In “I wish I owned a time machine,” hobby history is this advertisement from the December 1979 issue of The Trader Speaks for “sealed gum cases at the lowest prices ever seen!” And yup, that would be from Mike Cramer’s Pacific Trading Cards.
I shared this image on the Facebook “Vintage Wax and Packs” group, which led to some entertaining comments.
One person said he’d take an infinite amount of 1977-78 Topps Basketball; I agreed since I’ve only ever seen one photo of a wax case.
Another collector asked himself why he hadn’t bought a case for $25, responding that it was about $151 in today’s dollars.
There were a lot of comments about Mike Cramer, who owned the company. By the way, if you have any of his old catalogs for sale, please contact me.
The best comment was, “Funny that the priciest case then is the crappiest one now.” Referring to the 1975 Topps ABC Sports “Giant Stickers” for $40. They must have printed a million of them (and) or sold poorly because they’re incredibly easy to find today; a box was sold on eBay for $8 a few weeks ago.