I have not been as active on these Forums as I would like to be, but I have been a Harbour Lights collector for nearly 4 years. I was also very active as a secondary dealer for most of that time, but I am much less active today. I am still on auto-ship for every new piece.

The bloom has been off the rose, so to speak, for well over a year. This can be seen by the continually dropping prices for retired pieces on the secondary market. Do not expect this trend to reverse. There will always be a supply of retired pieces available for sale due to attrition among collectors. And there will always be someone who wants one of these retired pieces. But I think we are close to a state of equilibrium, where the demand for retired pieces roughly equals the supply.

As stated in previous posts, there are several reasons for the present situation. First, most of the more popular pieces have been made into replicas by HL. While St. Marks and Old Mission Point and East Quoddy are all very well done, none of them is a St. Augustine, a Portland Head or a Cape Hatteras. The line needs “sizzle” along with the steak, but most of the “sizzle” has already been done. Second, the GLOW pieces are so well done that it is hard for many collectors to justify spending the extra money for a retired LE piece. Just compare LE vs. OE for Old Mackinac, Grosse Point and Key West and you’ll get the idea. And a strong secondary market is important to the strength of a collectible line. Third, Harbour Lights made a serious strategic blunder when they increased the edition sizes the way they did. Can they recover? Things will never be the way they were before the increase in edition sizes. For all but a few releases it will be difficult to sell out an edition size above 6500. Fort Jefferson will go, but what other 2000 releases will?

One factor that has not been discussed is the product life cycle. Most products go through four stages: introduction, growth, maturity, decline. I believe the cycle is faster for collectibles than for most other products. Harbour Lights is already in the maturity phase. Now, this phase could last for many, many years, and I hope it does. But what prompted this thread, the discontinuance of the HL line by retailers, is an indication that the line is no longer in the growth phase.

I don’t believe anyone has said this yet, but the market is SATURATED with Harbour Lights.

So my advice to Harbour Lights? Reduce the edition size to 6500 for most new releases, 7500 for a few special items. Go easy on the international series, keeping the edition sizes even smaller. Eliminate the GLOW line, which hopefully will breathe new life into the secondary market. Slow down the pace of new releases: either go back to two announcements per year or fewer pieces three times per year.

Thanks for the read, from a lover of the Harbour Lights line who just bought two new curio cabinets which hold about 80 pieces (what do I do with the other 80?).

Mike