Greg Tunks is the founder of the credit card collecting hobby. He was also the editor of the Credit Card Collector newsletter in the eighties and nineties.
This article is a continuation of our previous post.
Greg Tunks: Instead of waiting for something to come along and get things moving, it’s usually best to rely on your own creativity. There’s an old expression about that: Waiting for something to turn-up? How about beginning with your sleeves.
Credit Card Collector: So you’re going to roll your sleeves up?
GT: Someone has to.
CCC: What are you going to do?
GT: We still have one thing most hobbies with our exposure don’t. We’ve got an ace in the hole.
CCC: What’s an ace in the hole?
GT: Sorry. It’s a poker expression. It means the best is hidden. It’s in reserve.
CCC: What’s our ace in the hole?
A book about credit card collecting?
GT: We’ve gotten a lot of national and international publicity through the years. Because of that, I’ve been approached a couple of times to do a book on credit pieces. You know. A collectibles book. I’ve never done one. This hobby still has never had a book published about itself.
Most hobbies use a book to get things really going and create thousands of new collectors. I’ve never used that method before. It’s never been necessary. It can work wonders for a hobby our size.
The older and larger hobbies continually issue new books, but it doesn’t move them generally. It’s just more information on top of more information. Book after book. But we don’t have any information in book form. It would be a first.
CCC: What kind of book do you envision?
GT: Ideally, the book should have shock value.
CCC: What do you mean?
GT: Something different than ever’s been done before. Something that really catches the consumer’s eye. Something that would generate a lot of publicity. Something like Satanic Verses or Final Exit.
CCC: Those were both big sellers, weren’t they?
GT: Right. Like Satanic Verses. That book sat on bookstore shelves and collected dust. Then when a five million dollar bounty got placed on the author’s head, sales took-off. It really had nothing to do with content. It had to do with publicity. The same held true for Final Exit. If the book wouldn’t have created such a controversy, I seriously doubt if the book would have sold.
What was in the books was less important than the titles, imagery the titles portrayed and the publicity gotten. Without publicity, both books could very well have been nothing. But because of publicity, the books became big world-wide sellers. And to boot, all the publicity that sent these books sailing onto the bestseller list was gotten for free.
Those books couldn’t possibly have had an advertising budget that could even pay for a small percent of all the free advertising they got through publicity.
CCC: So you think that’s the answer?
GT: Sure! There have been books that have sat on shelves gathering dust. Then the publisher comes in and changes the title and sales take-off.
There was one book that didn’t sell. The publisher changed the cover and title and the book became a bestseller. The inside of the book wasn’t changed in any way. They just put on a new cover that had appeal. A lousy cover and no sales. A new cover and best seller.
You might not be able to judge a book by its cover, but you sure can sell a lot of them because of their cover.
CCC: So you’re not thinking about a book on the joys of collecting?
GT: Not at all. That would put us right in there competing with every other collectible. Like I say, it’s got to be different. Something that makes you stand out from the crowd. Something that could be controversial.
CCC: Like what?
GT: I don’t want to get specific, but when you’re talking about credit cards there are many different angles. Remember, we’re already collecting something that’s supposed to be cut-up and thrown away upon expiration. Just the hobby itself is controversial. Let’s move on to something else.
CCC: Like what? Do you have something you want to cover?
GT: Not really. I just want to say that people should remember that this hobby didn’t even exist six years ago. We’ve come a long way in a short time. We have a lot further to go. I’m just always amazed how credit pieces were basically worthless six years ago, and now a collector is willing to pay $1,500.00 for one. That amazes me.
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