The Official Nintendo Sticker Book And Stick-Ons (Imperial)

 

The Official Nintendo Sticker Book And Stick-Ons
Imperial
1988

Stickers were a big part of the 80's. Kids collected them, traded them, and in general horded them. If it was a brand, you could rest assured a sticker set was out there somewhere. I've often wanted to put together a collection of some of my favorite sets, and though it's a slow (and somewhat expensive process), this is definitely one of my favorites.

The Official Nintendo Sticker Album and Stick-Ons were released in 1988 by Imperial. Yes, that company known for producing all of those generic action figures found in grocery stores. Each page of the sticker album featured a unique theme to it, based on some of the most popular games on the Nintendo Entertainment System, such as, Super Mario Bros. The Legend Of Zelda, Mike Tyson's Punch-Out and more.

In correlation with the album, Imperial released twelve different sticker sets. However, six of them are only subtly different from the first half of the set.

It's unknown if Imperial released the above six sets first, or the below six. If you take a close look, you'll notice that the majority of the stickers included are the exact same as those shown above with one very subtle change. One of the stickers from each sets has been removed, and replaced with one based on the Nintendo game, Rad Racer.

The reason I believe the Rad Racer sets to be the latter of the stickers is because of how rare they are. This would coincide with industry standard practices of releases towards the end of a series being the more difficult to find due to the low production run. These ones are definitely challenging to obtain.

In addition to the "Official" series of stickers, Imperial also produced a set of six packs based on SNK games of the era. Of all of the stickers shown in this post, these are by far the easiest, and subsequently, cheapest, to come by.

It's fun to think about what further stickers could have been made had Imperial gotten the license to Konami, Data East or Capcom, just to name a few of some of the most popular publishers of Nintendo Entertainment System games. The possible sets could have been endless.

Though these stickers are both challenging and fun to collect, they're also a bit pricey for what you get. The SNK sets can easily set you back fifteen dollars per pack, and the six sets of the "Official" ones, without the Rad Racer stickers, can go for fifteen to thirty dollars a pack.

The packs with Rad Racer stickers are so rare that it's impossible to set a price point for them. They rarely show up on secondary markets, and there are several collectors looking for them. Prices can get incredibly high when a bidding war is occurring.

With that said, due to the age of all of the stickers noted in this post, it's fairly common for the adhesive to wear off or disintegrate. This is a common problem with collecting vintage stickers, and something you need to be prepared to accept if you pursue this particular hobby. The bright side to this is that rubber cement fixes any sticker you want to adhere to an album, and even a tear. It's not like they're designed to be stuck and removed anyway.

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