Build a Custom Vintage Baseball Card Set: Dean's Cards

Let Us Build a Vintage Baseball Card Set Just for You!

by Dean Hanley,
Founder and Owner of Dean's Cards

Dean’s Cards has hundreds of vintage sets available online, but some of our customers ask us to meet some exact specifications for their sets. That’s when we reach into our vintage cards inventory of more than 1.5 million cards and custom build a set for you.

As an example, a new customer recently came to us and asked us to custom build sets for more than 20 consecutive years in a specific condition for each year. Our grading team quickly went to work and met the customer’s needs.

Some vintage baseball card sets recently built at DeansCards.com.

Due to the value of the cards, most Pre-War baseball card sets and 1952 Topps sets are custom built. Often, when collectors spend this amount of money, they are very particular on what they want.

Our staff of card grading experts reviews the cards personally to make sure you receive a set with the consistent grade you requested. And we grade our cards conservatively, on par with PSA standards – but we even go one step further. We take into account a card's "eye appeal” when we assemble a set.

Card collectors who are accustomed to purchasing ungraded sets from other vendors, are usually amazed at our tough grading standards – and the consistency of the condition of the cards in the sets we build for them. Other grading companies do not always take "eye appeal" into account when grading cards. Even if a card meets all of PSA's technical requirements for a particular grade, we also require that it have an overall look that represents that grade.

Our goal for your Dean's Cards custom set purchase is the exact same goal as we have when we buy cards -- we want you to be completely satisfied with the set you receive and never have to be hassled with returning unwanted cards for replacements. Our entire staff will do everything that we possibly can to exceed your expectations on the first try. No mistakes and no excuses. Your time is too valuable and your business is greatly appreciated. In short, we build your card set as if we were building it for our own collection.

1957 Toppses baseball card set at Deanscards.com

If you are looking for a card set that is not listed online, please contact us and let us know how we can build a set for you.

Please note that many expensive, custom-built sets require a deposit and/or milestone payments. Depending on their complexity, the set construction projects can take weeks, months, or sometimes even years.

Dean Hanley, founder and owner of DeansCards.com, is considered one of the foremost experts on the subject of vintage sports cards and has a regular column in the Sports Collectors Digest and publishes articles on his blog. Dean has also written two books on vintage sports cards: The Bubble Gum Card War: The Great Bowman & Topps Sets from 1948 to 1955 and Before There Was Bubble Gum: Our Favorite Pre-World War I Baseball Cards.

Click here if you have vintage baseball cards to sell -- 1869-1969.

How We Grade Baseball Cards and Other Sports Cards at Dean’s Cards

As a baseball card collector, I know that there is nothing more disappointing then buying a baseball card and then finding out the quality is not as good as promised. That's why at Dean's Cards we use the Grading Standards of PSA as the minimum baseline for grading the cards in our inventory. But we go much further than PSA standards -- we take into account a card's "eye appeal." Other grading companies, such as PSA do not always take "eye appeal" into account when grading cards. As a baseball card collector myself, I tend to be a bit more critical of a card's eye appeal than the professional grading companies.

Even if a card meets all of PSA's technical requirements for a particular grade, we also require that it have an overall look that represents that grade. For example, we tend to be more critical of cards that are blurry, dull, have diamond-cut (crooked) images or possess rough-cut edges. Collectors who are accustomed to purchasing ungraded cards from other vendors, are usually amazed at our tough grading standards. It is quite common for Dean's Cards to be graded one to three grades lower than similar raw cards (graded by the seller) that are sold online.

Dean with graded cards. Click here to learn about grading baseball and other sports cards.

Our Dean's Cards website shows the actual scans of the vintage cards that are listed online. Even with a huge image of the card that you are viewing, scans can sometimes be deceptive. By grading our cards conservatively, you can be assured that the cards you order from Dean's Cards will meet (and possibly exceed) your expectations. This practice is simply good business from our point of view.

If a card should fail to meet your expectations for any reason, please return it for a full refund. The reasoning behind this is simple: If you pay to have your card graded and encased and it is over-graded, you are probably happy. If you buy a card from us and it is over-graded, you are not happy.

Until 2012, we did not have scans of our vintage card inventory online. Before the scans, we had to exceed grading expectations, in order to avoid the business expense (as well as the customer frustration) of returned cards. Even though we now have (huge) actual images of our vintage cards, we have not relaxed our tough standards.

Elana, Dean's Cards purchasing manager, inspects a set of vintage baseball cards. Click here if you have vintage baseball cards from 1869-1969 that you would like to sell to Dean's Cards for top dollar.

