Topps trading cards are surely amongst the most collected Star Wars items of all time.
In the 1977-1983 era, subsets of these Star Wars bubblegum packs could be found nearly ubiquitously
at New Zealand corner dairies, and the associated movie photo cards were collected and traded widely
by kiwi kids of the time. The local versions of this confectionery were made by Allen’s and Regina Ltd,
and bear a few differences from their US counterparts. Read on for the background behind Allen’s and Regina
Star Wars cards….
Allen's and Regina Star Wars cardsRegina Confections Ltd is a long-standing New Zealand confectionery company that,
in 1954, partnered with Scanlen’s Goblin Sweets Pty Ltd (of Australia) to manufacture chewing gum products.
In 1972, Scanlen’s share of the Oamaru chewing gum factory was taken over by A.W. Allen of Melbourne, which is how
the Allen’s and Regina brand came to prominence just before the Star Wars bubble gum and trading cards became one
of their many local favourites. Regina has since been bought and then sold by Nestle NZ Ltd, and the brand still
exists today having been re-launched by Rainbow Confectionery Ltd, still located at the premises in Regina Lane
(historic info courtesy of RainbowConfectionery.co.nz).
Topps released a total of 5 series of Star Wars cards, 3 series of The Empire Strikes Back cards, and 2 series
of cards depicting scenes from The Return of the Jedi. In order to effectively distribute this product
internationally, confectionery companies in different countries took on the role of duplicating the chewing gum
and collectible cards for local release. For example, ‘O-Pee-Chee Co. Ltd’ made and distributed these items
in Canada, ‘Scanlens’ did so in Australia, ‘Laboratorios y Agencias Unidas’ in Mexico, etc. Unfortunately,
a consequence of this distributed manufacture was that not all of the above-mentioned series were deemed worthy
(from a cost-benefit point of view) of release in some countries.
New Zealand was locally only supplied with the first series of Star Wars cards (which featured a blue border
on the cards, and which was packed in a single version of the C-3PO wrapper), and the first series of Return
of the Jedi cards. The ROTJ product came packed in 3 major variations of wrappers featuring either Darth Vader,
Luke Skywalker, or Jabba the Hutt, each of which had two minor variations: including or omitting the reference
to “6 cards”. The Star Wars wrapper is perhaps the most unique to NZ, in reminding the consumer to
“Be a tidy Kiwi” by putting discarded wrappers in the rubbish bin, and reinforcing the marketing message
that “A & R Playtime Gum is Fun”. The ROTJ wrappers convey their country of origin by referencing Allen’s
and Regina as the manufacturer and authorised user of the Topps license, but the front of the packaging
uses the graphics of their Australian counterpart, and hence includes the ‘Scanlens’ name.
The New Zealand blue-bordered series of Star Wars cards are different in a number of ways. First, and most subtly,
they were printed on thicker cardboard than they were in other countries, the back of which was quite an
unbleached beige colour, compared to the white or grey seen overseas. Second, the American Topps versions had one
of a couple of things on the backs of the cards: a piece of a jigsaw puzzle from one of two pictures, or brief,
textual “Story Summaries” or “Movie Facts”. New Zealand cards also had the two jigsaw components
(a 4 card x 4 card photo of Han Solo, Ben Kenobi, Luke Skywalker, and Chewbacca in the Millennium Falcon cockpit,
and secondly a 4 card by 7 card interpretation of the classic movie poster, re-drawn by Topps artist Augie Napoli,
who also drew the box and wrapper art for the original Topps Star Wars series), but had plain unprinted card backs
where the Story Summaries might have been. Thirdly, and most significantly, other countries had a total of 66 cards
and 11 stickers in the series. The NZ set has 72 cards,much like the Australian conterpart, made up of the 66
international issues, and 6 of the 11 stickers presented as blue-bordered cards, carrying the numbering
through to 72. Interestingly, this means that if a kiwi collector has gone on to acquire the second and
subsequent Star Wars series from outside of New Zealand, then because the latter sets have numbering consecutive
with the preceding set, their collection will have very different two versions of cards numbered 67-72.