Thursday, February 17, 2011

How do you organize your cards?


I’ve set aside a chunk of time this weekend to organize my card “collection.” I put collection in quotes because I only have a few cards at  my current home – all the old stuff I have from when I really collected is stored in 3200 count boxes and binders in my childhood home. When I moved to New York City, I had to leave a lot of those behind because space is such a premium. I now live in a shoebox, much like my '80s junk wax. I gave my parents strict instruction not to throw them out (hmm, sounds like a Topps set), although I’m sure 90% of them are crap anyways. But I know I’ve got plenty of good cards from the 1990s and early 2000s there, and at some point in the future I’ll go through them.

Anyhow, what I do have here with me now is about 90% of my Tino Martinez collection – both inserts and commons (it hurts me to call you common Tino, it really does), and two binders and a few boxes full of various Yankee cards. Plus I have a case of any valuable cards I do I have – higher end inserts, autographs, etc.

However, I don’t love how my personal collection is organized. It feels too all-over the place. Tino's are in a binder – pretty much by year but not perfectly chronological - as well as about 50 or so in top loaders/screw cases. The Yanks are in a binders and boxes and that's fine. And recently, I’ve bought a few packs/boxes of cards, and the base cards/commons are sitting in their boxes waiting to find new owners. How do you guys organize your base cards/trade fodder? Do you use 3200 count boxes? Binders? Leave them in stacks on your dresser?

I know that everyone organizes a bit differently, so I’d love to hear how people with far bigger collections than mine store/organize their cards. Anything specific for player collections? For cards you have no use for or might like to move in a trade? I’m curious to hear you methods. Leave a comment and let me know.

4 comments:

  1. I'm currently shuffling through stacks of Reds trying to get them organized. I'm putting them all in binders by year, then set, then card number.

    I have decided to discontinue all my player collections except Kurt Stillwell and Shawon Dunston. When I get around to it, they will be in binders also by year and set.

    My doubles and tradables are in 5000-count boxes.

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  2. For the most part, they're not. My eventual goal is to get my Mets autographs, Gary Carter cards and Topps Mets team sets into binders, and get everything else sorted into 1600 count boxes.

    At the moment, I have the Carter & autograph binders and a mess of cards to finish sorting. :)

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  3. Holy smokes, did you just do five posts in one day? You're making us look bad!

    I've got cards in a little bit of everywhere. Fortunately most of them are all together in one room. Most of my sets are in binders. Most of my Dodgers are in binders. Cards that I don't care as much about (almost every non-Topps set from junk wax era) are in shoeboxes or similar boxes.

    Some special cards are in toploaders and tucked away.

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  4. Thanks for the responses. Looks like everyone is in the same boat as me...cards all over the place.

    Night Owl...I was aggressive yesterday. Although some were pre-scheduled (if that helps).

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