A couple of years before the Pandemic, On The Shlabotnik report that I thought Topps Heritage was going to end in 2021 (with the 1972 design) because I felt that 1972 was the end of the Vintage years. I also thought that Topps would revert back to 1952 and start with that set because in 2022 everyone who was in the 2001 set would be out of the league.
I was wrong but I was partly right - instead of getting rid of Topps Heritage they started Topps Chrome Platinum.
Crazily in June of 2022, they released 2021 Topps Chrome Platinum using the 1952 design - So I was kind of right they were reuse the 1952 design for major set on current players.
In June of 2023, they released 2022 Topps Chrome Platinum using the 1953 design.
In June of 2024, well...........
Topps ended Heritage minors in 2022. Unless they put out a set this year (possibility???)
Which got me to thinking. I really liked the 2024 (1975) and 2025 (1976) Topps Heritage sets. But I think I know why, because that was in my wheelhouse, 11 and 12 years old collecting. I started collecting at 7 the 1972 Topps Set (My First Love - and still my favorite), and a lot of kids in the neighborhood were collecting but by 1975/1976 it was just me trying to all the cards in the set. Which I never did.
Demographics. The Baby Boomer era 1946 to 1964 when the birth rates were high, The 1952 set came out when the baby boomers were 6 years old. The number of births per year fell every year from 1965 to 1977. In 1976 - The 11, 12, 13 year olds were the end of the baby boomers. As I mentioned before by 1976, I was basically the only one in the neighborhood collecting - there was no one to trade with (and come to think of it, I was one of the younger kids, there was a kid around 11 but I don't remember any kids in the neighbor between 5 to 10 years at the time. In fact, I can only remember when I was 17, a 4 year-old girl who lived down the street and she had to have been born in the late 1970s so I really believe that declining birth rate was true.
In 1979, 1980, 1981 there were a hell of a lot less 11/12/13 year-olds collecting cards than there were 5 to 10 years before.
These heritage sets are about nostalgia - which the coming design years would have less adults who collected them as kids.
Part of the reason I never really sought the heritages (the biggest reason was cost of short prints), was I did not collect them as a kid and they did not have the hold on me (though I love looking at cards from the 1950s and 1960s).
Back to Demographics - if I remember correctly the number of births increased each year from 1978 to 1989. They fell in 1990s (beginning with the terrible GDP years in 1990 and 1991) until sometimes in the early 2000s but I am not positive about this.
These demographic partly explain the junk wax era. In 1987, those born in those increasing birth rate years would have been 9, and reached 13 in 1991 (which appears to be the age (13) when a lot of kids drop out collecting - I had a 12 year old cousin who completely lost interest in cards after 1989). The junk wax explosion may have also been from some of the Baby Boomers (35-41 years old - stashing cards for their 5 and 6 year olds).
This takes me back to the potential upcoming heritage sets - I like the 1977 set, but I really don't care to collect it in modern version form. For some strange reason I would like to see a 1979 version of Heritage. I don't have much emotional attachment to the 1978, 1980, 1981, 1982, 1984, 1985, 1986 sets.
I would like to see a version of the 1983 and yes 1987 but that is about it.
Personally, I can see Topps (Now Fanatics) not continuing this much longer. I think we are getting hints of things to come (see above) and with the Heritage update set coming out almost a year after the release of 2024 Heritage set. Will there be an update set this year, I did notice the checklist did not really miss any big name players like they did last year. Is there a need for it. The way the rookie card status is manipulated is there a reason to get Nick Kurtz in any of the sets this year (He debuted in end of May) as the rest of the rookie class is really lacking.
I don't think there is a nostalgia market for us people in our late 50s and early 60s to want to collect the upcoming designs.
Well, the simple answer is that they'll stop making Heritage when it's no longer profitable. But the upcoming period was a big one for collecting. Baseball cards as a hobby really took off in the '80s and hit a peak in the junk wax era. There's a reason why Topps keeps putting cards based on sets like 1987 and 1989 in flagship as inserts and I'm thinking the years when those come around will be good ones for Heritage. When they reach 1995 they might start to have problems as collecting lost steam after the players' strike. But that's two decades away, and it's hard to say what the market will be like then.
ReplyDeleteSorry to hear that they aren't making Heritage Minors anymore. I've been buying the team issue sets made by Choice for the Mets affiliates (Binghamton and Syracuse) so I guess it's not that big a void, but there are some of those Heritage Minors cards (such as Mark Vientos on the 1969 design and Francisco Álvarez on the 1972) which I absolutely adore. One dealer at the shows around here often has dime boxes with a lot of Heritage Minors and Pro Debut from the mid-teens and it's fun to grab early cards of current players.