There are annual arbitrage moments in the collectible book market, and one 'sure-fire bet' is the American Library Association's announcement of the Caldecott and Newbery award books at their annual mid-winter conference.
The conference is held every year in mid-January, where thousands of librarians gather for the multi-day event. The event spans Friday-Tuesday, and on the Monday morning the Youth Media Awards are broadcast live. There is a lot of press coverage for the awards' announcement, and the first editions of the Caldecott and Newbery Medal immediately escalate in value. Upon announcement children's booksellers around the country visit their local Barnes & Noble to look for and purchase first editions.
The announcements were broadcast on Monday, January 24th, and two copies of 'Watercress', the Caldecott winner, already sold last week on eBay for over $150. There's only a couple of copies of Caldecott Honor book 'Unspeakable: The Tulsa Race Massacre' on the market, offered for $250-to-$650, but this price will break since Carole Boston Weatherford is such a popular author and numerous copies will surface over the coming weeks.
Those unfamiliar with the ALA might doubt the staying power of high prices, but the demand is explainable. Last week, after the ALA anouncements, every public library in the country ordered a copy of the Caldecott and Newbery winning books, therefore tens of thousands of copies are being sent to print, then onto the shelves of every elementary and middle school in America. And the Medal books will always be in print, securing future sales.
For children's books, high popularity and high sales, with a low relative first print run, translates into persistent collectible value.
In addition, there are an estimated 140,000 public and school librarians, and a small population of them are avid collectors of first editions of either Caldecott or Newbery books, or both. So first editions of the Medal books become a self-fulfilling high demand prophesy.
When I lived in the SF Bay Area, where there were plenty of Barnes & Noble and independent book stores within driving distance, I would venture out and buy 5 or 10 copies of the Medal books every year. That tactic has dried up of late, as in recent years booksellers and book scouts are picking them up too quickly. Therefore I just wait until the electronic listings surface and buy a copy in the after market once the initial price surge stabilizes.
From 2000-to-2010, there were several Newbery Medal winning books which were not initially printed in very high quantities, and the books jumped to over $500, and many have held a >$200 price (Kira-Kira, Criss Cross, A Single Shard), although demand has softened over the past decade. The first printing of the Neil Gaiman, Kate DiCamillo, and Avi winning books were published in too high quantities to ever be worth a lot of money.
Over the past decade many of the recent Caldecott Honor books have become somewhat difficult to acquire, and the lone first edition copies on the market are offered for ridiculous prices (see below link to ABEBooks, Caldecott Honor first editions, published from 2010-to-2021, sorted by highest asking price). Some of the prices aren't real, just temporary dislocations in the market, however if you have the only copy on the market you can set the price. Booksellers Barbara Mader, Find Author Author, Elaine Woodford, and Books Tell You Why have control of the market, while E.M. Maurice, Anne Hutchinson Books, and Windy Hill Books are also active in this space.
I think there are numerous recent first edition Caldecott Honor books sitting on the shelf for $10 at used book stores around the country, it's just that hardly anyone is specifically looking for them, therefore they aren't being electronically listed.
