The Lighted Glows are probably one of the rarest line of Harbour lights produced. The first lighted “Great Lighthouse of the World” was the Oak Island in April 2003 and the last one produced was the HL484 Whaleback in June 2010. Thirty-four of these were produced and generally sell for from $25 to retail.

Originally the GLOW’s were produced as open editions and were not considered collectables but as fillers for the hard to find retired limited editions. The idea was that more GLOWs could be made as they were needed, so there would never be a shortage of the popular lighthouse. Each batch produced would have a different ascending letter of the alphabet in front of the number starting with “A”. This worked well for the early years. An example would be the Cape Hatteras HL401 which had five production batches with the last one with the letter “E”. And even then Harbour Lights started all over again with a revised Hatteras HL401R.

As the years past collectors started losing interest with the Limited editions which created less of a demand and in return Harbour Lights produced less to compensate. Many of the retired hard to find lighthouses became available and for a reasonable price. This put a strain on the GLOW’s, that they were no longer needed as fillers and less of them were produced. The difference with the GLOW’s was that we never knew how many was produced, and since they were an open edition more could always be produced later down the line.

Since Harbour Lights is out of business all of the open edition GLOW’s are now limited editions. Ones like the HL401 Cape Hatteras that had over 27,000 made will never be a collectable but what about those made from 2008 to 2010. The limited edition Harbour Lights of that time period had a production of 550. Doesn’t it make sense that the GLOWs had a similar production amount?

I think that the collectors have been mindset that a GLOW is not a collectable. But those days are gone and if you follow eBay you will notice that post 2008 HL GLOW’s are hard to find just as the Limited Editions.


DANIEL