To buy or not to buy? Large collection of period publications and cigarette card albums!

[WarCollector2019]

Hi guys,

I am tempted by this lot of period items including a very nice DE cigarette card album with dust jacket which looks to be in amazing condition as does the Olympic albums. There are also around 50 copies of 'Der Adler'!

The seller is looking for around £300 after conversion including postage from Germany to the UK, does this sound reasonable. I would not normally spend this amount on publications but I see some great items.

Thank you, Glen.

[AmericanKraut]

Looks like a fair deal if you enjoy the items, I just picked up the same album with the chariot on the cover. I would check to make sure the albums have the cards inside before buying though.

[bigmacglenn]

That would be about $436 in US Dollars...That's a tough call. Is the lot worth that much if you add them all up? Perhaps. Would I spend that much on paper? Probably not, as it won't appreciate as much and won't display as badges/medals/helmets do...But then again, if you read German (as I do) you could consider it a gold mine with loads of information and interesting Photos/Propaganda...
It depends to a large degree upon what your main focus is, I suppose...
cheers, Glenn

[KMMorris]

I would pay around 10$ for a copy of Der Adler down here so that is a rather good deal.
Morris

[wood]

Sounds dead on the mark to me. The Olympic albums are quite common. As said above, make sure all the pictures are inside and undamaged.
Pete

[reneblacky]

I have to mention that paper items are difficult to preserve

[youthcollector1]

I'd pass, you'll never be able to sell all that paper.

* Great minds think alike Rene.

[gel65]

Save your money and you can slowly pick these pieces up individually and pay no where near the price that the seller is asking

[Monuir]

Hi, Glen.

Papier iteems are some of my favorite things to collect. The problem with them is, like some have mentioned before, that it can be difficult to preserve them, and it's also quite expensive as the acid-free plastic pockets often exceed the value of the documents themselfs. Also, when reading a book or a magazine one should wear acid-free gloves and they should also be stored away from sun-shine preferable in acid free plastic pockets. This makes it rather impossible to display them without seriously reducing their life-span.

I would also recommend you to try to narrow down your collection field as it's impossible to keep on track of everything. When I started collecting I just bought everything that impressed me, medals, feldpost, helmets, binocolaurs etc. It later became obious to me that to really get a serious collection I had to focus on a few things. Now I am quite good at collecting feldpost and photo albums, I can more easily spot fakes and calculate value to know if a deal is good or not, but I do not know much about medals or helmets.

If you do decide to buy this lot, I would recommend asking if there is any pages missing or pages loose (there is nothing worse then reading a book with missing pages or loose pages falling out all the time) + any tear or other damage to any of the pages. Also make sure the cigarette albums have all the cards in them, not much fun having an empty or incomplete book. If everything checks out I do think 300 £ is a fair price, and maybe you could even get it down to 270.

Good luck

[Frundsberg]

Well, if there are 50 Adler magazines in good condition it sounds a good deal. Sell some of the stuff and You will get the rest for free...