Fleer facts for kids
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| Private (subsidiary of Upper Deck Company) | |
| Industry | Confectionery, collectibles |
| Fate | Brand acquired by Upper Deck in 2005 |
| Founded | 1885 |
| Founder | Frank H. Fleer |
| Defunct | May 31, 2005 |
| Headquarters | , |
| Products | Bubble gum, trading cards |
The Fleer Corporation was a famous company started by Frank H. Fleer in 1885. It was the first company to successfully make bubble gum. Fleer stayed a family-owned business until 1989.
Fleer first created a bubble gum recipe called Blibber-Blubber in 1906. This gum could be blown into bubbles. However, it was not as good as regular chewing gum, so Blibber-Blubber was never sold to the public. In 1928, a Fleer employee named Walter Diemer made the Blibber-Blubber recipe much better. This led to the first successful bubble gum sold in stores, called Dubble Bubble. Its pink color started a trend for almost all bubble gums that came after it.
Fleer also became well-known for making sports cards. They started in 1923 by producing baseball cards. Over the years, Fleer also released American football cards (starting in 1960) and basketball cards (starting in 1986).
The company also made some non-sports trading cards. In 1995, Fleer bought another trading card company called SkyBox International. Soon after, they closed their Philadelphia factory where Dubble Bubble had been made for 67 years. In 1998, the 70-year-old Dubble Bubble brand was bought by a Canadian company named Concord Confections. Concord was then bought by Tootsie Roll Industries in 2004.
In May 2005, news spread that Fleer was stopping its trading card business right away. By early July, the company began to sell off its assets to pay back people it owed money to. This included selling the Fleer brand name. A rival company, Upper Deck, bought the Fleer name and their toy business for $6.1 million. Just one year before, Upper Deck had offered $25 million, but Fleer had said no. Fleer had hoped the sports card market would get better.
How Fleer Started and Early Card Attempts
The Fleer company was founded by Frank H. Fleer in Philadelphia in 1885. It began as a business that made confectionery (sweets and candies). Fleer was already known for its gum and candy.
The company started making sports cards earlier than many of its rivals. In 1923, they released baseball cards inside their "Bobs and Fruit Hearts" candy. These rare cards were similar to other cards from that time. However, they were machine-cut and had an ad for Fleer candy on the back.
Many years later, in 1959, Fleer signed a deal with baseball star Ted Williams. They sold an 80-card set that showed highlights from his career. Fleer could not include other players because a rival company, Topps, had signed most active baseball players to special contracts.
Williams was almost at the end of his career and retired after the 1960 season. Fleer kept making baseball cards by featuring Williams with other mostly retired players. They created a Baseball Greats series. One set was made in 1960 and another in 1961. The company did not make new cards the next year. Instead, they kept selling the 1961 set. They focused on signing enough players to make a set with active players in 1963.
This 67-card set included several stars. One was Maury Wills, who was the 1962 National League MVP. He had chosen to sign with Fleer instead of Topps. Wills and Jimmy Piersall helped Fleer sign other players. Still, Topps had the rights to most players, and the Fleer set was not very successful.
Meanwhile, Fleer took advantage of the new American Football League (AFL) in 1960. They started making football cards for the AFL. Topps cards covered the older, more established National Football League. In 1961, both companies made cards with players from both leagues. The next year, Fleer went back to covering only the AFL, and Topps covered the NFL. In 1964, another company, Philadelphia Gum, got the rights for NFL cards. Topps then took over the AFL.
Sometime after 1961, Fleer also produced cards for The Three Stooges.
Important Card Sets Fleer Made
Fleer created two very important trading card sets in the 1980s. In 1984, Fleer was the only major trading card maker to release a Roger Clemens card. They included him, a new player for the Boston Red Sox, in their 1984 Fleer Baseball Update Set. This update set also had the first official card of Hall of Fame outfielder Kirby Puckett.
