A simple concept became a long-running series of baseball cards when the Exhibit Supply Company began cranking up the presses.

Exhibit Supply Company was the first organization to ever distribute sports cards that were not tied to peripheral products. Previously, sports cards were often part of a promotion or even had coupons that one could clip out of the card itself. The cards produced by the Chicago-based company were sold merely for the novelty of collecting them and reading the biographies or information for the subject of the card.

The novelty of Exhibit Supply Company’s product did not end with its new product though. The delivery method was also an innovation for its time. Exhibit advertised to arcade owners, store owners, bar owners, and basically everyone that owned a high traffic venue, their ‘amusement machines’. The idea was that Exhibit Supply Company would sell an amusement device, such as a fortune teller, scale, etc. This device would bring the venue more customers and Exhibit Supply Company would profit from refilling and maintaining the device. This method was employed as the primary method of ESC's distribution of their cards through the sale of card vending machines. Some collectors refer to them rightfully as "arcade cards".

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Sports Collectors Daily


A few exhibit cards.

1929-1930


1934