Another difference that we have from PSA graded cards is that Dean's Cards does not use qualifiers on cards with flaws, such as OC (off center) or ST (stained). Dean's Cards will simply have a lower grade after taking that card's flaw into consideration. For example, a card that would grade PSA 8 (OC) would most likely be graded a Dean's Cards 6.

To further increase our quality, we ask our customers to report cards that appear to be graded too easy (or too tough) so that we can review the card and possibly adjust the grade.

Our goal for your Dean's Cards purchase is the exact same goal as we have when we buy cards -- we want you to be completely satisfied with the card you receive and never have to be hassled with returning unwanted cards for replacements. Our entire staff will do everything that we possibly can to exceed your expectations on the first try. No mistakes and no excuses. Your time is too valuable and your business is greatly appreciated.

Click here if you have vintage baseball cards to sell -- 1869-1969.

Overview of Our Tough Sports Cards Grading Standards

Near Mint/Mint

 

Near Mint/Mint or Dean's Cards 8 is our top grade for vintage cards. Depending on the issue, 1% to 5% of post World War II vintage cards grade this high. To quote PSA Grading Standards: "A NM-MT 8 is a super high-end card that appears Mint 9 at first glance, but upon closer inspection, the card can exhibit the following: a very slight wax stain on reverse, slightest fraying at one or two corners, a minor printing imperfection, and/or slightly off-white borders. Centering must be approximately 65/35 to 70/30 or better on the front and 90/10 or better on the reverse."

Near Mint

To quote PSA: "A NM 7 is a card with just a slight surface wear visible upon close inspection. There may be slight fraying on some corners. Picture focus may be slightly out-of-register. A minor printing blemish is acceptable. Slight wax staining is acceptable on the back of the card only. Most of the original gloss is retained. Centering must be approximately 70/30 to 75/25 or better on the front and 90/10 or better on the back."

Excellent/Mint

"A EX-MT 6 card may have visible surface wear or a printing defect which does not detract from its overall appeal. A very light scratch may be detected only upon close inspection. Corners may have slightly graduated fraying. Picture focus may be slightly out-of-register. Card may show some loss of original gloss, may have minor wax stain on reverse, may exhibit very slight notching on edges and may also show some off-whiteness on borders. Centering must be 80/20 or better on the front and 90/10 or better on the reverse."  * Taken from PSA's website.

Excellent

"On EX 5 cards, very minor rounding of the corners is becoming evident. Surface wear or printing defects are more visible. There may be minor chipping on edges. Loss of original gloss will be more apparent. Focus of picture may be slightly out-of-register. Several light scratches may be visible upon close inspection, but do not detract from the appeal of the card. Card may show some off-whiteness of borders. Centering must be 85/15 or better on the front and 90/10 or better on the back."

Very Good/Excellent

A VG-EX 4 card's corners may be slightly rounded. Surface wear is noticeable but modest. The card may have light scuffing or light scratches. Some original gloss will be retained. Borders may be slightly off-white. A light crease may be visible.

Very Good

"A VG 3 card reveals some rounding of the corners, though not extreme. Some surface wear will be apparent, along with possible light scuffing or light scratches. Focus may be somewhat off-register and edges may exhibit noticeable wear. Much, but not all, of the card's original gloss will be lost. Borders may be somewhat yellowed and/or discolored. A crease may be visible. Printing defects are possible. Slight stain may show on obverse and wax staining on reverse may be more prominent." *Taken from the PSA Grading Standards page.

A Dean's Cards VG 3 card is considered an "off-grade" card. Please remember that "Very Good" is a grading term and not an adjective! While several creases may be present in this grade, these cards will have other positive attibutes to make up for these flaws. The 1957 Klu (pictured above) is an example of a very weak Dean's Cards VG 3. Most will have a bit better eye appeal. This grade can also have pen marks on the back of the card. A card that has been trimmed or altered can be graded as high as VG 3, but we will clearly state this in the title of the card, if we suspect tampering.

Good

"A Good (2) card's corners show accelerated rounding and surface wear is starting to become obvious. A good card may have scratching, scuffing, light staining, or chipping of enamel on obverse. There may be several creases. Original gloss may be completely absent. Card may show considerable discoloration.", as stated by PSA.

A card graded Dean's Cards 2 GOOD is not good. It is downright LOUSY! For that reason, a GOOD card sells for only 10% or less of it's price in in NEAR MINT condition. It may have four rounded corners and multiple creases. They may also have a small amount of writing on the front or back of the card. Cards that grade "GOOD" are the lowest grade that we usually carry for post-war common players. The exception is a few Super Star Cards. These cards are very worn. If you are looking for nice condition cards, please do not buy this grade!

