The Unopened Market Report #1
1976 Topps Vending, 1975 Topps Rack Packs, Shock Theater Packs, Recent Sales Highlights, And A 1952 Topps Ad With A Pack
Welcome to The Unopened Market Report, a new addition to The Post War Cards Newsletter family. Today’s report is free, but moving forward, this will be the paid tier of the newsletter. Don’t worry—the regular Thursday Post War Cards Newsletter remains free and will still include an “Unopened Item of the Week.”
But what can you expect here? Deep dives into unopened products, 101s on collation and fakes, rare photos, historical price trends, recent finds, fascinating sales, vintage ads—and a lot more.
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📦 1976 Topps Baseball Vending Boxes And Cases
While reading the January 1976 issue of The Trader Speaks, I noticed an ad on page 24 offering 500-count vending boxes of 1976 Topps baseball cards for $5 each. A few pages later, another ad listed 24-count vending cases for $69.95.
It got me thinking—I’ve seen quite a few of these for sale over the years and wondered how their prices have changed over time. Now, public sales data from before the Internet is scarce. However, I did find an ad that The Baseball Card Kid, Mark Murphy, placed in the August 1994 issue of Sports Cards Magazine, offering 1976 Topps baseball vending boxes for $300.
Since around 2010, tracking data has become more accessible, reliable, and relevant. So, I created the following graph using data from top auction houses to show how these boxes have sold over the years and overlayed an exponential trend line.
Many of the boxes originated from Collect Auctions via The Fritsch Vault, suggesting that Larry Fritsch likely purchased a bunch of unsold cases directly from Topps.
However, not every case has been cracked to sell boxes individually; a handful of cases have been offered for sale, too. In Aug 2014, Collect Auctions listed a sealed case of 1976 Topps vending boxes, but the bidding didn’t meet the reserve. The case featured the 951-76 product code stamped on the box, though no case-specific stamp was visible in the photos.
Then, in Feb 2021, Heritage Auctions sold a sealed 1976 vending case for $87k. This case bore the same product code, 951-76, along with a case-specific stamp reading 231662, and was described as having been purchased from The Larry Fritsch Warehouse in 2020.
Finally, in Sept 2022, Memory Lane Inc. sold another case of 1976 vending boxes for $72,198. The case was cracked in June 2022, and the boxes were BBCE-wrapped. Interestingly, this case had a date stamp of 231563, indicating it was not the same case that Heritage had sold earlier.
🎭 1975/1976 Topps Shock Theater/Theatre Wax Packs
While browsing sold eBay lots, I noticed two PSA-graded 1975 Shock Theater wax packs that looked a little different. The 1975 test pack on the left sold for $103.50 (Jan 19), while the non-test pack on the right went for $95 (Jan 20).
It looks like PSA started updating their non-test pack flips to “1976 Topps Shock Theatre”, as noted by the Pop Report (28 total packs). The 1975 Topps Shock Theater test pack Pop Report shows 39 total packs. It seems like there might be an overlap between those numbers, though.
But, it turns out there are four total variations—two from 1975’s test release and two from 1976’s production that PSA doesn’t appear to account for;
For the 1975 test packs:
Black sticker (13/16") for 3-card packs.
Purple sticker (11/16") for 7-card packs.
The 1976 packs:
U.S. wrapper: Code 0-450-21-0-6.
U.K. wrapper: Code 0-450-0-7, with additional design tweaks (also implying they may have been printed in 1977).
Lonnie Cummins deserves credit for this discovery. You can read the details and see more photos on the Vintage Non-Sports forums. The history is really interesting!
And while there may not be many graded test packs, Heritage did sell a test-issue wax box for $3,720 in June 2024. There are also a ton of test wrappers on the market; Lelands sold 163 of them for $180 in September 2019.
🛒 Recent Unopened Sales Highlights
Here are a few additional interesting or noteworthy unopened sales you may have missed over the past month. Moving forward, this section will feature sales from the previous week, or so:
Dec-28-2024; 1980-81 Topps Basketball BBCE Wax Box; $16,592; Goldin
Jan-11-2025; 1952 Berk Ross Baseball PSA 8 Paper Pack; $10,486; Memory Lane Inc.
