fruitcratelabels.com
"2008 Clearance Sale"
ANNOUNCING!!! Announcing a big clearance sale of 30 years of accumulated material, that takes up so much space, I can't move around here anymore. I will be revamping my website in many ways, and selling off everything that does not fit onto my computer, into the new website, around my offices and archived in my warehouse.
I started my label business in 1978 and this website on May 22, 1997, with hopes of twenty years of doing business by mail and word of mouth, that the label world would open up. However, in the past ten years, no one could have guessed the changes that would take place. Not only did nearly 100 paper dealers show up on the web selling common labels and other paper ephemera, but most built websites, and they all leaped onto eBay to compete with each other.
For the most part, they carry the same labels as each other, and they drown shoppers in oceans of the same common material at varying prices, battling each other for position, and paying to have THEIR site rise in the search engines. And, because there are about 5,000 different labels out there, it is very confusing for folks to wade between the sites and the claims, the eBay auction listings and the varying prices for all these COMMON labels. Rare labels have become a separate beast altogether.
Many of you have read in my books over the years about every aspect of the label hobby. Well, soon the content of those books will be readable online. I plan to put all my books and price guides and finest label imagess online for everyone's consumption and enjoyment. It's a different world today.
That is why I now plan to only offer the rare labels here, along with ones I personally like for their graphic or "investment" values. WHY BOTHER COMPETING with 20-50 other dealers on the same common titles and material? Instead, I will let them sell the common labels, and I will try to help the more serious collector and discerning-eye decorators and hobbiests with only the choice material not available on other sites. This takes work, but it also takes the attention of serious buyers who re-visit my site periodically to see what I will offer, and then acting on what they see.
In so doing, I can now heartliy recommend these other sites as good places to find commom labels and learn what is readily available on most retailers sites. I won't need to take up valuable time and website space showing the same labels every other dealer has. Most of these sites have pages full of scans of common labels, all the same labels as their competitors carry. Just as my site started doing ten years ago, and was copied to death ever after. Manyu of these sites simply stole good ideas from a few of us who had been in the business a long time, and copied our wording, concepts and named their businesses almost identically to ours. They haven't an original idea in their heads to call their own. Then they went on ebay, and when we listed something, the copied the wording, lettering, phrases, made them look the same, etc. You might not be aware that there are over 70 kinds of labels in the "fruit crate label" world, including some for packaged goods and agri-related printing, like those below, and over 2,000 titles available in profusion! Here is a semi-list:
AMERICAN FRUITS (Eastern states fruit labels of various kinds. Labels were used in 25 American states!)
ASPARAGUS & ARTICHOKES
AUSTRALIAN / TASMANIAN apples, pears, citrus, cans
AVOCADOS
BEERS AND SPIRITS
BERRIES
BOOKS in and out of print from many authors in several countries.
BOTTLED PRODUCTS AND BEVERAGES
BULK LABELS FOR DEALER STOCKS
CALIFORNIA APPLES
CALIFORNIA FRUITS apricots, kiwis, nectarines, poms, persimmons,prunes
CALIFORNIA PEARS
CANADIAN apples, pears, fruits and canned goods
CANNED GOODS salmon and sea foods
CANNED GOODS -- fruits, veg's, sundries
CANNED MEATS
CHERRIES
CIGAR LABELS and tobbacciana
CITRUS LABELS CALIFORNIA AND ARIZONA
CRANBERRIES
EGG CARTONS
FIGS, DATES & DRIED FRUITS
FLORIDA CELERY
FLORIDA CITRUS
GRAPES
HAWAIIAN PINEAPPLE CANS AND HAWAIIANA
IDAHO / MONTANA / UTAH FRUITS
LETTERHEADS AND DOCUMENTS
LITHOGRAPHIC ARTIFACTS
MAGAZINE ADVERTISEMENTS (sunkist, dole, canners, fresh shippers, etc)
MELONS
NON-PAPER ITEMS (orange reamers, enameled signs, price cards and advertisements)
NOODLES AND PASTA
OREGON STATE APPLES, PEARS FRUITS
PACKAGING FOR PRODUCTS BOXES, CARTONS)
PEACHES
PET-FOODS (canned)
PLUMS
POSTERS of all kinds related to fruit advertising and related products
PRODUCTS RELATED TO PERSONAL GROOMING made from lemon oils, and other ag products
PRUNES AND DRIED FRUITS / GLACE (crystallized)
SPANISH ORANGE LABELS
SPICES, CANDY, TEAS AND COFFEES, ETC
TEXAS CITRUS
TOMATOES from CA, AZ, TX, MX and many other states
VEGETABLES 5x7 and 7x10 and including large and strip type
WASHINGTON STATE APPLES PEARS FRUITS
WINE LABELS
YAMS AND SWEET POTATOES
This is a daunting list of labels and related ephemera, and ALL of these are actively collected by many people. That is why it seems reasonable to list only the more choice labels that my friends do NOT carry, so that collectors have a place to come to avoid the common labels they have become so familiar with elsewhere. So, please be patient as I build-out this list and these pages.
ONE OF MY OTHER PLANS IS TO BEGIN AUCTIONING SOME LABELS, AND OFFERING OTHERS ON A FIRST-COME-FIRST-SERVED BASIS. If you are interested in receiving an email when I am holding special auctions on rare (inexpensive) material, and in participating generally, drop me a line and I will put you on the new mailing list. Sales through my auctions will not include all the fees eBay's auctions do, and, the amount of competition will be far less, so your chances are better at getting labels you really want. <signup with pat>
Other than this, I plan to move steadily into my stained glass business and close out the label business. So, 2008 is the perfect (and last) time to go after the rarer labels you wanted at reasonable prices. Soon they won't be available at all.
The only caveat is that we ALL are victims of our government and it's policies and the terrible economy, the upcoming elections and the price of gasoline, health care, insurance, food, taxation and mortgage industry woes. So in a bad economy, many people will not be buying labels. I understand that! So, I may hold off on some of the better material until there is a better chance for you to buy things and for me to make some money selling them :)
So please bookmark this page, and in the next several months, I will add links to what is new for sale. Thanks everyone!!! -- Pat
(Last update: )(6/1/08)