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Playing Card Chat ♠ ♥ ♣ ♦ => Playing Card Plethora => Topic started by: Linguist_ on March 26, 2012, 10:31:35 PM
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My mum and I were sorting through some drawers and I came across this deck. It must have been in there for a good few years. It's a cheap deck and the cards are that laminated way that you never really realised was terrible until you started collecting and handling higher end cards. Nevertheless, I just thought I'd share them with you since it's quite funny that they've copied the classic 'Bee' design. The 'BW' stands for something, it's on the side of the deck, but I can't quite remember what - an Asian name of some sort though. They say 'poker' on the top, but the cards are much smaller than poker sized cards. I don't know what bridge cards are like in terms of size, but these seem too big to be 'mini' decks. These pictures are just ones from around the interwebs.
(http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_snSgGvmCxLg/SVz0yCfTZyI/AAAAAAAAAGc/3zVs8CHCh5U/s1600/IMG_3417.jpg)
(http://www.squirrelpoker.co.uk/images/imagecache/200x200_bwpk6.jpg)
(http://www.squirrelpoker.co.uk/images/imagecache/200x200_bwpk7.jpg)
(http://cache.osta.ee/i/auctions/large/cd/c1/cbec22190d8f304121764d7bb0dac1cd.jpg)
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if you take a poker sized card and put a bridged sized car on top, push the bridge card flush with the edges of the poker sized and you should at least the size, you should still have one or two boarders of the poker card visible
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I actually have 2 of these. I was going to do a vid comparing these and some other Bee knock-offs to the real thing but honestly, they're cards you get free with cheap poker chip sets and stuff and they're not awful. They're relatively poker sized; bridge cards are a different shape, these are just cut smaller.
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I think they are from Bin-Wang China. Does the Ace Of Spade say anything?
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I posted these on eBay, but no takers... They're Bee knockoffs too... From what I understand, Bee happens to be the longest running brand of playing card in U.S. History...
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I have 2 of these, they are decent decks but not terrific handling. But I don`t mind them for a game of poker.
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@Linguist_: a standard poker-sized card is 3.5" high and 2.5" wide, while a standard bridge-sized card is the same height and only 2.25" wide.
There are numerous Chinese printers of imitation Bee decks. Some go to the trouble of at least trying to pretend they're something different by using different names (sometimes even in Mandarin), while others are bold enough to use USPC trademarks and copyrights and label their decks as Bee, stating they're made by USPC when it's clear they aren't.
I was helping Sales Director Bill Schildman track some of these counterfeits down in my neighborhood about a year ago. I identified shops that were carrying the cards for him. The intent wasn't to pursue the individual shop owners, since many of them wouldn't know USPC products from paving stones, but to get them stopped at the distributor level. USPC knows they have a snowball's chance in hell of pursuing legal action against the manufacturers. While helping his effort, I also found other cards that were being counterfeited, like numerous knock-off varieties of Uno card games.
I'm guessing that part of the reason they're creating a stronger presence in China is that they're trying to "invade" the turf of the counterfeiters themselves with a higher quality product. As limited capitalism continues to take hold and some people have more disposable income, they are becoming more quality-conscious and thus prefer the genuine article over cheap imitations. The Bicycle Star deck (both colors) was actually intended for sale in the Chinese market and is advertised on the Chinese website for USPC.
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I have a couple of BCG decks, too. They're pretty much identical to the BWPK cards.
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I posted these on eBay, but no takers... They're Bee knockoffs too... From what I understand, Bee happens to be the longest running brand of playing card in U.S. History...
About how much are/were they selling at?
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I posted these on eBay, but no takers... They're Bee knockoffs too... From what I understand, Bee happens to be the longest running brand of playing card in U.S. History...
About how much are/were they selling at?
These are NOT expensive decks. I found my counterfeit Bees at dollar stores for 99 cents a pack. BCG or BWPK are probably not that much more expensive, and certainly cheaper than Bikes.
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For you Nathan I'd let them go at $12 per deck... Just playing, I think I started them at .99 and titled them "Bee Knockoffs" or something like that...
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I posted these on eBay, but no takers... They're Bee knockoffs too... From what I understand, Bee happens to be the longest running brand of playing card in U.S. History...
I remembered something from the bicyclecards.com site...
Russell Morgan & Co. got into the playing card business in 1881.
They became US Playing Card Co. in 1891.
They acquired NY Consolidated in the 1890's, which created the Bee deck in 1892, before the buyout.
But...
Russell Morgan created the Bicycle deck in 1885, and the Congress deck in 1881!
Unless you can find a card brand older than that still in print, Congress is the oldest brand still in use today.
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@Don, Possibly, but as far as decks go, I believe that the Bee Deck has remained unchanged and printed since the late 1800s...
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@Don, Possibly, but as far as decks go, I believe that the Bee Deck has remained unchanged and printed since the late 1800s...
I see your point - it's more about not just same brand, but same design. Congress is always done in different styles. (Most of which are cheesy!)
Bee came into existence in 1892. There's been some different deck designs, but the Diamond Back's probably been around from day one.
Bicycle's been around since 1885, and the Rider Back came into being in 1887. RBs are still made today (and in general production, not as a vanity reprint) and are five years older than any Bee deck in any back design.
I honestly couldn't think of any general production deck made by USPC today with a history that's longer than Bicycle and Congress. Tally Ho was probably 1890s, just like Bee; Aviator came about as a commemorative deck celebrating Lindbergh's Atlantic Ocean crossing; I don't know when Mavericks came into being but I don't think it was earlier, and neither were the Texans, since they came about after the International Playing Card Company division of USPC was created.
Maybe Aladdins? Anybody know the history of Aladdin decks?
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For you Nathan I'd let them go at $12 per deck... Just playing, I think I started them at .99 and titled them "Bee Knockoffs" or something like that...
I'll take a look at them.
This makes me think of this deck:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Playing-Cards-TIGER-565-China-Plastic-52-Pack-Deck-Blue?item=150545768271&cmd=ViewItem&_trksid=p5197.m7&_trkparms=algo%3DLVI%26itu%3DUCI%26otn%3D4%26po%3DLVI%26ps%3D63%26clkid%3D7323777582688628079#ht_1286wt_1154
Tiger deck. vjose32 has a review on it. Its a fugly, terrible handling deck with a box that is unopenable without ripping apart. 3.99 w/o shipping.
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The packaging on those Tiger 565s are vaguely reminiscent of the box for the Fournier 505...far from identical, but they also used a very similar typeface to the Fournier title for the Tiger title.