a complete review of previous blogs, please visit 

www.sportsillustrated98.com

Welcome to my Sports Illustrated/TIME magazine blog – Your collector’s guide to the latest hobby updates and insight into what’s trending now.

This is not the end, no, not even the beginning of the end, but the end of the beginning.  Sorry I can’t take credit for that one (Winston Churchill on the defeating of the German Luftwaffe by the Royal Air Force).  But it perfectly sums up the current evolution of our hobby. 

In recent times, we’ve started to see the beginning of the maturing of the graded magazine hobby.   We now have several thousand graded examples of SI, TIME, Sport, etc, magazines and things have started to settle in like dinosaurs in a tar pit.

A cursory review of these findings leads me to the following opinions.  Focusing on pre-1980 mags, if you have an SI cover that is a 9.4 or higher, there is a high statistical probability that grade will remain the highest into perpetuity.   I believe this to be true (and it is important that investors and collectors alike know this is not just a marketing claim but an opinion based on years of data) because I have observed millions of wannabees thru my countless internet searches, collection appraisals, and blog connections.  Barring the outer edges of the curve, pristine covers are just not out there.  OK – there are still the infrequent entries (outside 3 sigma) that grade high, but no major cover graded 9.4 or above, has been exceeded in over two years.  And that is a statistic to which we should be paying attention.

The reason all this is important is that many buyers are speculating on future results but, 

The more accurately we can predict future results, the less risk we have in our investments.

There are also variables which should be considered when attempting to predict future high grades.  For ex., SI covers between 7-1-56 and 12-31-70 have not held up particularly well under the stresses of time.  Therefore, a high grade from this era is likely to be scarcer than issues outside this era. 

If by chance you were to find the new highest grade of the 56 Mantle, 63 Clay, 77 Bird, 59 Unitas, 60 Brown, 83 Jordan and maybe 5-10 others, you can quit your day job.  Find one of these and you will set the entire hobby abuzz.  Make sure you get it accurately/appropriately appraised before you sell – if you sell.

So we are entering a new era of graded mag collecting.  Perhaps the biggest change is the number of interested parties.  In the past year, I have seen the buyer categories – investor, serious collector, casual collector, gift buyer – each appreciate in size and breadth much faster than early expectations. 

Investors now have competition and serious collectors have come to realize they may not be able to own the top grade and are having no problem buying up lower grades.  The casual collector and the gift giver love the encapsulation but care little about the grade.  Everybody, whether it be collector or gift giver, all seem to want their favorite player, event, or memory in graded encapsulation.

What great time it is to be an SI collector!

Next time we’ll take on the diamonds of the mid-grades.  There’s plenty of opportunity.

I hope you are enjoying the reads on the history of TIME and SI magazines as well as an insight into relevant magazine collecting.

Great collecting to you and best fortunes with Sports Illustrated/TIME!

For a complete review of previous blogs, please visit 

www.sportsillustrated98.com

Welcome to my Sports Illustrated/TIME magazine blog – Your collector’s guide to the latest hobby updates and insight into what’s trending now.

Nothing is more satisfying than verification that our prized collection might eventually support our retirement or undeserving child’s endowment.  To think that we might have made a profitable investment is a testosterone thing.

On this subject, I have been cautioned by a few hobby participants that it’s not all about increasing value.  My contention is that eventually it’s always about increasing value.  One thing is for sure, if you’re not looking to make a great investment, you won’t.

One way to legitimize your efforts is to compare your purchases against existing sold lists.  Problem for us magazine guys, there hasn’t been a whole lot of price comparison available.  Lucky for my readers, your author is the #1, foremost, ultimate source for graded magazine pricing evolution, both private and public.  I have graded, sold, and own more graded SI’s than all other sellers combined.  I only make this admonition because I want to establish the creditability behind the numbers I’m publishing.

In an effort to update current values, I went back to the Price Values Guide I established two years ago in my Blog #19.  Interestingly, I found the original guide, for the most part, was still quite accurate regarding current sales realized.  The major difference always seems to be at the top end of the spectrum.  No surprise, if you own one of a kind stuff, you dictate the price.  What may surprise you is the sell prices of those items.  But you will not find pricing verification anywhere, as these items are in collections and have not been re-sold since their original purchase. 

In fact, not one CGC 9.8 top 10 SI mag cover has changed hands in the past two years.

As a collector you should read into that extremely important statement – the big money isn’t selling – they’re still buying.  If you’re a collector, that is really good news.

Key to using this guide:

1. CGC census matters.  None Higher – POP 1 designations will out value others of the same grade.
2. Lower populations will out value higher populations.
3. “Unlimited” valuations of the Best of the Best are always set by the seller.
4. Grades lower than CGC 9.0 can be factored by a sliding scale continuation.
5. Valuations are first cover only.
6. Guide values are an average of all the variables.  For example, a 1967 Bobby Orr CGC 9.0, None Higher – POP 1 sold at Heritage auction this month for $6,360.  If your CGC 9.0 – 9.4 mag slips out of the Top 10, I’ve experience sell prices at or below $1,000.

