In the vein of “Things I Never Thought Would Have Value” comes the newest entry: historical Glock brochures, catalogues, magazines, user manuals, etc.
The brochure pictured above came out in the late ’80s and was one of the first, if not THE first, printed adverts for the Glock. A recent ebay auction netted the seller a cool $156 for one of these four page brochures. But if you’re looking for the REAL money, take a gander and some realized sales prices for early user manuals. The current sales record is sitting at $1521… for a plain white manual.
The driving force behind this exponential increase is the need for a collector to restore an original Glock back to it’s original condition: correct mags, box, cleaning rod/brush, mag loader, and paperwork. Even the warranty cards will fetch quite a nice price–the more “original” the better.
People have scoffed at Glock “collectors” for a number of years, but when you start to examine things, these prices start making sense. This is the firearm of the 21st century and there is no stopping the fact that many will be collecting it down the road just like they collect Colts and S&Ws today. And what do collectors want with the “traditional” collectible firearms? They want it to be factory original and complete. If you have a $5,000 gun, but not an original box, how much more are you willing to pay for that piece of cardboard???
The end result of this post is that you can all go manual hunting now… who knows what treasures you might find 🙂
A Brief History of Glock Firearms Aimed at Collectors 