If you grew up collecting Hockey cards in the 90's then you should remember when Pacific started to produce hockey cards. At the time I was met with mixed emotions; I wasn't sure if I was ready for another brand producing hockey.
Despite my uncertainty, I busted some packs when the premiere 97-98 Pacific Hockey series was released. I remember not being overly blow away and adding them to my commons box. Over the next few month's I saw some of the crazy inserts collectors had been pulling from the product. Over the season Pacific released more product: Crown, Omega, Dynagon, Invincible and Paramount (hopefully I covered them all).
Pacific creativity was changing the collecting card market. They revolutionized the insert, parallels and low numbered inserts. When Upper Deck slowly began to phase in Jersey cards in the early 2000's and packaged them in boxes at ridiculous odds, Pacific was packaging at least one game used per box.
I google searched for Pacific and what happened to them but very minimal information came up, it was if the company did not exist. All I know is that in 2004, Donruss purchased the right to the Pacific trademark and stated that they did not intend to use the name any point soon but perhaps in the future. Later the Donruss names was purchased by Panini. Panini intends to released a Crown Royale set this year, a set named used by Pacific but is being marketed under the Panini name and not Pacific.
The last set produced by Pacific was 04-05 Hockey and after the company shut down for good. What I'm curious about is how did it get to that point? They had done so well for a period of time and somewhere something fell apart and it's not documented very well anywhere. I will do some research over the next little while to see what I can pull up.
Keep your eyes opened for Part 2, with more information and lot's of scans!
I always wondered why they went away. I really liked a lot of their products from the late 90's and early 00's.
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