Statis Pro Baseball Cards: Protecting Memories for Over 50 Years
Baseball cards have long been a treasured part of American pop culture. From the late 19th century tobacco cards to the modern licensed team and player cards, collecting cards depicting our favorite baseball stars has brought joy to fans of all ages. One challenge collectors have always faced is preventing damage and deterioration to their prized cardboard over long periods of time. This is where Statis Pro came in to solve the problem in a unique way.
Statis Pro was founded in 1966 by brothers Lewis and David Klots in Queens, New York. As avid baseball card collectors themselves, the Klots brothers were frustrated by the fragile nature of standard paper cards. Over time, cardboard would bend, crease, fade or grow brittle with simple handling or exposure to light. Looking for a permanent solution, the inventors experimented with different plastic coatings and sealing techniques.
Their breakthrough came when they discovered a polyester-based film that could be applied as a nearly invisible, extremely durable shield over individual cards. By 1967, Statis Pro had perfected the process of sandwiching cards between two thin polyester sheets, sealed on all four sides with special heat-activated adhesive. The result was a protective “pouch” that was lightweight, flexible and completely sealed the card away from any potential damage for decades to come.
The Statis brothers knew they had created something special that could really benefit collectors. Starting with a small factory and office in Queens, they began marketing Statis Pro cardholders directly to hobby shops and sports memorabilia dealers across the Northeast. Word of mouth and enthusiastic reviews helped sales steadily grow throughout the late 1960s and 1970s as collectors embraced the preservation benefits. Baseball legends like Mickey Mantle and Hank Aaron even started personally endorsing the Statis Pro method.
A key marketing strategy was bundling valuable vintage and rookie cards inside the protective pouches. Early Statis Pro “factory sets” often included cards from the 1950s and 60s that were still affordable at the time but have since become highly valuable. Sealed this way in near-mint condition, they retained much greater surplus value years later versus typical paper cards of the same players and sets. As baseball card collecting exploded in popularity during the late 1970s and 1980s, Statis Pro was perfectly positioned with its shielding solution.
By the 1990s, Statis Pro had expanded national distribution and a much larger factory in Long Island City was pumping out millions of cardholders each year for the booming collectibles market. Over the decades, the polymer film technology and sealing process was refined for optimized clarity, flexibility and adhesion qualities. Statis Pro also began offering different sizes of regular sleeves as well as larger “super sized” pouches that could hold entire complete sets or entire team collections of cards at once for convenient compact storage and display.
For today’s collectors and investors, Statis Pro remains the gold standard of long-term protection over 50 years later. While flimsier one-time-use plastic holders have come and gone, Statis Pro’s pouches have proven their worth by ensuring cards encased decades ago still look as brilliant as the day they were packaged. The polyester film does not yellow, crack or degrade with time. Properly stored cards inside Statis Pro holders have stayed in pristine condition while others from the same era have deteriorated.
This unmatched preservation quality is a big reason why cards sealed by Statis Pro in the 1960s-80s command higher values in the collector marketplace versus typical paper cards of that vintage. The Statis Pro seal provides authenticity and peace of mind that the card has been continuously protected for decades without risk of damage. Ranging from common players to rare variants, vintage 1961 Topps, 1966 Topps, 1969 Topps and 1971 Topps are particularly prized sets among investors when they carry the Statis Pro label of certified long-term preservation.
In an ever-changing memorabilia industry, Statis Pro still dominates the niche it created more than 50 years ago. With professional quality control ensuring consistent film and seal strength on every pouch, Statis Pro remains the safest, most trusted way to save beloved cards or entire collections for future generations to enjoy. Just as the company has grown and upgraded facilities over the decades, it also continues innovating by expanding compatible sizes and formats for modern cards, autographs, uncut sheets and more specialty collectibles. Statis Pro’s time-tested polyester film formulation keeps memories fresh-faced for another half century and beyond.