2020 Sports Illustrated Evaluation Guide

Never Read	Top 10 Star	11-20 Star	21-100 Star
9.0	$2,500	$1,000	$500
9.2	$5,000	$2,000	$750
9.4	$10,000	$5,000	$1,500
9.6	unlimited	$8,000	$3,000
9.8	unlimited	unlimited	$6,000

One comment on a Top 10, FC, Sports Illustrated, never read, CGC 9.6 – 9.8, None Higher, POP 1 – I’m talking Mantle, Jordan, Gretzky, Mays, Clay, Clemente, Aaron, Rose, and maybe a couple more – bring a minimum of $50,000 if you want to own one – and that might not be enough.

In the end, do your homework.  Put yourself in the best position to succeed.  You’ll have fun and you’ll be happy you chose SI magazines.

I hope you are enjoying the reads on the history of TIME and SI magazines as well as an insight into relevant magazine collecting.

Great collecting to you and best fortunes with Sports Illustrated/TIME!

For a complete review of previous blogs, please visit 

www.sportsillustrated98.com

Sports Illustrated Blog #50 – State of the Collectible Sports Illustrated Hobby – 2020 Edition.

Welcome to my Sports Illustrated/TIME magazine blog – Your collector’s guide to the latest hobby updates and insight into what’s trending now.

We’ve hit a milestone in our journey to recognize and advance our hobby and all things Sports Illustrated. This blog marks my 50^th blog edition spanning coverage of the hobby over the past 3 years.  The mission has been to propel magazine collecting into the spotlight by educating any and all stakeholders to the truth and trends of our hobby.  In my coverage of present and potential values, forecasting, pricing, equity, movements in the market and answers to FAQ, nothing has been off limits.  My hope would be that within these writings you feel you have a bible into the hobby.

One thing I’ve learned over this period is that when you have a good (or great) thing, you can’t just sit on your hands and let the wind of change blow around you.  Building your SI collection has evolved from raw mags to newsstand to condition sensitive to grading to achieving the highest grade on as many issues as possible – and that’s where we are today.  We have built equity in our collections by being first or early in our acceptance of hobby movement.  And I believe those that followed this guideline have been nicely rewarded.

I have written very little about my early investors/believers in our neophyte hobby but I’d like to share a bit about my humble beginnings and my relationship with one investor.    One man believed and put his money in his belief.  My role was to search the world for high grade SI’s and he committed to buy them.  I made a profit on my sales and he built equity – a lot of it.   It was and still is a great partnership continuing to this day.  I wish to thank him here in this blog.  I mention this only to support the idea that the SI market is still a thing for those later adopters.

 Since, others that read my blogs, believed and followed suit, are also feeling positive about their future potential and as a result, they are not selling. 

It’s time for the next evolution.  The premise I’d like to put forth now, can be sufficiently explained by this analogy

“1952 Topps is to 1951 Bowman as Sports Illustrated Magazines are to other sports publications”.

Other sports publications do not compare to SI for all the collectable reasons however I believe as SI’s become more and more expensive and hard to procure, there will be increasing interest in off publications – in high grade. 

Therefore, off publications is the next trend I am hyping and advising to my readers.

Before I continue, I want to caution my readers about a couple of sellers on ebay, one in particular, that are trying to extort those of us that have faithfully and honestly tried to advance the hobby.  These sellers have artificially raised prices to crazy and unrealistic levels, to unsuspecting hobbyists in an attempt to scam my nonreaders.  Be careful of those who contribute nothing but try to piggyback on the real McCoy.  Text me if you have questions here.

Back to the topic, there are really great examples of very desirable pubs – mags featuring the iconic stars, years in advance of SI.  Musial, Mantle, Mays, DiMaggio, Williams…..  But, in my opinion, they must be very high grade and graded, to overcome the poor perception when compared to SI.  One issue I think really has potential is the 1946 Sport First Edition with DiMaggio on the cover. 

This is really an exciting pursuit in that it is as if we were starting over with the magazine collecting hobby.  A whole new window is opened and early believers will be rewarded.  Believe or not, invest or don’t, check my record for hobby predictions.

So there you have Blog # 50. 

I hope you are enjoying the reads on the history of TIME and SI magazines as well as an insight into relevant magazine collecting.

Great collecting to you and best fortunes with Sports Illustrated/TIME!

For a complete review of previous blogs, please visit  www.sportsillustrated98.com

Welcome to my Sports Illustrated/TIME magazine blog – Your collector’s guide to the latest hobby updates and insight into what’s trending now.

