Scalpers vs Hoarders
 

I'm pretty confident that the majority of the collectors on this site don't collect as an investment, but instead to enjoy their toys (in whatever way that may be, whether it's to display, play with, give to children, or what not).
To most of us most likely, we don't think that this toy is/will be worth this much, or that won't. We likely take joy from just having our toys.

I got started thinking about this after watching Toy Collectors this week (I'm not labeling the guy as a scalper. Based on the episode, I don't think of him as that. It just put me down this line of thought, is all.), And I've come to think that there are two primary types of "Anti-Collectors," I will call them for the sake of this commentary. Two types who collect only so they can turn around and profit on the toys.

There are Scalpers: people who go out, troll the toy isles and buy every rare figure they can find, so they can turn around and put it on ebay for as absolute much as they can get, thus artificially driving up the prices of certain toys, and sometimes creating shortages where none would exist if they didn't.

And Hoarders: Casual people who mistakenly have the idea that every single toy is going to be worth large amounts of cash, 20 years down the road. They'll aquire toys, put them in a box in storage somewhere never to be seen or enjoyed by anyone until they happen to remember they have it, and want to know if it's worth anything yet. Sometime, there are toy hoarders who actually do have enough knowledge to find toys that may genuinely be rare at the time of their aquiring it.

So, of these two, which do you think is the most damaging to the collecting community?

For me this is a bit hard, because on one hand, Scalpers are an immidiate cancer. But they're not always a threat/danger in the long term. A hoarder however may lack a scalper's knowledge, but anything they aquire will be out of circulation for years, if not perminantly.


EDIT:
PLEASE NOTE that my usage of the term Hoarding for these purposes, I am not referring to people that have the general mental inability to ever throw anything out.
Again, I'm assigning it to people who have no interest in toy collecting as we do, and buy toys just in case it might be valuable years down the line, if they sit on it for years.
Just clairifying.

Scalpers, my mother is a hoarder and the only toys she ever got were mcfarlane stuff and junk toys in general, including the animated batman toys, and american kamenrider stuff...

I sold it a few years back and only made a few hundred. There were a few hundred toys in there.

Scalpers on the other hand know what figures are popular and purposely buy them to resell them at double, even triple the price. They might even hold em till they become ridiculously expensive.

Agreed scalper's....at least with Hoarder's you can bargain with them...I think.

I'd say hoarders could also be refered to as MOC collectors, some buy what they like and keep it moc while other do it for every figure rare and common and at some point sell the entire collection or in lots, like Andycr75? not sure if that's his proper handle. I think some toys will make tons of $$ in the future but that's just my opinion based on current trends and ebay price ranges. Ie hot toys and 3a figure could be worth a huge amount as they're already expensive to begin with.

Nope, they just hold onto it until they die, or until you cart it out of their house unnoticed. They don't really remember half of what they have anyway.

Hoarders just keep junk, which is great. They buy pegwarmers in the hopes they'll be like that classic giant figure from the original star wars line.

Scalpers are the worst because a hoarder once they find out it won't b worth anything there prices will drop scalpers will try n get the most they can even if the figure is worth nothing..

Hoarders. Why, well, they never give anything up. Scalpers sooner or later will at least get there money back. Us as collectors pay those stupid prices because we want to complete our collection. So good on scalpers for screwing around with us because THEY KNOW THEY CAN.

true, though context varies greatly between collectors.

subjective assertion, but i see you working.

as a previous moc collector 'turned loose,' i'd say space occupied has much to blame for perception of hoarding.

I'd have to disagree and say that while some do fall into that trope, there are others that genuinely care about their collections and enjoy them, too. I've known both types. I know a Star Wars collector who never opens, but hooks every figure onto the wall of their spare bedroom. He likes to go in there, sit, and just enjoy it.
In that sense, it really isn't much different from those of us who open them and display them.
I have to say I carefully chose my words, and referred to this particular action as hoarding, to specifically avoid offending any MOC/MIB collectors who do enjoy their collections.
Though, the example you cite is some of what I was indeed referring to.

I title myself as a MOC Collector.

I am not a Scalper, nor am I a Hoarder. I do not do it for the hopes of turning a profit, but if something of mine ends up going up in value I will not argue.

Do I collect loose? Yes. But they are not listed as part of my collection because my goal is to have them MOC. If I have something loose it is because A) It was a double B) The cost for it MOC was outragous and was able to get it cheaper loose.


With that being said, I take offence that a MOC collector like myself be classed as a hoarder.

Does anyone care? Probably Not..........

I'd say the most damaging to the collector community are the people who enable scalpers to even exist. The people who are willing to go and pay overly inflated prices on the secondary market just because they "gotta have it now!" That is why prices can skyrocket on certain items upon initial release, only to drop drastically a few months down the road.

quoted for truth.

Of the two choices I have to pick from here, and in the sense you're using them, I'd have to say hoarders. If both the hoarder and the scalper are out buying up the goods, at least people have a chance to get the stuff from the scalper. If it's just being hoarded then it might as well be tossed into a black hole.

this applies to most of us here......no wonder the scalpers troll this site.

I don't think either are bad for collectors.

Scalpers offer availability of some extremely hard to find toys to every part of the world. Even if it is more expensive, and drives up the value, at least those toys are actually available to collectors. Without them, people in small towns throughout the world would have no hope of finding the rare stuff.

Hoarders actually bring up the value of the hard to find items when they eventually bring them out and sell them. Without these types of collectors, we'd have no hope of ever finding things like Action Comics #1 stuck between the pages of an old dictionary. They add excitement to the possibility of finding gold amongst garbage.

Both of them actually buy the toys we all like, adding production value to the lines, and allowing the makers of these toys to profit enough to continue making them. Sometimes they can even improve on the line with extra revenue.

Without both of these aspects of the toy collecting community, less toys would be produced, and less would be available to the general public.

What most collector's dislike of these people comes down to is money. Both of these types of collectors end up charging much more than retail for the things they buy, and a lot of collectors don't have the money to pay these inflated prices. So really, what we all get mad about is not these types buying the toys, but the fact that they're selling them for more than we can afford to pay.

I personally don't have anything against either of these types of collectors. I just do my best to try not to give in to their prices.

Dude, chill. I'm sorry you're offended, but if you actually bothered to read either of my posts, I actually protected and stood by the typical MOC collector. I did not call them or by extension you as a hoarder or a blight on collecting.
The conversation isn't abbout open vs close. There's a whole different thread for that. By the lines guidelines I put forth in the opening post, you're in the same boat as everyone else, effected negatively by either of these two types.

^You're weird, haha.
I have a ton of toys, but when things get tight, I'm willing to sell.

Getting back on topic, I would say that both groups adversely affect our hobby, just in different ways. So neither is really worse than the other, in my opinion.

I've seen mixes of both. Those who scalp something as quickly as possible while it's "hot", but will hoard something if the ebay price drops below what they want. I tried buying a figure from a guy once at the $15 he had it priced at. He had 3 of them. He then refused to sell because the figure was going for twice that 6 months before, and he wanted to see if it went back up. :rolleyes: