Lists: Behavior Matters Most

The plate-collecting business is instructive and directly related to the challenges of catalog acquisition. Plate collectors are from every income level and geographic location. Their only commonality is collecting, which makes prospects hard to come by.

As I delved deep into the business of plate collecting, I discovered a large segment of these folks are in the lower socioeconomic strata living in trailer parks. Their mobile homes are lined from floor to ceiling with hundreds of dollars worth of colorful clown plates designed by Red Skelton, the sad-eyed children of the Keanes, itsy-poo figures from the House of Hummel and endless iterations of Disney, Norman Rockwell and The Wizard of Oz.