I completely missed one in Huggins & Scott Auctions’ Fall 2025 auction, which closed December 4, 2025: a 1959 Topps Funny Valentines salesman sample. It sold for $270.
Salesman samples are a category I’ve spent years researching and documenting. We tend to associate them with baseball and football issues because those dominate today’s post-war vintage market. But in the 1950s/60s/70s, Topps was moving enormous amounts of non-sport product, some argue more than sports in certain years.
And just like their athletic counterparts, those sets had salesman samples too.
Beyond Funny Valentines, known non-sport examples include (among others):
- 1955 Topps Rails and Sails
- 1956 Topps Elvis Presley
- 1956 Topps Davey Crockett
- 1957 Topps Space
- 1958 Topps T.V. Westerns
They don’t surface often. When they do, they’re usually overshadowed by the latest high-grade rookie card or pre-war icon. But historically, they’re just as important. These pieces represent how Topps sold its product to retailers, not to collectors.
Baseball may drive headlines, but the non-sport salesman samples are a reminder: Topps’ post-war dominance wasn’t built on sports alone.
Happy collecting!
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