It was 20 years ago that the New York – Pennsylvania Collector ceased arriving at my mailbox. In fact the Collector ceased publication entirely. It seemed to me at the time that a regional antiques publication remained a viable idea, so I explored purchasing the “remains” of the then Canandaigua-based monthly publication. It was, and has been, the most expensive antique I ever purchased, I often joke. We revived the Collector in March 2005.
Last fall we needed to find a new place to print as the Buffalo, N.Y., daily newspaper where we had been printed decided to idle their presses. I’m sure our regular readers noticed that the size of the Collector changed with our new printing arrangements, while our content and regular writers remained.
Moving ahead, we suspected there would need to be additional adjustments in the Collector operations. The postage cost of “home delivery” of a regionally mailed publication has been rising and the requirements to balance the circulation needs of our advertisers (who pay bulk of the cost of printing and producing the Collector) withrules for periodical mailing to homes finally reached the tipping point. We suspected this was going to happen, so we stopped asking for renewals and continued to mail copies to subscribers. Most of our subscriptions will have “expired” as of this issue.
So, what now? We will remain in print as a free publication, with thousands of copies “bulk” sent to dealers, co-ops, antiques shows, auction houses and other venues where those folks interested in “collecting” can be found. We will also arrange for the current issues to be available to read on our website: nypa-collector.com. While we know that not all our readers are fans of “digital,” we believe having the Collector in print and on-line may offer advantages print alone cannot.
As is the case with many things these days, buying, selling and collecting antiques and “collectibles” isn’t the same as it was five or ten years ago. We hope to continue to navigate those changes. We’ll be going through our mailing list to be sure folks with some home-delivered issues due are treated fairly, we will be reviewing sites where the “bulk” printed copies are delivered, and we will be preparing to make the print issue available on our website.
Thinking about it, I suppose if nothing changed there would be nothing to collect. If the “first” Apple computer continued to be manufactured in quantity and unchanged, it wouldn’t hold much antique interest. But today an Apple 1 from 1976 can bring six figures. Now that’s collectible!
