General Forum

I keep seeing it brought up in passing but I think it's time the question be asked, are we in a new junk card era?

For evidence I present a couple things...

1) In stores I'm starting to see boxes of prior year cards on the shelves marked down and current year cards are even being marked lower online.

2) When I added some of the 2023 Topps cards I have for trade, I noticed there are well over 1,000 of each card already in people's collections and the people offering some of the cards up for trade were up over 200, where the number of people looking for the cards was under 30.

3) I'm not seeing many sold auctions online for base cards.  During the height of Covid, even commons were selling for 99 cents and selling well, now unless it's a parallel or subset, they aren't selling at all.  Even major stars are very infrequent in their sales.  And the prices I'm seeing are dropping.  Just a few years ago, I was seeing base cards going $10+ within the first month or two of sets being released.  Now, even the inserts are topping out around $1 in most cases.

4) Card isles aren't being cleaned out by flippers any more.  I'm finding it easier and easier to find boxes of cards in my local stores.

What do you all think?

I agree, particularly with your second point. I'm amazed to see the amount of base flagship in people's collections, and the high ratio of FS/T to wants.

I'm not sure if I'd call it another Junk Wax Era, but it sure feels like the early 1990s again. Maybe the Parallel Set Era has begun ... or began I guess in 2020, and now it's running out of gas. 

Seems that way

it's isn't even just 2023 either.  I though maybe since people are still trading and settling with the current year cards the fs/t ratio would be off but I picked a random 2022 card and there were 1,464 in collections, 14 wants and 311 up for trade.  A random 2021 card had 1,452 in collections, 21 wants and 277 up for trade.

For comparison I pulled a random 1992 Topps card (which we all agree is peak junk era) and I see 1,533 in collections, 29 wants and 172 up for trade.

Couple other years I compared:
Yr - cards in collections - wants - for trades
2023 - 1,154 - 20 - 224
2022 - 1,464 - 14 - 311
2021 1,452 - 21 - 277
2011 - 750 - 48 - 60
2003 - 578 - 30 - 49
1995 - 698 - 32- 61
1992 - 1,533 - 29 - 172
1987 - 2,459 - 24 - 307
1980 - 1,234 - 54 - 83
1973 - 783 - 61 - 68
1954 - 181 - 59 - 8 (low # series)

I tried to pick a common low number in every case.  As you can see, the ratios we are seeing are close to junk era ratios.  I guess the follow up question is when has this trend started?  Seems in the early 2000s people either left the hobby or whatever as there are far fewer cards in over all collections then the total cards in members collections jumps back up again somewhere in the twenty teens.

Yes, but a different kind of "junk".  The original "junk" was because of overproduction by numerous card companies. Now the "junk" is more about quality and a couple of companies producing 20-30 brands and hundreds of parallels and inserts.

It feels more like the abundance era, which primarily sits between 1998 and 2003. Basically, there are way too many products that are available.

I would be curious to know what the production runs are on current year cards vs those from the junk era.  Example, 1991 Topps and 2021 Topps (Flagship/base only.)  I'm sure they are out there, but 2020 seems to be the height of the bubble for the current era so the impact in production would have probably been 2021 / 2022.  There would be variables, such as the different sets that are out now as opposed to back in the 1991.  

Two years ago, a local hobby shop owner said this was going to happen. He said that the bottom was going to fall out of the card market, but he was off by a year or so. His shop does not deal in sports cards, whatsoever, even though he has over two million cards sitting in a local storage facility. He'll help with supplies all day long, but he'll never deal in sports cards again. It's just too volatile for some people, I guess. Right now, it's a case of higher supply and lower demand, but the reasons why, I'm sure, are varied. Some collectors are overpriced out of the market, some changed their collecting wants, and some just got bored with it and left the hobby, I'd guess. Card companies saw the increase in demand, figured they'd produce more cards, overshot their estimates, and now they're stuck with product that fewer people want. I wouldn't necessarily call it "junk," though. It's just high-priced stuff that fewer people want, right now. Personally, I'd love to grab a box of cards every time I go into Walmart. When I have to choose between cards and a tank of gasoline for the car, though, being able to drive far outweighs pretty pieces of cardboard every time.

Card companies saw the increase in demand, figured they'd produce more cards, overshot their estimates, and now they're stuck with product that fewer people want.

Exactly what happened in the late 80s/early 90s. The difference this time around is the number of parallels and inserts + the number of different sets produced by these companies - Base, Allen & Ginter, Archives, Gypsy Queen, Heritage, Holiday (yuk!), Opening Day, and then the end year Update that has way too many cards in the set. For all of these, the base cards are overproduced so that they can issue enough packs to get out all the SP, SPP, parallels, & inserts (and their parallels). If you only collect base sets, it is a good time to be in the hobby.