ARE TODAY’S KIDS COLLECTING? Today’s kids are collecting, but they collect Lance Armstrong-type plastic bracelets, U.S. state quarters, or Yu-gi-oh trading cards, not the souvenir spoons or secret decoder rings of 50 years ago.
News-Antique.com - Nov 30,-0001 - “Kids aren’t connecting with collecting today,” reports a recent Wall Street Journal article.
“Nonsense!” respond Ralph and Terry Kovel, authors of the best-selling book Kovels Antiques & Collectibles Price List. Of course, children are connecting with collecting, but collecting has changed. Today’s kids collect Lance Armstrong-type plastic bracelets, Star Wars figures, U.S. state quarters, or Yu-gi-oh! trading cards, not the thimbles, souvenir spoons, or secret decoder rings of 50 years ago.
Children collect small, inexpensive or free things like fast food premiums until they are old enough to leave home. Then they spend time on social life and jobs and have little time to go to antiques or collectibles shows. Most collectors begin spending serious money when they have a house to furnish and shelf space for display. They start with the affordable pieces, about 50 years old. More knowledge and more money may lead to collections of more important and perhaps older art and antiques. The collection is a reflection of unique personal taste. It is not someone else’s collection.
Collecting may have changed, but it’s not going away.
Hundreds of books on collecting are published each year.
At least six weekly television shows focus on collecting, including the PBS show “Antiques Roadshow” with millions of viewers.
EBay hosts millions of sales by individuals, online auctions, special collectible sales, and more.
The internet has thousands of websites that sell antiques and collectibles and offer information to collectors. Chat rooms are devoted to salt and pepper shakers or commemorative tins, and the participants email and even take trips to visit each other’s collections. Online communities have partially replaced the organized collector club.
What will happen to today’s antiques and collectibles if the kids don’t want Mom and Dad’s collection? The Kovels have the answer to that question. “We tell our kids, you get the money, you get the headaches. Collecting and collections are personal, so don’t feel guilty if you don’t want our collections. Take a few things you like, donate or sell the rest. We have given them instructions about what we have promised to museums and how to sell the rest of the stuff at a fair price. We won’t be sad. A serious collector who will love our collections will buy them at the sale.”
Ralph and Terry Kovel are the authors of more than 95 books about collecting and antiques. Hailed by Parade magazine as "The duke and duchess of the antiques world," the Kovels publish Kovels on Antiques and Collectibles (an award-winning newsletter) and write a syndicated weekly newspaper column distributed to more than 150 newspapers. They appeared weekly on the HGTV program, Flea Market Finds with the Kovels. Their popular website with price information is www.kovels.com. The Kovels' next book is Kovels' Bottles Price List, 13th Edition, published by Random House, on sale April 14th for $16.95.
