For those of you who were not collecting phonecards in 1995, it was a very optimistic year. It seemed the sportscard industry had caught up with the rest of us, and was issuing cards as inserts in packs, as well as produced stand alone sets. Sports Collector’s Digest, a large hobby weekly magazine, had a quarterly insert on phonecard collecting. In 1997, there is a very different reality. The quarterly insert went to a one page mention in a monthly non-sports insert. Last month, the phonecard page disappeared. Tuff Stuff, another publication, had news on phonecards - Now there is really no information in that publication.
Now back to my point. What really struck me when looking at the cards was the price asked. This person obviously knew something about phonecards, at least more than the average sportscard dealer judging by what he had in his inventory. The prices seemed way out of line, just too high. Some prices were above what I would consider reasonable by a factor of two. After looking at a few of the cards, I noticed that the prices being asked were actually in line from a couple of years ago. (Case in Point - The Hakeem the Dream $3 phonecard sold for over $10 then, but now can be purchased for about $3) Prices really have dropped. The NYNEX Democratic Convention $1 Card, which once sold for over $1000, now can be purchased for a few hundred. Is this a good thing? I suppose it depends on your perspective. If you purchased the cards at higher prices, then perhaps not. However, I’m glad this hobby had a "price correction" while it was and is still small.
The Daytona Beach Street Rods car club started in 1973 with 25 cars, and has grown to 5,000 antique cards and street rods. One card a year will be released. This is the first collector card issued for this event. 2,500 were produced, and have 5 units of phone time that expire in May of 1998. The selling price is $10. For further information, contact Lee Grove at Grove Imaging. (407) 382-1077. They can be e-mailed at LG1077@aol.com, and their web site is located at: http://members.aol.com/LG1077/index.html. A picture of this card is available at The Card Mall web site.
To commemorate the opening of "Mother" to movie fans nationwide, MCI and the studio are offering a free collectible MCI PrePaid Phone Card. Top-rated radio stations in 19 markets nationwide will award a total of 2,000 of these customized collectible MCI PrePaid Phone Cards bearing the title "Call Mother, " with an image from the film on the card face. Each card includes 10 free minutes of domestic long distance calling value. Because the cards are rechargeable, consumers can purchase additional call time after expending the complimentary minutes.
WLTW-FM 106.7 in New York and KSCA-FM 101.9 in Los Angeles were the first to launch the promotion, beginning last week. Listeners are encouraged to call in and tell a story about their mother. Winners are selected at random.
"The number one name in PrePaids is proud to be associated with one of the best movies of the new year," said Jeff Lindauer, general manager, PrePaid Markets at MCI. "This is the first of what we hope will be a number of PrePaid hits at the box office."
The custom-designed card face clearly conveys Paramounts promotional message, and the fact that its a limited edition card makes it a valuable contest prize for participating radio stations. As a result, winners receive a piece of movie memorabilia that everyone can use - long distance calling.
The MoneyGram Phone Card is being sold in thousands of participating MoneyGram agent locations, including many of the nation's largest supermarket, drug store and check cashing locations. Under the agreement, MCI will provide a complete range of services, including network transmission, software, and 24-hour-a-day, seven-day-a-week multi-lingual customer support.
From: Fred King
From: Ulf Helmke
That’s all for this week,
Alan
2) Direct e-mail. Send a message to: phoneline@cardmall.com
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