British football fan completed his World Cup Sticker Booklet in 6 weeks

Every four years, in late March, a small booklet upends the life and habits of millions of people around the world. Kids abandon their usual games. Businessmen change their schedules to meet up with strangers on street corners. And entire families walk from park to park in search of others like them.

In every case, the goal is the same: to fill up their Official Panini World Cup sticker booklets.

British football fan Russ Cockburn managed to complete his album in just six weeks and he only spent £90. He used the social media power of Facebook and Twitter to swap his way to the full 640-sticker set. He was probably the first in Britain to complete the sticker collection.

Panini began its World Cup collections in time for the 1970 tournament in Mexico and spin-off collections have been issued ever since. Completed albums can be valuable, as owners of Panini's 1970 World Cup set well know. Last week one appeared on eBay with an asking price of £1,800. Earlier this month, thieves in Rio stole one of Panini's vans just to get the 300,000 stickers inside. In 2010, before the South Africa World Cup, thieves stole 135,000 packets from a distribution centre.

Source: Mirror/Wall Street Journal