Just been given a Bradford Park Avenue programme for their last league match (v Scunthorpe April 1970) before they were relegated. This programme cost 20 pounds in 1970 and in 2000 the owner was offered 200 pounds for it. Contacted Bradford P A and they said they have a number of these programmes for sale in the Club Shop for 30 pounds and one was 'sold on e-bay for 12 pounds recently.' What I can't make out is why a programme that was valuable and in short supply in the 1970's has now become easily available and much cheaper. Surely all those who bought the 1970 match programme didn't decide to sell their copies sometime after 2000. (also if anyone could help me retrieve the pound sign which has gone awol and comes up as #### I'd be grateful!)
USA keyboards have the # where the pound sign is on UK keyboards, sorry, Usa keyboard here and don`t have the pound sign. Check to make sure your keyboard is UK format
Mass production is the answer l was given by a collector regarding programmes not fetching much, l have a few. Whether or not that applies to Bradford PA l don't know. I was also told that ones signed by someone who has died tend to fetch more. I have our FA cup games with Liverpool in 84/85? Signed by the entire Liverpool squad apart from Bruce Grobelaar, so like an 8 year old pillerk, l did his autograph myself!
A programme in good condition signed by some or all players from each team is worth what a collector is prepared to pay for it. In the 50's Doncaster Rovers played a series of friendlies to mark the installation of floodlights re- Celtic, Hibernian, Sports Club Waker Wien ( Austria) and Fiorentina. One game was against an International XI and my Dad who worked behind the scenes at Belle Vue got my programme signed by both teams. It had the autographs of Shankly, Finney, Frank Swift ( died in the Munich Air crash), Dally Duncan, Leon Luty etc. I sent a photocopy of it to John Motson and he wrote back with an offer of fifty quid for it, which I declined. I eventually sold it to a collector from Manchester for £ 400 which was great because it only cost three pence in old money.
A lot of programmes have dropped off in value over the years - or maybe they were over-valued in the first place. I have been collecting for years and seen old Cup Final programmes for example drop in value in the last 20 years or so. I think the Bradford PA programmes were popular for collectors at one point as some collectors wanted to collect all the programmes from their last season in the League, especially the last one. Programmes from a club's last league season used to be a popular area to collect when only a handful of clubs had left the league (Gateshead, Accrington, Bradford PA, Barrow, Workington etc). This was before automatic promotion and relegation in and out of the league was introduced after which this area of collecting seems to have fallen away in popularity so the Bradford PA programmes became less collectable and their value dropped.
BPA applied for re application to the league and were rejected and replaced by Cambridge United https://bpafc.com/club/history/
I've got home and away programmes from the 71/72 UEFA Cup Final between Tottenham and Wolves and a signed Tottenham league cup winners poster from 73. They're worth buggar all unless you bump into someone Tottenham daft that is willing to buy them. Had a look around and they're ten a penny.
