From the Curb to Collectible: How Our “Junk” VHS and Tube TVs Became Treasure

We didn’t know it at the time, but sometime between 1999 and 2006, my family participated in a cultural extinction event.

Photo by Jason Hawke 🇨🇦 on Unsplash. Once destined for the curb, now worth more than some flat-screens — the CRT redemption arc nobody saw coming.

It was the years after my dad passed, and my oldest brother decided our family’s mountain of VHS players had to go. Not one or two — I’m talking a shitload. The kind of stash that could’ve stocked a small-town video rental store.

His reasoning was airtight, at least in the early-2000s logic of “future-proofing” the house:

“Nobody’s gonna use these anymore. Everyone’s getting DVD players.”

And just like that, the VHS decks were gone. Some went in the trash. Others ended up in donation bins. A few vanished into the hands of people who wanted them “for parts” — which, back then, sounded like saying you wanted a rotary phone to make prank calls.

I didn’t argue. At the time, the VHS player seemed like an artifact from another era, one step above an 8-track. DVD had won, and we were leaning hard into the sleek, shiny promise of the future.

The Future Was Flat, Digital, and Perfect (Or So We Thought)

By 2005, flat-screen TVs were invading every Best Buy in America like chrome UFOs. DVD was “perfect picture, perfect sound” and promised we’d never deal with tracking lines or that mysterious whirring sound ever again.

Across the country, families did what we did:

• CRT televisions rolled to the curb.
• VHS collections sold for a quarter at garage sales.
• Combo TV/VCR units, once the ultimate bedroom flex, became the equivalent of shag carpet: a leftover from a less sophisticated time.

The prevailing wisdom was that this stuff was worthless — heavy, outdated, and taking up valuable space. We congratulated ourselves for “decluttering.”

The Plot Twist Nobody Saw Coming

Fast forward to 2025, and suddenly… that “worthless” stuff is collectible.

Retro gamers and media preservationists have spent the last decade mounting a full-blown rescue operation:

• CRT TVs — especially the legendary Sony Trinitron models — are prized for their picture quality. They’re the gold standard for playing retro consoles the way they were meant to be seen.
• Light gun games like Duck Hunt and Time Crisis literally don’t work on modern TVs, so if you want the real thing, you need a tube.
• Mid-90s VHS copies of Star Wars, especially the 1995 “Faces” set, are now more valuable than Disney’s Blu-rays of the sequels. It’s not because they’re sharper — they’re not — but because they’re the last widely released, unaltered theatrical cuts before George Lucas added the CGI “Special Edition” flourishes no one asked for.
• TV/DVD/VHS combo units? People will pay $60–$100 for a working one, because they hit nostalgia from two different decades at once.

It turns out we weren’t junking trash — we were junking the future collectibles aisle.

My Re-Entry into the Retro Market

I didn’t go looking for it, but recently, I stumbled back into this world.

The first sign was a Sylvania 6720FDF, a 20" flat-screen-style CRT with a built-in DVD and VHS combo. I listed it on Facebook Marketplace for $60, thinking that was maybe a little optimistic. Within days, it was gone — picked up by someone who, judging by the sparkle in their eye, was about to marathon Back to the Future in the most authentic way possible.

Then came the big one.

A Sony KV-27FS100 Trinitron — a 27-inch WEGA model from the early 2000s. A beast. Heavy enough to turn moving it into a CrossFit session, but coveted by gamers and collectors for its clean, vibrant picture and component video inputs.

I plugged it in and ran it through its paces — sound, channels, and inputs all worked like it just rolled off the assembly line.

The Things We Didn’t See Coming

Here’s the funny thing: the people buying this stuff now aren’t just collectors.

Some are display purists — they want a Legend of Zelda cartridge running on original hardware through a CRT, because it’s the way the colors, scanlines, and motion blur all merge into the image they remember from childhood.

Some are preservationists — digitizing VHS tapes because studios and rights-holders can’t be trusted to keep every version alive (looking at you, unaltered Star Wars).

And some just miss the feel of a VHS or the warm glow of a tube screen. The technology may be obsolete, but the emotional connection isn’t.

The Irony Hits Hard

Back in the early 2000s, people would have laughed at the idea that a mid-90s VHS set could outsell a modern Blu-ray. Or that gamers in 2025 would be driving across town to pick up a 27-inch television that requires two people to lift.

We thought we were making room for the future — sleek, flat, and digital. What we were really doing was throwing away objects that future generations (or, in my case, we ourselves 20 years later) would fight to reclaim.

It’s the same cycle that plays out in vinyl records, typewriters, Polaroid cameras, and film photography:

• Step 1: New tech arrives and everyone rushes to upgrade.
• Step 2: Old tech becomes worthless overnight.
• Step 3: Nostalgia kicks in.
• Step 4: The market flips, and suddenly the “junk” is treasure.

The Warm Glow of a Sale in the Making

Now that I know the Trinitron works, I’m playing the long game. The original remote — a Sony RM-Y168 — is on my radar. Once I track one down, the listing goes live at $260 or best offer.

Until then, it sits here like a silent reminder: sometimes the thing you thought was junk is just waiting for the right moment to become treasure.

And this time, I’ll be the one grinning when the buyer hauls it away.

A.L. Bellettiere writes about trans rights, activism, trauma, and politics. She is currently writing the first books in two upcoming series. Subscribe to her Beehiiv newsletter for exclusive updates on her work.