Hi,

Although I understand that collections from Argentina are out of the scope of this forum (except for Mars Attacks, Batman and a couple more), I thought it would be interesting to show some Argentina issues along with their US counterparts. Some of these images are from my own collections, and some other are taken from the web.

1) Marte ataca (Mars Attacks)




2) Aviones (Topps Wings)



3) Ventanitas Chistosas (Funny Doors)


4) Solapitas Divertidas (Comic Book Foldees)


5) Batman Riddler backs (don't know the spanish name)


6) Batirisas (Batt Laffs)



7) James bond (don't know the name)


8) Sorpresitas (Mad Medals + Ringer dingers)
This one was a real surprise. It is a mixup of Mad Medals and Ringer Dingers. Check the image and compare the Argentina wrapper with the two US wrappers. The big image is the album.
What's more surprising is that Sorpresitas is a collection that was issued in 1971 (I collected them when I was a kid, so that's correct). And while Ringer DIngers is from 1971, Mad Medals is from 1976 That's a big WTF!!! (sorry for my french). Did Topps copied an Argentina collection??? There is no way that I can figure that out from here. Little or no records about this collection, but maybe somebody in this forum can find out something.


9 Sport cards (don't know the spanish name)
I don't think this collection is from Argentina, but I couldn't find any information on the cards. So it may be from Spain or Mexico. It says T.C.G in the back of the card. Maybe they are a spanish US edition?


10 Viaje a la luna (no US version??)
I thought that these cards were an Argentina edition of an US collection, but I couldn't find any matching collection. Anybody?


There are a lot more collections that were released in Argentina.
Beatles series 1 2 and 3 in a series of 115 cards
Batman (norman saunders)
Chips, Grease, Star wars, BJ, Monraker, King Kong, and many more. But not a lot more.

I really don't know about older collections. It is difficult to know.

Hope you find this interesting. If you have any questions I will try to answer them with my little knowledge.

Thanks!

Enrique

Thanks for the post. While not the PRIMARY focus, it's always great to see cards from other places or countries--especially when they are similar to the ones we collect!

Great Stuff! They look like better cardboard and ink were used when compared to Venezuelan issues of the same era. I am not sure of the exact date but Topps had established a presence in Argentina by at least 1959.

I don't think so, all those cards were published by Stani (except for a few). Never saw any edition published by Topps. I guess that Stani had some kind of deal with Topps. Do you have any information about Topps in Argentina that you can share? Not really too much stuff here to investigate.

Topps, even with licensing deals, was known to have a financial interest in the local firms in Venezuela and England that I am aware of and Joseph Shorin's obituary mentions Argentina as one location where Topps had a plant (1959). The deals could be very disadvantageous to the local firm, witness what Topps did to A&BC Gum in 1974. The basic gist was Topps decided to enter a foreign market, Topps found a local firm needing financial or infrastructure help, had the local firm sign a contract favoring Topps, Topps invested in the local plant, production commenced of cards and gum. I think most ownership interest was on the gum production side. Some deals ended poorly, others did not I guess.

Dan's link is interesting as it shows a licensing deal covering a large portion of South America. I wonder if all the cards from the countries mentioned were printed in Mexico? Venezuelan cards in the 60's were actually printed in that country but differences abound it appears. Topps was a crazy patchwork of stuff from day one--whatever worked!

That's interesting. I took a look and the article has good information. I will read it tonight at home.

What about the Mad Medals and Sorpresitas issue? How come it was released in 1971 in Argentina (by a local company named CRACK) and in 1976 in USA by Fleer?

Sounds odd to me.

I have seen this with the Scanlens and Regina and Allens issues in Australia and New Zealand; some other firm's cards, say Donruss Odd Rods (don't quote me, just illustrating) are also licensed, so perhaps some licensing deals were not exclusive. Sometimes, licensing went from a third party to Topps instead of the other way around so when that agreement was up, another company could obtain the license thereafter.

Neat stuff!

I'd love to get one of those Marte Ataca wrappers.

stop being bashfull Todd you mean another one

A Spanish version of Topps Sports Cars? Another set to look for!

Jon.

Tony - too funny! I just wanted one to go with my set of Marte Ataca cards.

todd do you have the English version as well?

Great information, Enrique! I always enjoy seeing your posts.

Tony, No - always wanted that one but have never found one that was in decent enough condition that I could afford.

Cool stuff. I do think Topps took advantage of their UK counterpart, and I wouldn't be surprised if they pulled something like that on other local-yokels as well. I suspect the tipping point would be once they no longer felt they needed a local agent, they were motivated to "cut out the middleman" and do it all themselves. (Like they say in the mafia films before pulling the trigger: "It's nothing personal, just business.")

Sorry, but after reading the text again I realized that I didn't scan the US counterparts of these collections from Argentina.

I changed my mind after some time dealing with scans and Photobucket, and forgot to change the text.

The ones that surprised me most (besides Mad Medals) was the argentinian version of Funny Doors. I collected them when I was a kid and I have wonderful memories about them. I discovered the US version a couple of months ago reading an article at The Wrapper magazine. Not to mention that I only found some pretty expensive test prints ($500+ ea.) of those cards at ebay.

Why is that collection so expensive?

Thanks for your previous compliments.

Enrique