Each month, one or two new CGC Highest Graded Star Sports Illustrated Covers find their way into the hobby census.  Such are the dynamics of our growing, evolving graded magazine hobby.  

Three years ago, new highest grades for SI’s entering the market were a common ordinary occurrence but as the census has grown from less than 100 graded SI’s to several thousand, eclipsing an old, highest grade star cover has become less and less frequent.  Currently the hobby is absorbing, on average, approximately one or two per month, at best. 

In fact, I predict that, with extreme few exceptions, the grade on 99% of pre-1980, CGC 9.4 star covers will NEVER be beaten. These issues are so rare that CGC 9.0 and CGC 9.2 star covers for this era (especially those printed in the “dark era” – mid 56 thru 69) have become accepted as the gold standard for condition.  Eclipsing a CGC 9.0 or 9.2 today is a significant find.

Just like the graded card hobby, as the graded magazine hobby organizes and actual off-line buy prices become public, more highest grade submissions will surface.  However, the rate of new highest grade submissions will be just up to the level that attracts the supply and demand competition so healthy for a growing hobby.

One comment on off-line buy prices – currently off-line buy prices have not leaked to the public as of yet because investors are still enjoying artificially low buy prices and want to keep it that way as long as possible.  Rarely, if ever, does one see any auction house selling a highest grade star SI cover.  Same characteristic in the card market – rarely does one of the top cards come to auction.  I know this about off-line SI investing because I’m the market seller.

When the actual off-line buy prices become documented, it is then that the graded magazine hobby will heat up exponentially and you’ll be very glad you bought in early.  There will be more buyers than sellers and in collectibles that phenomenon is what drives the hobby to the next level.

As a graded SI collector and investor, I find this stuff sooo exciting – operating within an almost untapped frontier.  How many times in life does this kind of opportunity come along?  Even now, my readers tell me they wished they’d have joined the party when they first started reading this blog. 

Every day is a new adventure.  These old SI’s are so colorful they just jump out at you from inside the professionally designed CGC presentation case.  They tell a story, a history and chronology of events we saw with our own eyes. 

Sports Illustrated is the TOPPS of sports publications – it’s a Cadillac.   That’s why it’s is so popular – it has the tangibles AND the intangibles.  What a journey in just three short years!

 Here are a few of the new, highest grade, star covers joining the census in the past two months.

I hope you are enjoying the reads on the history of TIME and SI magazines as well as an insight into relevant magazine collecting.

Great collecting to you and best fortunes with Sports Illustrated/TIME!

For a complete review of previous blogs, please visit  www.sportsillustrated98.com

Welcome to my Sports Illustrated/TIME magazine blog – Your collector’s guide to the latest hobby updates and insight into what’s trending now.

SportsIllustrated9.8 has just received the “2019 Registry Award for Outstanding Achievement on Building the Top Ranked Set in the CGC Registry”.

Registries are an integral component of the card collecting hobby but virtually an unknown within the graded magazine hobby.  It’s time we changed that.

First, let’s define what a registry is and its relative importance to the hobby.  A registry is a set of graded items of any criteria – any items, any quantity, or any value that typically have some relationship to each other.  For ex. – all SI baseball covers pre 1980 or, all SI Sportsman of the Year issues or, the top ten home run hitter SI covers – anything of interest to you and/or other collectors.

Most hobbyists like to showcase their collections.  In many cases, considerable sums of time and money are devoted to chasing, locating, negotiating, organizing, comparing, displaying, marketing etc etc etc. one’s collection in an effort become recognized as the leader or the best or the most valuable.

One way to achieve recognition is to submit your proposed registry (all or part of your graded collection) to CGC for certification and listing.  Once your submission is confirmed and certified, CGC will add it to the appropriate category (with a title and include all submissions individually) within their overall registry list.  Currently, there are 10’s of 1000’s of registries all vying for individual recognition.

Recognition follows as registries also receive a grade and are ranked according to values assigned to the individual grades.  Each individual registry and each of its components can be viewed by any CGC society member.  If you are interested in finding out who owns certain graded items or who collects items that may be of interest to you either to buy, sell, or compare, periodically checking the registry list is a good way to develop contact information.  In this way, registries help organize the hobby and any contribution in this area is a good thing.

SportsIllustrated9.8, that’s me, won this year’s Magazine Category, for its submission of the first 25 years of the highest graded Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issues.  You can locate the issues and grades achieved in the current registry list, if interested.   I will be submitting more SI registries throughout the coming year as a way to further organize and promote the hobby. 

I hope you have found this information helpful in your pursuit of all things Sports Illustrated.  If you would like to know more about CGC registries feel free to contact me with any question you might have.

I hope you are enjoying the reads on the history of TIME and SI magazines as well as an insight into relevant magazine collecting.

