A few trades came in today. Thanks very much to those who have traded!

Hello everybody, I am new at the forums. I feel like a kid again with the paninis.
I have the following to trade. I am really interested to complete Greece. PM me.


Other 14 24
URU 68
ARG 123
NGA 141
KOR 150 158 162
GRE 173 175
ENG 191
USA 208(x2) 217(x2)
ALG 224
SVN 248(x2) 249
GER 274
AUS 285 293 295
GHA 324
NED 338
ITA 412 421(x2)
PAR 443(x2)
BRA 496(x2)
PRK 511(x2) 523
CIV 533 541
ESP 564 574
SUI 592
HON 616

In Brisbane

The great Panini World Cup football-sticker crazeBuying and swapping football stickers is expensive and frustrating, but it's also totally addictive. Er… does anyone have a spare Danny Shittu?
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John Crace
guardian.co.uk, Sunday 23 May 2010 20.00 BST
Article history

Collecting a full set of Panini World Cup football stickers is not as easy as it sounds. Photograph: Guardian

Ever since 1970 when they were first produced, the countdown to the World Cup has really started with the arrival of the Panini stickers: 638 players, teams, stadiums and badges to be collected and stuck as neatly as possible – harder than it sounds – into the appropriate numbered slot in the album.

That it is a pointless activity goes without saying, but it is one I have happily indulged every four years since the late 80s – especially as I have a son, now 14, on whose behalf I can pretend to be collecting. But make no mistake: Panini is not for kids. He gets an album, but only to fill with my spares.

One woman, too ashamed to be identified, but whom we'll call Sarah, won't let her four-year-old near her stickers; she's got the last five World Cup albums in her attic as she can't risk him tearing a page.

It's an expensive pursuit too. A packet of five stickers costs 50p, so even if you got lucky, you would still be nearly £65 out of pocket. But of course, you don't get lucky. You get doubles. And trebles, quadruples and worse. And herein lies the four-yearly great Panini conspiracy theory.

Would Panini load the packs so some stickers appear more often, ensuring you fork out for more packets? Yes, says almost everyone who has ever collected them.

Chris Taylor, from Manchester, collects with five or six of his mates. "My album is now about two-thirds full and I've already ended up with a whole load of Lee Young-Pyos, Hameur Bouazzas and Vince Grellas," he says.

"Definitely," says Sarah. "Four years ago it was all Gary Nevilles and Marco Materazzis. This year I've got loads of Didier Drogbas and Wilson Palacios." Meanwhile @benjilanyado tweets, "Panini seem to be flooding the packs with Javier Mascheranos and Blaise Nkufos". In my collection, John Terry was an early front runner in the doubles stakes but then went awol; perhaps he's hidden himself in the Panini Wag stickers.

Up in Manchester, Taylor has never seen a Thierry Henry, while I've got six. Are there regional variations in distribution?

Panini says not. "Every sticker is printed in equal quantities and there are no regional variations," says a spokeswoman. "What makes a sticker rare is demand. Everyone wants the familiar, big-named players for their albums. This in turn means that the sticker is less likely to enter the swap arena."

I'm not so sure. No one gives a stuff about favourite players or teams. When was the last time anyone said, "I really want Danny Shittu"? It's all about completing the collection. Right now, I'm desperate for Jonathan Bornstein and Rafik Halliche and I haven't a clue who they are. Nor do I care. I've spent more money than I can count on my collection and there are still 26 absentees. Conspiracy theory it is then. And most of us wouldn't have it any other way.

World Cup Stickers: the latest trend where I’m out of the loop
Apr 24th, 2010 by Julie.
There has been a frenzy of activity in my MBA class this morning (my LAST MBA CLASS WEEKEND ever, FYI! All that remains is final exams + a week in Phoenix. Praise be.). You might assume the activity is focused on final exam prep, but you’d be wrong. Instead, there has been a burst of World Cup sticker trading.

What does that mean, you might ask if you are on the fringe of the futbol (aka soccer for you Americans not living in Mexico) loop as I am. Well apparently each World Cup year, a company called Panini distributes envelopes (each costing 5.50 pesos) with 5 stickers each. There are normal stickers (the player stickers), dual-part stickers (which depict the stadiums in two halves) and the *special* stickers that have holograms of the World Cup logo or trophy on them. FYI, the hologram stickers are the cool ones & hence are more valuable (i.e. you can trade them for more than one player sticker).

A summary of all the tools you need for a successful World Cup sticker orgy: cold hard cash, your list of missing sticker numbers, a pencil to check them off, the cool-ass hologram stickers, the hottie player photos, and the photos of a player caught eating something.

We spotted an album in action-- being filled with stickers as we speak!
The goal is that in the months leading up to the World Cup, you buy & trade these stickers, all the while adding them to your Official Licensed Sticker Album. I was initially confused because unlike baseball cards in the US, there are no stats/info on these stickers– just a shiny photo of the player’s face. BUT it all works out in the end, since the album has the players’ info already in the book, just waiting for his picture to be slapped nearby. Then during the World Cup, you take out your album filled with all your stickers and flip vigorously from page to page when something happens to the relevant player on TV.

My friend Alonso informed me that the trading is perhaps a bit more intense among youngsters who can’t afford to buy envelopes of stickers en masse, the way our MBA classmates are able to with full-time jobs. He says it is more common in the 20-30-year-old crowds to buy full BOXES of stickers, which I might argue is cheating.

As you can imagine, few 8-year-olds will have already acquired this many stickers this early in the sticker-collecting season (we're about a month into it), much less be equipped with a PDA to track inventory.

You might think this would be an activity that skews toward the male population, but you’d be wrong. In fact, I was most impressed today by friend Karina, who returned from our lunch break today with an UPDATED MISSING INVENTORY LIST that she created at home. She is NOT screwing around, people.

Karina keeps her yet-to-be-acquired World Cup sticker list with her at all times, making updates whenever she has access to a printer. (FYI, handwritten sticker inventory lists are for losers. I saw a number of Excel spreadsheets in use today.)

I don’t know if the flurry of stickers & cash changing hands today has convinced me to rush out and start collecting pics of hottie football players, but it has provided a good supplemental lesson in economics.

Finally, on a slightly unrelated note, while browsing the Panini website, I came across the mascot from the World Cup in 1986, the year Mexico was the host. In case anyone was unclear about popular Mexican stereotypes, Mexico did a great job reinforcing them with this horrific mascot named Pique:

In case it is confusing for you, you are looking at a POT-BELLIED jalapeno wearing a SOMBRERO and a MUSTACHE. Apparently the shoes are called "tacos", I am told. All we are missing is a half-empty tequila bottle and a sarape.

Special thanks go out to Alonso, Karina, and Liliana for their support in explaining & photographing this new concept for me. One cultural lesson at a time, folks.

http://www.midwesternerinmexico.com/2010/04/24/world-cup-stickers-the-latest-trend/

There'll be about 4-8 panini traders at the Warrenview in Enmore (Sydney) tonight watching the Aus v Denmark game and trading panini for anyone keen and in Sydney.

Sorry for the late notice.

(I'll post my doubles and needs after tonight's Enmore swapfest!)

Edited by biffsteak: 1/6/2010 05:13:32 PM