Vintage Sports Cards - Whats the Best Way to Store Vintage Sports Cards and Memorabilia?
The best way for you to store your vintage sports cards, newspapers, ticket stubs, and memorabilia depends upon how you want to present your collection. sometimes collectors display several of their prized cards or memorabilia in display cases for others to frequently view, while other collectors are more focused on achieving long-term storage to preserve their investment.
How to handle your sports cards and memorabilia
It's very important to handle your vintage sports cards and memorabilia with great care. Remember not to touch or handle a card or memorabilia item by its corners. it is better to handle your collectible by its edges. Likewise, it's preferable to lay the card flat on a clean surface, or rest it on an angle against something solid so you do not scratch or damage the back of the card or collectible.
How to store your sports cards and memorabilia
The best way to store your card collections and memorabilia is to place them in a dark, cool, and dry environment. Bright light, high humidity and high temperatures can affect a card's appearance and value. Failing to protect your sports cards and memorabilia could result in discoloration, extreme wear, and bent corners, to name a few ways that could typically decrease the item's value, even below its original cost.
Before we discuss the various options you have for protecting your valuable sports cards and memorabilia, please remember that to protect your investment it's important that these valuables are not pushed into a corner or closet, unprotected. One day when you decide to sell a card or item from your collection, you will quickly realize that the sports card industry demands perfection when buying collectibles-that's why paying attention to how to store your collectible will determine their value in the future.
Protective storage options for vintage sports cards and memorabilia
You can purchase plastic sleeves or poly sleeves, as they are sometimes called, to help keep your sports cards straight, flat, and protected. Most of the poly sleeves are three-hole punched, which makes it extremely easy to store one card in a poly sleeve, and then to insert the poly sleeve into a three-ring binder.
Likewise, once your memorabilia or sports cards are inserted into poly sleeves, you may also place them in storage boxes if you're going to store them for a long period of time.
TIP Be sure to create an inventory for each one of your sports cards or pieces of memorabilia. the inventory list would typically include the player's name, the card number, the company who made the card, the year the card was made, and adding the approximate condition of each card or memorabilia piece is a bonus.
If you are storing a group of cards together as a collection, perhaps you can give it a number, and then place the corresponding number on your inventory list. Like with all your other important papers, be sure to store your sports cards and memorabilia inventory lists in a safe place.
Storage boxes are adequate for storing your least valuable sports cards and memorabilia. Boxes can be organized by set, by player, alphabetically, by year, by the card company, or publisher.
TIP Creating an organizational system now for your vintage sports cards and memorabilia will be critical in the future when you decide to sell a card, a magazine, a ticket stub, or any of your collectibles. Why? when you have a system, then you will know exactly where to look when you decide to sell one of your items.
Some sports card collectors prefer to use a case that screws shut since they believe that it protects their most valuable cards. the case is made of transparent plastic that is screwed shut, and holds a card safely and securely in place. it protects and preserves the current condition of the sports card.
In addition to poly sleeves and screw-shut cases, here is a partial list of other storage devices that you may wish to consider to protect your collectible investments for the long-term.
* Acrylic and acid-proof storage boxes
* Toploaders (soft or hard)
* Acrylic or Glass display Cases
* Three-ring binders with top-loading plastic sleeves
* Picture Frames
* Sports Boards or Matboards
* Magnetic card holders
Vintage Sports Cards - What's the Best Way to Store Vintage Sports Cards and Memorabilia?
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