Old Slab Collectors?

It's mostly an urban legend that PCGS graded more strictly way back when. While it might have been true for certain series (some moderns? Maybe a few Morgans.) at some point for a short period of time, it's mostly myth that coins slabbed in the old green holders will bring a higher grade if resubmitted. T'aint so and won't happen. If resubmitted to PCGS, they'll be lucky to keep their green label grade. BTW, if ebay receives a coin in an old holder with a green label for regrading, they won't let it out of their shop unless it's in a new holder (may be some qualification to this but this is what they told me on the phone a couple years ago).

Nevertheless, ebay sellers with coins in the old PCGS green label slabs still use the green label as a selling point stating that the old slabs were undergraded.

I have no information on the dates of changes in PCGS slabs although I read about it somewhere (PCGS site?).

PCGS will be happy to reslab the rattler coin in a new slab... for 30 bucks or more...

I would normally agree with the statement about the old green holders and it being an urban myth but something to consider is a personal story of mine...

Right after PCGS and NGC got into a war years ago on which company was going to be selected as the prefered ANA grading agency, and NGC was selected, I sent some coins into PCGS immediately after they lost the war.

They were really not happy at losing, even going to the point of taking out full page whining ads in the Numismatist.

I got my coins back from PCGS, some of the first coins submitted after the they allowed non-dealer submissions. My poor coins were raped. I can't help but think it was because they thought some poor ignoramus collector dared to think he knew anything about grading.

I have since had all these coins reslabbed by major TPCs at significantly higher grades.

So although I don't think it's generally true that old green labels mean they should grade higher, they maybe can if that label was issued in a certain time frame (my considered opinion).

On another note, I've seen old green labels stating Red or Red/Brown and they faded a bit since slabbing.

It wasn't hard at all for PCGS to look conservative in the beginning. The valley was covered with "low-hanging" fruit--NCI certificate coins. Didn't exactly take a "superman" to knock that stuff off the trees. But it made anyone who finally did it look like superman.

Seth, here is the information you were looking for on what the various varieties are for PCGS and when they were used.

PCGS slab varieties

And you didn't ask for it, but here is the same info for NGC

NGC slab varieties