Fleer also sold complete factory sets of their baseball cards from 1986 to 1992. These sets came in colorful boxes for stores and plain boxes for hobby shops. The 1986 set was not sealed, but the 1987-89 sets were sealed with a sticker. The 1990-92 sets were shrink-wrapped.
In 1986, Fleer helped bring back the basketball card industry. They released the 1986-87 Fleer Basketball set. This set included the rookie cards of Michael Jordan and Charles Barkley. Many basketball card collectors see this set as the most important basketball card set ever, like the "1952 Topps of basketball."
In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Fleer made shiny "parallel" sets for their 1987-89 baseball sets. These were very popular among collectors for a while. However, that popularity faded. Today, these sets (except for the rare 1989 one) are not worth much more than the regular sets.
Fleer's first "Ultra" set came out in 1991. Some years, it was released earlier than their regular Fleer (Tradition) set. The 1991 set had a smaller production run than the regular Fleer sets. It was made on higher quality card stock and used silver ink. The 1992 set used a special coating on both sides and gold foil on the front. This made it one of the most beautiful sets that year.
In 1994, Ultra and regular Fleer sets started a new trend. They began offering an "insert card" in every pack. The next year, they started another trend called "hot packs." About 1 in 72 packs contained only insert cards. Another tradition that continues today is the Ultra Gold Medallion parallel insert set. This started in 1995 and included all the insert sets for the first two years. These are found one per pack. In 1997, Ultra introduced the Platinum Medallion insert set. These are usually numbered to 100, meaning only 100 copies exist. In 1998, the purple Ultra Masterpieces were introduced. These are "one of one" cards, meaning only one copy exists. This started the trend of including very rare cards in the regular, Gold, and Platinum sets.
Fleer's very high-quality set, called Flair, began in 1993. It was made in smaller amounts than Ultra sets. Its special feature was that it was printed on very thick card stock. It was about twice as thick as regular cards. It also used a unique shiny finish and six-color printing. The "packs" for Flair cards were different. The cards (usually ten in a "pack") were shrink-wrapped. Then they were placed in a shrink-wrapped "mini-box" instead of the usual foil packs. The 1996/1997 Flair Showcase basketball box set included the first "one-of-one" cards for any major sport. These were called "Masterpieces."
Fleer also got a deal from WWE to make and sell WWE trading cards. They did this from 2001 to 2004.
Company Changes and Sales
The Fleer family, who were descendants of Frank Fleer, sold the company in 1989. They sold it for just under US$70 million to John W. Fleer and Charter House Investments. John W. Fleer kept most of the ownership in the company. In the early 1990s, Fleer started selling more products in large retail stores like Rite Aid. This made some smaller hobby dealers upset.
The comic-book company Marvel Entertainment Group, Inc. bought Fleer on July 24, 1992, for US$540 million. Marvel bought another card company, SkyBox International, on March 8, 1995, for $150 million. Fleer/Skybox then reduced its focus on retail chains. They started a program to support hobby dealers and collectors.
Marvel faced financial difficulties in 1996, along with its other companies. Fleer was directly hurt by the 1994 Major League Baseball strike and long player disagreements in the NBA. In June 1997, Marvel created its Marvel Enterprise division. This division managed its trading card and sticker businesses.
Marvel put Fleer up for sale, asking for $30 million. Fleer came out of Marvel's financial difficulties on October 1, 1998. In February 1999, Fleer/Skybox was sold to a company owned by Alex and Roger Grass, a father and son.
In early 2005, Fleer announced it would stop making all trading cards. They also said they would begin a process to sell off their assets to pay debts. In July 2005, Upper Deck bought the rights to the Fleer name. Upper Deck then started making Fleer-branded basketball, ice hockey, and American football cards. The $6.1 million Upper Deck paid for the Fleer name was much less than the $25 million they had offered to buy Fleer a year earlier.
In 2006, Upper Deck produced baseball card sets under the names Fleer, Fleer Ultra, Fleer Tradition, Flair, Skybox Autographics, and Fleer Greats of the Game. The last Fleer-branded baseball cards appeared in 2007.
