The Tiffany Collection

It's not often I splurge on big card purchases.  I'm typically trying to nickel and dime my way to completing sets, but every so often an item pops up that really gets my attention.  It's at this moment when those two little figures appear on my shoulders.  You know the ones, an angelic looking figure trying to convince you to save your money for something better and the other devilish figure (which looks like my brother) telling you that you'll never ever see this in the wild again, so you better hurry up and buy it.

It's really an internal debate and I end up hemming and hawing over the benefit of buying more cards, especially if I never intend to open that box or set.  In some cases the point is moot because the price was too good to pass up.  At other times, I look at the opportunity cost.  How much will this set me back in beer money?  Decisions, decisions.

My Topps Tiffany collection started with this.  The 1990 Topps Tiffany Football set.  I purchased this set a long time ago from a place called Shinders.  This place was well known around here for its magazines/comics/cards, and I went there often looking for deals on marked down cards.  The original sticker is still on the box, but I didn't pay full price.  Shinders always had a weekly coupon in the local paper for 10 or 15% off and I gambled that no one else would swoop in on this deal.  I watched this set sitting high up a on a shelf for weeks and fortunately for me no one did.

The box of this tiffany set is rather sturdy.  Much more so then the baseball sets of prior years.  Here you can the see that the seal is still intact.  It's not often I pull this set out.

As you can see by the picture, I have set number 1030.  I've read somewhere that only 3000 of these were printed.  This is also the only year Topps produced a Tiffany FB set.

The next Tiffany set I purchased was the 1988 baseball set.  Long ago, I found this set tossed in with a bunch of junk wax sets marked down at a dealer table at a Twinsfest (when the Twins would host this event at the old Metrodome).  I think my final cost was $20.  This was a no brainer because you just don't find Tiffany sets laying around.  You can see that the seal is broke, so it was opened and as far as I can tell the entire set is there.

This is the first time I've ever pulled any cards out of the set.  They're very glossy and made from the same card stock as some of those small box sets (such as this one) that were printed in Ireland.

Despite this being an opened box (and the box is rather flimsy), the cards are in great shape.  I'm probably also fortunate that grading wasn't a thing back then, or that Glavine (and a few other cards) may have been pulled.  I think I read somewhere that the print run on this set was 30,000, but I've never seen another in the wild.  My set is number 19,136.

Aside from the glossy card stock, you can always tell a Tiffany card by looking at the back.  It is much brighter and clean then the regular issue.

Next up is this 1987 Topps Baseball Traded Tiffany set.  This was found at an estate sale, amongst a tray of toys.  It was a pleasant surprise to say the least, as again, I've never ever seen one of these in the wild.  I had to buy the whole tray of toys, but I didn't complain.

The box is still sealed but it has a couple of dimples in the front so I'm a bit worried about the condition of a couple of cards.  Nevertheless, owning the traded set meant that if I ever saw the main set I'd have to try to pair it up.  Oh and all those other toys went to Goodwill.

Finally there is this.  A fully sealed, barely touched 1987 Topps Baseball Tiffany set.  I first saw this while visiting a local shop with my brother.  The place had just bought out a collection and this set and a 1991 Tiffany set were sitting there waiting to be put out on a shelf.  Prices of the 1991 set are otherworldly, but knowing I had the '87 traded at home I focused on this.  Unfortunately the shop and I couldn't connect on a price point and I was forced to walk away from that deal.

As luck would have it, a couple weeks later my brother and I took a road trip to a card show.  While there we also visited a couple of local card shops.  It was at one of these shops that a chance at another '87 Tiffany set presented itself.  My brother's eagle eye saw it sitting in the shadows in the corner of a display case.  After never having seen this set in the wild, to all of suddenly seeing two in the matter of weeks was unreal.  I thought to myself, "a second chance"!  I called the dealer over and we talked at length about our collecting histories.  As luck would have it, he was the sole owner of this set and was willing to part with it.

Then the negotiating began.  He threw out a price and it was the same price that I had tried to buy the set a couple weeks prior!  Done deal!

I've seen plenty of individual Tiffany graded cards, but finding the whole set is a different beast.  And I don't know if I'll ever be able to add more Tiffany sets to my collection, especially due to the rarity of finding them in the wild, but I am super excited to have these sets.