Fair and Poor

PSA states that "A Fair 1.5 card's corners will show extreme wear, possibly affecting framing of the picture. The surface of the card will show advanced stages of wear, including scuffing, scratching, pitting, chipping and staining. The picture will possibly be quite out-of-register and the borders may have become brown and dirty. The card may have one or more heavy creases. In order to achieve a Fair grade, a card must be fully intact. Even though the card may be heavily worn, it cannot achieve this grade if it is missing solid pieces of the card as a result of a major tear, etc. This would include damage such as the removal of the back layer of the card or an entire corner."

"A Poor 1 will exhibit many of the same qualities of a PSA Fair 1.5 but the defects may have advanced to such a serious stage that the eye appeal of the card has nearly vanished in its entirety. A Poor card may be missing one or two small pieces, exhibit major creasing that nearly breaks through all the layers of cardboard or it may contain extreme discoloration or dirtiness throughout that may make it difficult to identify the issue or content of the card on either the front or back. A card of this nature may also show noticeable warping or another type of destructive defect."

A card that has one or more severe defects. Cards with this grade are in REALLY, REALLY BAD condition.  Fair or Poor cards may have been altered by trimming or cutting or may have significant paper loss. Pen marks or writing can be on the front of the card. A POOR card is a "1" on a 10 point scale. DeansCards.com usually only sells Pre-War and star cards in Poor condition.

Dean Hanley, founder and owner of DeansCards.com, is considered one of the foremost experts on the subject of vintage sports cards and has a regular column in the Sports Collectors Digest and publishes articles on his blog. Dean has also written two books on vintage sports cards: The Bubble Gum Card War: The Great Bowman & Topps Sets from 1948 to 1955 and Before There Was Bubble Gum: Our Favorite Pre-World War I Baseball Cards.

Click here if you have vintage baseball cards to sell -- 1869-1969.

How to Sell Your Baseball Cards: Advice from Dean Hanley, Owner of Dean’s Cards

Whether you are selling your boyhood collection or liquidating the collection of a family member, selling baseball cards or other card collections can be a difficult task. Every day at Dean’s Cards we are asked to offer advice on selling baseball cards. That’s why we are publishing this article to share the options open to you in selling a vintage baseball card collection – and, most importantly, how to get the most money possible for your collection.

Although this article contains my opinions, I hope the information provided here will save you considerable time and effort and also help you get the best possible price for your collection. Since I believe that what we pay for a baseball card collection is more than you will get elsewhere, it is in both our interests for me to give you as many facts as possible to help you make the best possible decision.

While there is no shortage of dealers who will buy vintage collections, Dean's Cards can offer a higher percentage of the collection's actual value than most traditional card dealers. How is that possible? What we buy goes directly into our own online inventory of more than 1 million cards. In fact, quite a few card shop owners who buy collections will regularly send them to us – because they know they will make a nice profit on the cards.

The Dean’s Cards Buying Team strives to make selling your collection an extremely easy process. We ask you to send the cards to us so we can review them, and we are usually able to provide you with our bid within two business days. We make our top offer right away – there are no games played and we won’t low-ball you. If you accept our offer, we will mail you a check. It’s that simple.

My hope is that we will be writing you a large check. This means you have some nice cards, and we always need the inventory. If the amount we offer for your cards falls below your expectations, we will pay the postage to return the collection to you.

Selling Baseball Cards You Have Inherited

Dean's Cards offers a large Selection of Mickey Mantle cards.

Quite often people that have never collected vintage baseball cards and other sports cards inherit the responsibility of selling a card collection. It can seem like an overwhelming responsibility. The first thing that some people do is go to their local baseball card shop (if they can still find one) to ask what the collection is worth. Most are surprised to discover that they are often offered a few pennies on the dollar of a collection's stated book value.

The dealer at the card store usually offers a brief economic lesson of card collecting in order to explain the low amount that he is offering. The dealer may explain that there are numerous reasons that the cards are worth such a low amount and gives examples such as: buyers seldom pay "full book price" on cards and the shop must pay rent, labor, insurance, and other types of store overhead to cover the stores' expenses. He may also tell you that a card may sit in inventory for months or even years before it eventually sells.

All of these reasons may be true, but there is a much more important reason that the "strip mall" card dealer can only pay the collector a few pennies on the dollar for a vintage card collection. The main reason that their offer is so low is that retail card stores sell mostly the newer collectibles. Unlike Dean's Cards, vintage baseball cards are not their specialty. Most card shops keep a few vintage baseball cards in the display case for show, but it is impossible for a retail card store to do enough traffic to sell more than a few vintage baseball cards.

Largest Inventory of Vintage Baseball Cards at Dean’s Cards

Visit DeansCards.com to see more than 1 million cards online.

At Dean's Cards, we offer a different concept than you will find with other dealers. We buy collections from dealers all the time and pay the same percentages to them as we do the individual collectors. Dean's Cards can pay more for vintage card and memorabilia collections, because what we buy goes directly into our own online inventory. This way we can both avoid the middleman.

