Collectibles - General

Some of the most popular areas of collecting today include: first edition books, rare maps, postcards, Coca-Cola ads, baseball cards, vinyls, Elvis Presley memorabilia, ancient coins and world stamps, hunting decoys and sporting knives, WWI and WWII wartime collectibles, and vintage designer handbags and accessories. Prices in these categories depend on popularity or trends, scarcity of the item and comparable items, condition, perceived importance, and the overall state of the financial market.

The estimated annual market for rare coins in the United States overall is around $3 billion; in the the US alone, there are 5,000 coin companies. The US Postal Service estimates that 11 percent of Americans collect stamps, making it the largest collecting hobby in the country. Roughly the same percentage of the British population also collects stamps, while percentages rise in Germany, Switzerland, and Eastern Europe.

Passing many performers in memorabilia sales, Elvis Presley lives on years after his death. Items dating from the 1950s and ‘60s, when Presley produced most of his music and films, are typically most valuable. And among sports fans, baseball cards still today attract high bidding. Some cards even shockingly reach values in the millions; in April of 2015, Robert Edward Auctions sold a T206 Honus Wagner card, c. 1909, for $1.3 million.