Jan-11-2025; 1976 Topps Football Unopened BBCE Cello Box; $13,668; Memory Lane Inc.
Jan-12-2025; 1979 Topps Basketball BBCE Wax Box; $2,100; Fanatics Collect
Jan-18-2025; 1977 Topps Baseball PSA 7 Cello Pack Dale Murphy On Top; $700; Fanatics Collect
Jan-19-2025; 1969 Topps Stamps Baseball Empty Wax Display Box; $157.50; eBay Auction | Another copy sold for $168 at REA on the same day
Jan-19-2025; 1987-1988 Venezuelan Winter League PSA 8 Stickers Pack, $132; REA
Jan-19-2025; 1974 Topps Baseball Action Emblem Stickers BBCE Pack; $360; REA
Jan-19-2025; 1966 Topps Football GAI 8 Wax Pack; $1,560; REA
Jan-22-2025; 1961 Nu-Card Football BBCE Wax Box; $1,348.95; eBay Buy-it-Now
Jan-23-2025; 1985 Topps Garbage Pail Kids Series 2 BBCE Wax Box; $2,062; Heritage
Jan-23-2025; 1978 Topps Marvel Sugar-Free Bubble Gum BBCE Wax Box; $1,093; Heritage
Jan-23-2025; 1967 Donruss The Monkees - "C" Series BBCE Wax Box; $718; Heritage
Jan-24-2025; 1973-74 OPC WHA Hockey Posters BBCE Wax Box; $1,599; eBay Buy-it-Now
⚾️ 1975 Topps Baseball Rack Pack Card Placement
1975 Topps Baseball cards are super popular. The set has George Brett’s and Robin Yount’s RCs and a slew of other Hall-of-Famers. Plus, there’s a lot of unopened product from this set on the market. With rising unopened prices, the market is attracting more bad actors, so it’s important to know about basic pack sequencing (the low-hanging fruit) to ensure you don’t buy a fake.
First, both 1975 Topps and 1975 Topps Mini rack packs follow the same sequencing.
All cards on a 1975 Topps Baseball uncut sheet have a single asterisk (*) or double asterisk (**) on the bottom of each card, on the back, next to the copyright.
Each cell away from the header (the red insert on the far right that says “trading cards, 42 cards only 49 cents”) has cards from the same corresponding sheets on the top and bottom. They are consistent across the first, middle, and far cells. There shouldn’t be cards from mixed sheets in the same cell; single asterisk card on top, single asterisk card on the bottom, for example.
The first two sections (first and middle) have cards with a single asterisk, and the far section (furthest from the header) has cards with two asterisks.
There were five different sheets of 132 cards. The first three have a single asterisk, and the last two have two asterisks. Cards from the two low number sheets are in the first cell (cards 1-264), the middle cell has cards from 265 on with a single asterisk, and the furthest cell from the header only has cards with a double asterisk.
Brett and Yount are only in the header cell of legitimate 1975 Topps rack packs. Both are numbered below 265 and have a single asterisk.
The third cell, furthest from the header, would contain the Rice, Carter, and Ryan cards; Ryan’s card is #500 and has two asterisks on the back.
If you suspect a product is fake, it probably is. There’s too much fraud not to follow asterisk sequencing. I’d encourage everyone to play the odds. There’s a 1% chance that some racks didn’t follow the */** before re-sealers entered the market, but I don’t see how that can be proven anymore.
📢 A 1952 Topps Baseball Advertisement Featuring A Wax Pack
I could probably write 20+ Unopened Market Report pieces about 1952 Topps baseball products, and I did share a detailed piece about an unopened box back in The Post War Cards Newsletter #4. So, I figured I had to include something about the set in the first Unopened Market Report. So, here’s an ad for the cards that Topps placed in the 1952 All-Star Game Official Souvenir Book, along with a graded 1952 Topps Baseball 5-Cent Wax Pack that BBCE Auctions sold for $162,626 in November 2023 for comparison.
Don’t forget to upgrade your subscription so you don’t miss next week’s Unopened Market Report, where I’ll be covering 1954 Bowman packs and a bunch more!
And if you have any cool items to share, shoot me an e-mail.
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