Dean's Cards is often called the "Amazon" of vintage sports cards and is recognized within the hobby as the #1 Online Seller of vintage cards. Although some other dealers came to be #1 in online sales, no other dealer has more than a fraction of our online inventory.

Baseball Cards Rarely Sell at “Book Value”

Often when it comes time for people to sell a card collection, they are surprised to learn that no one will offer them anywhere near the Book Value Price for the cards. Here are a couple reasons why this may occur:

• The Book Value are refers to cards that are in Near Mint condition. Cards that grade "NEAR MINT" still have sharp corners, good centering, and no gum stains or pen marks on the card. Less than 2 percent of vintage cards (less than 2%) grade as high as NEAR MINT. Since most cards were originally bought and handled by kids, a very low percentage of the cards remain in high quality condition. 
• The "Book Value" is the Suggested or the "Pie in the Sky" Price. Few collectors are willing to pay the book value price for cards. 
• Card Dealers need to make a profit on the cards to cover their time and expenses. Most card dealers have the expense of renting a table at a card show or, in the case of Dean's Cards, the advertising, labor, and hosting expenses of a website. Not to mention it takes months (or years) to sell the cards that we have in inventory. 

Less than 2 percent of Vintage Baseball Cards Grade as Mint Condition

Non-collectors tend to over grade the condition of cards. Card Collectors can be very picky! It is very common for a novice card seller to contact us and state, "My cards are in MINT Condition". Very seldom does this turn out to be the case. Dean's Cards will certainly buy vintage cards in almost any condition, but it is important to realize that the condition affects the value of the card.

The good news is that - if you bought your cards as kid - you are going to make a great return on your investment. How many of your other childhood toys can you say this about?

eBay and Auction Houses May Not Be Your Best Choices

Many people also are tempted to sell cards online through eBay on their own, thinking they can get the most for their cards there. But there’s a lot more to selling on eBay or other such sites than most people think.  A large collection could easily take months or years to liquidate. Online auctions are usually not the best option, because they generally appeal to bargain hunters and rarely bring top prices for collectibles.

Auction houses also get lots of attention, but they usually don’t work out well for collections. Auction houses normally handle the rarer, high dollar items – and large fees also are charged for listings and commissions.
When you consider the time and expense involved in eBay and auction houses, you’re usually much better off selling to a dealer for the best price you can get.

Reasons to Sell Your Vintage Baseball Cards

Send an email to the DEan's Cards Buying Team to sell your baseball cards.

But you should always remember that the bottom line is that they are your cards and you certainly do not have to sell them – especially if you are emotionally attached to them. Many collectors never do sell the cards, until there is a special event which encourages them to do so for the money. Typical examples include: weddings, sending Kids to college or paying off a big bill. Many collectors keep the cards until they die and then let their heirs worry about what to do with the collection.

If you have not looked at your cards in years, it may make sense to do something useful with the proceeds that you could get for them. It is often the family member that inherits the collection that ends up selling the cards. If you come to the point where you feel that the value of the collection could be put to better use, please contact us. You have my word that you will be treated fairly and honestly and that we will pay top dollar for your collection.

Dean’s Cards Back-of-the-Baseball-Card Facts:

• We buy more than 500 collections every year and have been doing so since 2001.
• Dean’s Cards sells more vintage cards online than any other dealer.
• We have 12 employees and a 5000 square foot office in Cincinnati, Ohio.
• If we don’t buy cards, we can’t sell cards – and that’s why we strive to offer you the best, no hassle price upfront.
• Vintage cards – before 1969 – have the greatest value. But cards from 1950s and 1960 are condition sensitive – meaning cards in best condition are worth much more than cards in poor condition.
• Pre-World War II cards are the most valuable and often have good value regardless of their condition.
• Semi-vintage cards – from the 1970s – have more of a modest value and need to be in excellent condition to get the best price.
• Modern cards – 1980s and on – are beautiful cards and fun to collect, but they were made in such great quantity that the value is not high – so we generally do not buy these from collectors.
• Vintage cards peaked in value in the 1990s, then declined a bit, and now have been holding steady ever since.

Ready to sell your baseball cards? Visit us at Dean's Cards to start the process. We promise a prompt reply -- and our best offer..

Dean Hanley, founder and owner of Deanscards.com, is considered one of the foremost experts on the subject of vintage sports cards and has a regular column in the Sports Collectors Digest and publishes articles on his blog. Dean has also written two books on vintage sports cards: The Bubble Gum Card War: The Great Bowman & Topps Sets from 1948 to 1955 and Before There Was Bubble Gum: Our Favorite Pre-World War I Baseball Cards.