CORINTHIAN

Originally called International Prostars the Corinthian figures were initially seen as a toy product it was clear by 1998 that they needed to change the strategy for the brand or stop making it. The UK retail trade were increasingly reluctant to stock the brand as the initial huge volumes came down to a more normal level of sales. Corinthian released most of the players from most of the clubs and all of the players from the biggest clubs. They had no more new players to make. They decided to "rest" the product for 6 months in 1998 and come back with a new range, new name and new direction for the product in 1999. At the end of 1998 football season the Headliners products from the high street and toy shops and focus distribution on specialist retailers who understood the product and were prepared to devote time and space to it rather than demand just the star players. By 1999 the ProStars brand was introduced with Series 1. This dramatic change of direction for the brand marked the transition point of the original product from toy to collectible. The range benefited from being made up of genuinely top class international players from most of the biggest teams in the world football. The blister pack series took a little time to move off the shelves as relatively few collectors knew about the range until the advertising started. Once collectors realized they were out there demand went up noticeably. Some

Since 1999 the ProStars range has gone on to produce more than 40 series. In addition to the regular series, special releases including "England 1966 Winners" 12 Player Packs (signed by Sir Geoff Hurst) and Limited Edition ProStars "Elite" double packs of some of the world’s greatest ever players, including Geoff Hurst in England strip.

As before the figures were each assigned a collector number, this time the codes all started with 'PRO' and the last figure Corinthian released in the Prostars range was PRO1825 but only 1750 figures have actually been released, the other 75 are all unreleased figures!