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The Up & Under: Obsessive Collector’s Disorder
By Sam Berman | July 18, 2008
I’ve spent HOW much?!?
—————
“Wait a minute honey, I’m gonna add it up…”
-Violent Femmes
Add It Up
At last count, the total is 225.
Since buying my first Ring of Honor DVD, Manhattan Mayhem during the Summer of 2005, I have somehow found the time, money, and inclination to purchase a total of 225 Independent wrestling DVDs. That’s insane.
I’m actually not trying to be dramatic; I freely admit that amassing that many shows in what essentially amounts to three years is a little crazy. In the same amount of time, my other major expenses include rent, food, gas, clothing and probably more than my fair share of beer. That said, all of those other items, the beer included, are pretty reasonable expenditures for someone in their twenties. In an effort to make myself very, very sad, I’m going to break down just how much of my money went to fund my somewhat newfound Independent wrestling habit.
The bulk of my DVD collection is comprised of Ring of Honor shows. I have essentially every event run by the company since the beginning of 2005 (at last count, I’m only missing the forgettable Dedicated, Battle of the Icons, and Reborn Again cards). Each of those sell at full price for $20 apiece. However, due to ROH’s near-constant sales, the actual dollar spent per show ends up being closer to $15.
Some other companies, most notably Full Impact Pro and Pro Wrestling Guerrilla list their shows for $15 right out of the gate, so sale prices can drop those prices even further. Still, seeing as I’m not going to take the (often exorbitant) shipping costs into account here, how about we just go with the flat $15 rate for every show I have. I’m certainly willing to consider that reasonable considering that Smart Mark Video’s occasional sales have allowed me to purchase shows from CHIKARA, IWA Mid-South and Fight Sports Midwest at that very price.
So, at an approximate average of $15.00 per show, my 225 Independent wrestling DVDs have cost me a grand total of $3375.00. And like I said, that doesn’t even include shipping costs, which would be difficult to track anyway because I have purchased tons of DVDs at live shows anyway… difficult to track, that is, if I wasn’t obsessive about my email records.
According to my accrued email transaction receipts, I have spent a whopping $257.75 just having shows sent to me. Again, none of that money went towards anything but moving the shows to me from wherever they were before. Tossing that on the pile, we’re now up to $3632.75.
Here are a pair of comparisons that might help put that number in perspective.
-For that same amount, I could pay the rent for my current apartment for over five months. In my previous apartment, it would have been six months.
-At 25 miles to the gallon, and at an average price of $3.00 per gallon, the 30,000 or so miles I’ve put on my car in the last three years would have cost me roughly $3600. Or $32.75 less than my wrestling DVDs.
Think about those. Six months of rent? All of my gas for three years? And instead I spent the money on wrestling.
Truth be told, the damage doesn’t even stop there. How can I possibly quantify the cost of attending live ROH shows, especially considering that it’s not like they’re taking place in my home town. I’ve been to Chicago nine times and Detroit twice, no small feat when you factor in ticket costs and travel. All-in-all, discovering Independent wrestling has probably cost me in excess of $5000.
So after all of the number-crunching and hand-wringing is done, one important question remains: why do I do it?
There are a lot of fans who can probably live with only owning a few shows, picking and choosing to possess only the matches they find the most interesting. I’m not like that. I’m obsessive about having ‘all’ of something. Put simply: I’m a completist.
Why else would I go out of my way to make sure to have such underwhelming efforts as Night of the Grudges II and How We Roll? I mean, who am I trying to impress by saying “I have every one of [insert company here]’s shows since [enter date here]!”?
Frustrating as it is, I don’t have good answers to those questions. In a perfect world, I’d be able to convince myself that I was buying wrestling at such a large clip because I liked the idea of supporting the small companies I follow. But the truth is that it’s far more about my compulsive want to have more shows, and not anything so altruistic.
Quite bluntly, I’m almost concerned that my wrestling hobby has started to bleed over into a wrestling addiction. Maybe that’s pushing the envelope a bit, after all who is actually getting hurt by my purchasing a bunch of videos? On the other hand, it is a little disheartening to think about how else I might have spent that five grand.
I’ll admit that I’m sometimes prone to addictive behavior, but what is it about wrestling that, to coin a phrase, lends itself to completism? It probably has the most to do with wrestling having an ongoing narrative, where skipping a chapter, even a less-than-stellar one, takes away a part of the larger picture. Furthermore, when you take the specific case of a company like Ring of Honor, it’s rare that an entire show goes by without something worthwhile occurring, be it a match, a promo, or one incredible spot. For many fans, that one moment might be enough to warrant a purchase.
I love watching Independent wrestling, and I don’t intend to stop anytime soon. And anyway, I’m not really that obsessive. It’s not like I’m going over the top, right? I really just follow Ring of Honor, CHIKARA, Pro Wrestling Guerrilla, Full Impact Pro, IWA Mid-South, Pro Wrestling NOAH, UWA Hardcore, Ohio Val—oh my god… Yeah, alright, maybe I have a problem…
Topics: The Up & Under |
July 18th, 2008 at 1:42 am
You could make alot of that money back through ebay. Which is how I got rid of my collection, when I decided to convert entirely to cmll lucha. I had tapes and dvd’s stacked to the heavens but slowly but surely I sold them all. I walked away with like 500 dollars.
I started cutting back by saying, “well what are the must own shows.” I kept doing this until I said, “one company, one dvd”. Next thing you know my entire collection fits in a shoe box.
Also Pro Wrestling Noah, Dragon Gate and New Japan aren’t indies.
July 18th, 2008 at 3:13 am
And this is why I torrent.
July 18th, 2008 at 8:05 am
I applaud you for loving your hobby. Everyone is always trying to apologize when they tell stories of what they spent on stuff not deemed “important”. I say fuck shame. What’s so important anyway?! Your collection and the fun you’ve had is alot more important than over half the shit we mindlessly spend money on without questioning (like gas, taxes, insurance, and so on). Money isn’t that important. Great fun article.
July 18th, 2008 at 3:05 pm
I’ve noted to you before, Sam, that I don’t own many wrestling DVDs. But that said, I’ve easily spent upwards of $2000 in the last eighteen months purchasing tickets to live shows (21 ROH shows since February of 07, about 10 CHIKARA shows, 5 JAPW shows, plus gas, hotel rooms for two trips to Long Island for ROH, and food). So I feel your pain.
July 18th, 2008 at 3:27 pm
I also spent a considerable amount of money on t-shirts.
July 19th, 2008 at 11:37 am
I am the exact same way you are. I have every single Ring of Honor show from The Era of Honor Begins to Supercard of Honor III (once I attend the Manassas show on August 1st, I will own every show period). Thankfully, I got every show from 2003 to Unscripted II at $5.50 a piece thanks to a large bulk buy from ebay, but then I had to go back and buy all the 2002 shows, finish up 2006, get all the 2007 shows, and now all of 2008. I don’t plan on stopping any time soon. And now that I have started adding Chikara DVDs to the pile, my expenditures will certainly look like yours.
It’s good to know that I am not the only one out there with a completionist complexity.
July 19th, 2008 at 4:43 pm
not sure what kind of TV you’ve got Sam, as I’v been shopping around lately myself, but for even $1500 you can get a HD plasma set around 50 inches..