The completist
Working through the whole of something. One artist's catalogue, one label's numbered run, one producer's output across four bands. They aren't buying records, they're closing a gap, and they can tell you the exact size of the gap without looking.
There's a particular calm about a completist at a fair. Everyone else is browsing, they're searching, from a list that hasn't changed in three years.
You'll know them by the way they flip. Fast, decisive, barely looking at covers, stopping dead on one spine in a hundred. And by the fact that they walk past records they love because they already have them.
They're right about depth. Following one artist all the way through, including the album everyone skips, is how you find out what somebody was really doing. Highlights collections make for a pleasant shelf and a shallow one.
The first press purist
Owns a loupe. Uses it in public. Will turn a record over before they look at the front, because the label tells them more than the sleeve does.
They can date a pressing from the shape of a company logo, and they'll tell you why the early cut sounds different, at length, with real feeling. What outsiders miss is that this isn't snobbery about money. It's a fascination with the object, which lacquer, which plant, which engineer's initials are in the run-out.
You'll know them by the phone torch angled across the run-out groove and the small satisfied nod when the matrix number matches.
They're right about the fact that two copies of the same album can be two different records. Mastering, plant and era all move, and once you've heard the difference you can't unhear it. First pressing vs reissue is their whole worldview in one page.
The fifty pence bin optimist
Never gets to the good stalls. Finds the cardboard box under the table, sits on the floor beside it, and is still there an hour later, happy.
Their shelf is glorious chaos: library music, a brass band record from a town they've never visited, three copies of the same easy listening album because the covers are different, and one thing that turns out to be genuinely sought after which they mention to nobody. They buy on instinct and a good sleeve, and they're wrong about half the time, which they consider a fair rate.
You'll know them by the cross-legged position, the growing stack beside their knee, and the sentence "I have no idea what this is" said with real pleasure.
They're right about the fact that the fun is the hunt. A collection assembled entirely from things you already knew you wanted is a shopping list with a shelf.
The genre archivist
Not collecting albums. Collecting a scene. Northern soul, seventies dub, UK jazz, private press folk, early Chicago house, and they know how the pieces connect because they've followed the players from one record to the next.
Ask them about one record and you get the label's history, the two musicians who played on everything that year, and a recommendation you'll end up buying. Their shelf is sorted by something nobody else would think of, a system that starts with how to organise your record collection and then goes somewhere much stranger.
You'll know them by the fact that the dealer asks them when a box comes in and nobody can identify it.
They're right about context. Records are conversations between people who were in rooms together. Once you hear a scene rather than a set of albums, the individual records get better.
The sleeve collector
Buys with their eyes and is unapologetic about it. Blue Note cover design, seventies sci fi paperback aesthetics, Polish jazz posters, anything by a designer they follow. Half the shelf is filed face out because a spine is a waste of good artwork.
They own several records they've never played and they'll say so cheerfully. They also own the best looking room of anybody you know, and they notice when a reissue has quietly cropped the original photograph.
You'll know them by the record held at arm's length before they turn it over, and by the frames on their wall.
They're right about the cover being part of the record. Twelve inches of artwork is part of why this format survived, and pretending the music is the only thing on the shelf is a story people tell to sound serious.
The inheritance custodian
Didn't choose this. A crate arrived from a parent, a grandparent, an old friend, and now they're the person looking after somebody else's taste.
They came to collecting sideways and they take it more seriously than most, because these records aren't theirs and losing one would mean something. They can tell you which album was played every Sunday, because the sleeve corner is soft and the first track is noisy. Slowly, records of their own start appearing in the crate, and one day it becomes a collection rather than an inheritance.
You'll know them by the way they handle a sleeve, and by the fact that they can name the person who bought each record.
They're right about records being objects that hold people. Everyone else's shelf will be somebody's inherited crate eventually.
The one in one out minimalist
Has run out of space and made peace with it. A record comes in, a record goes out, and the shelf stays exactly the size of the wall it lives on.
This sounds like restraint and it's really editing. Every record has survived a decision, sometimes several, which makes it the most deliberate collection in the room. They're also the person quietly handing good records to friends.
You'll know them by the pause before they buy, and by the tote bag with two records leaving the fair when everyone else has twelve.
They're right about the shelf you play. A collection you've listened to all the way through beats one you're still planning to get to.
They're all the same person
Give it twenty years and you'll be all seven.
You start in the cheap bins because that's what you can afford. You fall for a scene and become an archivist. You get precise about pressings because you heard the difference once and it ruined you. A crate arrives from a parent and you become a custodian without being asked. The wall runs out and you become a minimalist by necessity.
The thread through all of it isn't taste, or budget, or method. It's knowing what you own. Every one of these people can tell you what's on their shelf, which copy it is, and where it came from, and that's the thing that turns a pile of records into a collection.
Cratemint is free on iPhone and it exists for that thread. Scan a barcode and the record lands on your shelf with the cover full size, add older pressings by search, and anything the catalogue doesn't hold becomes a ghost entry so nothing is ever lost. Private notes hold where a record came from and what you paid, and logging spins builds the stats that show you what your shelf really is.
So, which one are you? Post the type, tag the friend you were thinking about the whole way down, and see whether they agree.
Cratemint is free on iPhone. Every feature, for everyone.
Common questions
What are the main types of record collector?
Broadly seven show up at any record fair. The completist working through one artist's whole catalogue, the first press purist with a loupe, the fifty pence bin optimist, the genre archivist, the sleeve collector who buys for the artwork, the inheritance custodian looking after someone else's crate, and the one in one out minimalist. Most people are two of them at once.
Is one type of collector better than another?
No, and the question usually comes from outside collecting rather than inside it. A shelf built on artwork and a shelf built on first pressings are both shelves somebody loves. The only thing the types have in common is that each one knows exactly why every record on their shelf is there.
Can you be more than one type of collector?
Almost everyone is. A completist about one artist and a bin optimist about everything else is the most common combination there is. The types are habits rather than identities, and they change depending on what you're hunting that year.
What is a completist collector?
Someone working through the whole of something rather than picking highlights, usually one artist's catalogue, one label's run, or one series. They tend to know the gaps in their collection by heart, which makes them very fast in the bins and slightly dangerous at a record fair.
Do collectors change type over time?
Constantly. People often start as bin optimists, drift towards a genre, get precise about pressings, and then hit the point where the shelf is full and become minimalists by necessity. The same person can be all seven across twenty years of collecting.
What do all record collectors have in common?
Knowing what they own. However the shelf got built, every collector can tell you what's on it, which copy it is, and where it came from. That's the shared thread underneath every difference in taste, budget and method.