General Forum

I'm planning on storing most of my primary collection in binders.  I'd like to put each card in it's final spot in the binder, and where I have missing cards put in placeholders until I get them.

I'm fine with these cards just having text with the card information or low quality images of the cards.  I'd like to print these out in bulk rather than writing them out by hand or trying to create them manually on the computer.

I am looking into creating a script to do this for me, but before I spend time on this I wanted to see if something like this already existed or other suggestions that people have for placeholder cards in binders.  Thanks!

Edit:

See my reply on page 2 of this thread, I was able to create a script to generate a PDF with cards that I could print out.

Admittedly, I've gone the rather lazy route of cutting out small rectangles and writing the names of the players on them. Ugly but effective. I wish you luck on the print & script!

I just leave blank spots.

@myrke - Thanks!  I have a lot of missing cards, so just hoping to save some time rather than writing them all out.

@CluelessJoe - makes sense, I would just prefer to see a placeholder rather than the card on the next page.

Leave a blank spot for the cards you don't have.  There is no need to make a placeholder. Did you know about the number 9? When inserting cards into sheets, add up the card number: example #537 goes into position 6 on the sheet. 5+3+7=15, 1+5=6. that's the easiest way to know where to place the card if you're missing lots of them when starting a set. Of course this doesn't work with sets that have a and b VAR cards.

@Xanadude - Thanks for the suggestion.  I'm actually collecting a player, but that trick does seem helpful for a set collector.  I could make do without the placeholders, it's just an aesthetic preference I suppose, so while I am browsing my collection I can see which cards I'm missing.

As a Red Sox collector, I use placeholders to represent positions for team sets. That way I know if I have the 2020 catcher, first baseman, etc as the collection doubles as a rememberance as to who started, closed, etc during that year. Making placeholders by hand is a bit of a chore, so hopefully someone has found a faster way if one's collection is bigger. 

If you have a list already typed out, you could use a mailing label template to print out the card names & numbers on their own spaced-out sections of paper - or just print it out with a multiple-column setting.  It would require a little trial and error with font size or extra carriage returns, but I imagine it would take less time than rewriting all of them by hand.

I have blank spots in my Mets autograph binder too, but you know? Making quick little placeholder cards makes a lot of sense, especially for some of the older guys who I know I'm going to have a hard time finding cards for.

They do sell precut 1/2 index cards that are just the right width for a binder sheet, no cutting necessary.