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In general you find a number of different types of collectors within the football programme world. There is the potential collector who has a passing interest in starting a programme collection, there is the latent collector who collects programmes infrequently, there is the casual collector who may accumulate old football programmes without having a specific theme to their collection, and also there is the confirmed collector who has specific aims and regularly tries to purchase programmes in order to enhance their collection.

There is no minimum or maximum size to a collection, and the only limitations to it come in the form of your available finance. To be a collector, there is no need to own highly sort after programmes, just simply something that brings pleasure or a sense of satisfaction to the collector. Programme collectors come from all sorts of backgrounds.

When they first start collecting, a collector may try to buy everything on offer to their collection as quickly as possible in order to give it some bulk. However, with this comes a loss of focus, and later when restrictions may mean a particular theme will have to be chosen and explored in order to enhance a collection.

There really are an unlimited number of themes and sub-themes of programmes that can be collected. However, there are certain traditional ways to build a collection. For example, for example all those programmes concerned with a particular team, all those concerned with a particular competition, etc. Whilst collecting a person is likely to experience the joys and pitfalls of buying a rare old football programme, or the frustration of not being able to find a source for one that is key to your collection.

Those collectors who are more causal in their approach to the collecting of football programmes will usually own a small number of important programmes for major finals or semi-finals for the team that they personally follow, internationals, testimonials, special fixtures, or other big cup ties. These can basically be classified as a Big Match programme.

If you have a big affiliation to a particular soccer club your mission in programme collecting may be to simply acquire all issues for your favourite team. In addition to the regular league and cup matches, you may also be tempted to collect programmes from friendlies, foreign tours, reserve teams, and youth teams.

One way of increasing the depth and scope of your collection is by setting an earlier date from which to collect. You could, for example, decide to collect back to 1965, etc.

A collector who is neutral in his or her affiliations, and just has a general passion for football will often widen the scope of their collection. In these sorts of collections you often find football programmes from a range of clubs at varying levels (including non-league). For the more adventurous type of collector, football programmes may have been acquired from countries other than his or her own.

Chris Rudolph is a football programme collector and dealer. He runs the programme collector website.

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