Your collecting pattern over the years

[5FDP]

At least no one can accuse you of contributing to the global financial crisis

I certainly haven't gone to this level of detail with my collecting. Every purchase I make is entered into a spreadsheet (something I have done ever since I received a hand-me-down Commodore 128 from my cousins), but I only track name / faction / condition / series.

I think subconsciously I wanted to avoid reminding myself of how much money I spend each year... it's definitely something I wouldn't want the wife to see.

[1AZRAEL1]

Very nice. I have no idea myself how my pattern is, but I would say over the past few years it has increased. But has come to a halt

And I too have no idea how many I own.

[1orion2many]

Wow, you put a lot of effort in there Paul I wouldn't have the foggiest as I don't really have any patterns as such. It all depends on spare cash and what is around that I like at the time

[GoktimusPrime]

Roughly speaking...

From 1984-1987/88 my brother and I had the second or third largest collection amongst our peers. Then the kids with larger collections sold them (I got Soundwave and Gnaw for $5 each!) and so our collection became the largest. After the Marvel Comics were cancelled our collecting declined. By 1992 my brother had stopped collecting altogether and I only picked up a few figures. The G2 years were definitely the slowest for me in terms of TF collecting.

It picked right back up again when Beast Wars came out and I went nuts collecting. Then the bloody 2002 drought came... I wanted to keep buying but there were hardly any new toys to buy! My wallet breathed a sigh of relief, but the collector in me sure was frustrated. I even bought RiD Optimus Prime despite the fact that I got Super Fire Convoy 2 years before just cos I had nothing else to buy! (sad huh?) My purchasing would've peaked in 2003-04 when I was buying a lot of repaints (although most of them I gave to my gf atm who's also a TF fan - so they never went into my collection). Shortly after that I wound down and tried to become more discerning with what I bought - and that's pretty much where I am now.

In terms of volume, I'd also say that I've been buying a lot more since 2007 just because there's a lot more of stuff out there to buy, what with all these lines running simultaneously (movie, Animated, Universe etc.).

[liegeprime]

hehehe good thing there wasnt a drought in TFs (2002) in Phils, Gok, but my wallet was in El Niño during that era so it doesnt make a difference

[Zippo]

That is a pretty graph.
Maybe I should put my recorded pictures into something similar.

When I styarted in late 2000, it was everything I could get my hands on - generally locally since I didn't have a card. When I got the card in 2001, there were many many lean weeks when I poured cash into the card to import, while also getting stuff locally - anything and everything

That was the patern until mid run Energon when I decided that I couldn't actually afford, nor store them. So I decided to ditch collecting the American lines and focus on Japanese, unless there was no Japanese version (or it was a USA Edition)

In 2006 I changed my mind again, and again in 2009 - I sold mostly all the stuff that was't related to G1/G2/e-Hobby/Binaltech/Alternators/Classics/Universe/Henkei.

This year I have only imported a few things, with the plan to pick what I have missed while on holiday in Singapore. Have learnt its a heck of a lot cheaper over there.