For nearly as long as I can remember, I have always sought ways to keep my collection organized and cataloged. And for just as long I have failed.

I began collecting at age 7, when prices of packs were a mere quarter. And like many of you, the gum WAS a big draw to the product.

Shortly after I began accumulating these cards, I started tabulating them on a piece of paper. Add naturally that only lasted a short while as I often traded cards with friends and keeping track of them was a nightmare. And of course I was 7 years old at the time, so you know I lost my list somewhere.

I digress. So through the years I tried over and over again to replicate this catalog process. Each time I failed.

And then in 2000 I thought I bought the greatest product known to mankind: the Beckett Collector Connection.

It was a novel idea — to me anyway — to have a computer program where I could maintain my collection. Sure I had typed out Microsoft Word lists a dozen times, but this program looked nothing like that I had ever seen before.

So one day while searching for blasters at a Toys R Us, I decided it a good idea to pay the $20 for a copy of the program and finally get my stuff in order. Yeah, it didn’t work to well.

The program was/is essentially is a spreadsheet format in which you had to input information. At the time I remember what a great idea it would have been if the program actually had all of the cards ever created and allowed you to select what it was that you owned.

A few years later this dream actually came true as Beckett’s website offered this same service free of charge — and like the other program I tried it … and it didn’t work too well for me.

So here I am, now in 2010, still searching for a way to catalog my collection. I keep going back and forth on using a spreadsheet or just sucking it up and using the Beckett system, which only works for me part of the time depending on how often the server decides to time out on me.

Anyone have ideas?

This entry was posted on June 24, 2010 at 12:45 pm and is filed under Newspaperman with tags baseball, baseball cards, Beckett, hobby, sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.