A Practical Guide to Coby Glass Ornaments History
Collecting Coby glass ornaments started becoming a thing in the late 1990s when people began digging through estate sales and finding these small glass figures at garage sales for pennies. The company behind them, Morris Kohn Manufacturing Company, ran a small factory in Philadelphia from the 1930s through the 1970s, and they made pressed glass items mostly under the Coby name. The ornaments were produced primarily between 1937 and 1957, with some pieces continuing into the early 1960s. Here is how the process actually works if you want to identify and catalog these pieces. Most collectors start by looking for the mark — Coby typically used an engraved "Coby" on the base, sometimes with a model number, though not always. The glass itself is usually clear pressed glass with painted details. You will see color applied as overglaze paint, which means it sits on top of the glass rather than being fused into it. The common pitfall here is assuming that every Coby piece is from the same era. The company's output changed significantly over its lifespan, and certain shapes and color palettes are period-specific. The animals — birds, horses, dogs, cats — came in various sizes and color variations that can help date a piece if you know what to look for.
I spent years trying to sort out the difference between pre-war and post-war production runs, and the main tell is the paint quality. Pre-war pieces tend to have thicker, more saturated paint application with slightly less precision. Post-war pieces show a shift toward thinner paint layers and more consistent detailing, which makes sense when you consider that postwar factory operations were more standardized. One edge case that gave me trouble involved pieces with no visible markings at all. Some Coby ornaments simply don't have an engraved mark, and beginners often write those off as non-Coby or reproductions. The workaround is to examine the glass quality and paint style against known reference pieces. The pressed glass molds and the particular shade of clear glass they used have specific characteristics that are hard to replicate accurately. I learned this the hard way after tossing a batch of unmarked pieces into a "not Coby" pile, only to verify them later against a collector group that had museum-quality reference materials. What to look for when evaluating a piece:
The base should have a smooth glass finish where it meets the ground surface. Cheap reproductions often have rough or uneven bases because they were not produced on the same molds. The paint should show slight brush marks when you look closely under good light — machine-applied reproductions look too uniform. Also check for the characteristic Coby glass thickness, which tends to be slightly heavier than mass-produced modern imitations. There are reproduction Coby-style ornaments on the market, particularly from Asian manufacturers who have been making them for about two decades now. These are generally easy to spot once you have handled enough originals. The paint on reproductions tends to be too bright and lacks the subtle variations you see in genuine mid-century pieces. The glass also tends to be thinner and more uniform in a way that feels off. The most documented reference material is the book "Coby Glass: The Morris Kohn Story" by Richard L. Dreicer and Howard Schuetz. It runs about 200 pages with color photographs and has become the standard reference for identifying production periods and cataloging the full range of figures produced. There is also the Coby Collectors Club, which maintains online forums and has published newsletters that document production changes over the years.
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Prices vary wildly depending on condition and rarity. Common bird figures in decent shape go for anywhere from fifteen to fifty dollars at estate sales and online auctions. Rare pieces like the larger animal figures or unusual color variants can reach into the hundreds. The key constraint here is that condition matters enormously — chipped paint significantly reduces value, and any crack in the glass is basically a deal-ender for serious collectors. If you are starting a collection, my recommendation is to focus on one category rather than trying to collect everything. Animals, birds, or seasonal figures each have their own sub-culture of collectors and reference materials. Spreading yourself too thin early on just leads to buying duplicates and mediocre pieces because you lack the knowledge to evaluate quality within a specific niche. The market for Coby glass remains steady but niche. It is not going to make you rich if you flip pieces, but it is a manageable hobby that does not require enormous capital to start. The main bottleneck for most people is simply access to reference materials and the patience to learn the visual language of the pieces over time. There is no shortcut around that.
