As the purchaser of a slabbed lobby card from Heritage this weekend,
and a collector who's younger and much less experienced in this hobby
than most of you, I thought I'd throw in a couple cents...
The slabbed card I bought ($325 bid -->$400 all told) is the portrait
card from MR. SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON (1939), CGC graded 7.0,
Heritage graded Fine/Very Fine:
http://movieposters.ha.com/common/view_item.php?Sale_No=7025&Lot_No=83797
I'd never seen a CGC encapsulated lobby before this Heritage auction,
and I actually emailed Heritage asking about it -- whether I'd be
devaluing the card by removing it from the plastic, which I'm
inclined to do so that when I frame it, it will look the same as my
other framed lobby cards. (Though I have a large box of posters
under my bed, I always buy them with the intention of framing and
hanging them; I'm just out of wall space for anything bigger than a
window card at the moment. I buy posters as decoration, not investments.)
In addition to my query about CGC, I also asked Heritage about their
*original* description (no longer up), which noted a tear in the top
border (that I couldn't see), but said nothing about what appeared to
be a large tear in the bottom middle that went up into the image
area. What's interesting is the reply I got from Bruce Carteron at Heritage:
"Thanks for your inquiry. You can certainly take these out of the
sleeves to hang them up. You would just have to have the card
regraded again if you resold it. None of the defects were supposed to
be mentioned when it was CGC graded. The tear was taken into
consideration when it was graded originally."
As I wanted the card to frame and hang (MR. SMITH being one of my
"top five" favorite movies) and I didn't see the tear in the bottom
as being too detrimental to its display value, given the limited
bidding, I put in a small bid and won. Still, I thought it
interesting that for CGC cards, Heritage seemed to think that putting
the CGC grade in the description was good enough. Personally, I
would have preferred the "tear here, crease there, three pinholes"
kind of description they give for the rest of their lots, especially
since this was a "Signature" auction.
Long story short, I bought this card IN SPITE of its CGC
encapsulation, not because of it. I know I'm less sophisticated than
most of you long-time collector/dealers. I bought my first posters
in 1997 from a price list I received in the mail. I knew nothing
about "sheet" sizes or even "R" re-release dates, let alone
condition, and hadn't even seen an image of the posters I bought
(based on film titles) until they arrived. Needless to say, I've
learned a lot since then (and replaced most of those original
purchases with better quality posters in more reasonable sizes with
better images from those titles). Now I pay attention to things like
condition and previous purchase prices (mostly from Bruce and
Heritage's online databases), and buy fewer, better posters than I
did when I started. I also only buy from reputable dealers and
haven't purchased a poster on eBay in at least five years.
Since taking my new lobby out of the plastic only de-values it
if/when it comes time to resell it, and in the meantime increases its
value to me, that's probably what's going to happen to it when it
arrives. Thought that might interest some of you.
Elizabeth
ReelClassics.com
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