Great collecting to you and best fortunes with Sports Illustrated/TIME!

Welcome to my Sports Illustrated/TIME magazine blog – Your collector’s guide to the latest hobby updates and insight into what’s trending now.

For my readers interested in graded SI trends, I have much to report. 

Five days exhibiting in Chicago proved to be much of what I expected – lots of questions and starry eyed intrigue.  The “National”, as it is called by the annual attendees, consists mostly of window shoppers, curious strollers out for a day away from home, and autograph seekers.  But also, there is a dedicated group of serious buyers that come from the four corners of the USA to buy or collect anything and everything.  Don’t let the low key, good ol’ boy conversations fool you, there is some high stakes, serious money at this show and they say if you can’t find it here, it probably doesn’t exist.

Our reason for attending the show was simple – to introduce the hobby of graded magazine collecting to as many and as much of the world as possible.  Yes, if I sold something that would be nice too.   I spoke with about 100 former/current card collectors interested in finding the next new investment potential.  I answered questions mostly regarding an explanation of the hobby, added 50-100 names to my blog, and took in a few new customers too.  Here’s hoping that the 100 interested parties with which I spoke will each tell 10 friends of their encounter and we’re off to the races.

Once the world understands that collecting graded SI’s is much the same concept as collecting graded cards, there will be an urgency to buy in as early as possible.    

Investors are intrigued by is the newness of the opportunity.  I heard over and over, investors have been mired within a very stable card collecting market and there is a pent-up demand for the next big new thing.  Card prices are almost like currency.  You can count on them.    If you have a Grade 6, 52 TOPPS Mantle, it is worth x amount given within a small range.  The only variation is at the very top end of the spectrum.

Graded SI’s are something quite different.  First of all, SI is the TOPPS of magazines.  It’s one of a kind – nothing out there like it.  That’s a big plus to collector’s seeking to find any small advantage. 

Imagine, it’s the year 1979 when you could buy a 52 TOPPS Mantle, in any grade, for $100.  That’s where we are in Graded magazines.  I started grading SI’s three years ago.  I began blogging and educating on the subject two years ago.  In that time, I have bought, graded and sold the top graded, most popular SI’s known to the hobby, many at a tenth of today’s value.  That’s been the price trajectory over these two years. 

But interestingly, even with early values skyrocketing, none – not one, of my highest value sales has ever been re-auctioned.  Why is this you say?  It is because investors make money by understanding the product life cycle – knowing when to buy and when to sell – and we are definitely on the front side of “Buy and Hold”.  If you are interested in an opportunity to invest in the latest, high grade acquisitions before they are made available to the hobby, send a request to be added to my investor list.

In fact, the whole graded SI concept has become so intriguing to early investors they can’t get enough – within 24 hours of my acquiring new high grade SI inventory – it is sold.  If there is a problem, it’s that the supply continues to fall short of demand.

That is the reason I have devoted such an effort to educate the world to the hobby.  I want you, my readers, to be the first exposed to the opportunity on the front side of the curve.  If you are someone who’s been weighing that investment decision, I think the simple fact that investors are buying but NOT selling, should be received as a very positive indicator.  

So the recap of the show is:

1. SportsIllustrated98 was the first and only exhibitor devoted to graded magazines ever to attend the National.
2. 100 more interested collectors have been brought into the family, and in time, we hope each will tell 10 friends.
3. There’s still time to get in on the front end of the investment cycle.
4. I saw nothing at the show in conflict with anything I have been saying.  My opinion – the hobby interest level will be advanced in the next year at least 3-5 times the interest level today.

I hope you have found this blog consistent with my stated intentions – to educate my readers as to the evolving status of the hobby.

I hope you are enjoying the reads on the history of TIME and SI magazines as well as an insight into relevant magazine collecting.

Great collecting to you and best fortunes with Sports Illustrated/TIME!

Welcome to my Sports Illustrated/TIME magazine blog – Your collector’s guide to the latest hobby updates and insight into what’s trending now.

One the most FAQ posed by my readers is “How do I match the most collectable covers to the years of their print?”

In previous blogs, I have published such lists as “a ranking of the most popular covers”, “the rarest covers overall”, and a general pricing guide reflecting up to date pricing trends.  Matching the most collectable covers to their years of print will help a collector when he or she is confronted with an inventory sale from a certain defined era.

For example, the conversation may go something like this – Seller – “What specifically are you looking for?”  Buyer – “What years do you have?”   Seller – I have from 1954 thru 1962.”  Boom! You know exactly which collectable covers could be included.

This list is by no means final, but it’s complete enough to get you started.  You can add to it with your own preferences.  Here they are. 

I hope you are enjoying the reads on the history of TIME and SI magazines as well as an insight into relevant magazine collecting.

Great collecting to you and best fortunes with Sports Illustrated/TIME!