What an Icons certificate actually certifies
And, just as importantly, what it does not. If you collect in this market you should know the difference — including when you are buying from us.
Certificates of authenticity have a reputation problem, and it is deserved. Anyone can print one. A certificate is a piece of card that says a thing is true; it is worth exactly as much as the records behind it and the willingness of whoever issued it to still answer the phone in a decade.
So rather than tell you ours is different, here is precisely what it contains, what each line means, and where our knowledge runs out.
What is printed on it
Four things: the production the piece came from, a description of the item, the date the certificate was issued, and a unique serial number. Plus a tamper-evident, anti-counterfeit hologram — which protects the certificate itself from being copied, and is not the same thing as protecting the claim.
If several items sell together as one lot, one certificate covers them all, listed as described. We do not issue certificates with promotional items or anything that was not used in the production itself.
What the wording means
This is the part most people skim, and it is the part that matters. We use four levels, and we use them literally.
The four levels
- Acquired from the production. The piece came to us from that production. It makes no claim about appearing on camera — and most production assets never do.
- Screen matched. We can point to this exact object in the finished film or episode, with specific points of correspondence recorded.
- Screen used. Documentation on file establishes the object was used on camera.
- Screen worn. Worn by a named performer as a named character, with documentation.
Our default is the first one. A piece only moves up if written evidence is attached to its record and a named person signs off — and the system will refuse the change if that evidence is missing. That is a deliberate constraint on ourselves, not a policy we merely intend to follow.
A claim you can check is worth more than a claim you cannot.
Why the serial number is the important bit
The hologram stops the certificate being forged. The serial number is what makes it checkable, and permanently so. Every serial we have ever issued is recorded against the piece in our inventory system, and those records do not get deleted.
Which means the certificate keeps working after we are out of the picture. If you buy a piece from us and sell it in 2034, the person who buys it from you can write to us with the serial and we will confirm what it is. That is the whole point of the number.
Why there is no instant lookup box
We are asked this regularly, and the answer is counterintuitive: a public search box would make forgery easier, not harder. Anyone producing fake certificates could try invented numbers until one came back valid, then print that one.
A person checking the record gives a forger no signal at all. It also gives a genuine owner a better answer, because whoever replies can compare your photographs against the ones we took when the piece came in — something no lookup box can do.
What to ask any seller, including us
If you are buying entertainment memorabilia anywhere, three questions separate a real provenance claim from a decorative one. Ask who the piece came from. Ask what documentation exists, and to see it. Ask what the seller is not claiming.
That last question is the most revealing. A seller who cannot answer it is not describing a piece — they are selling a feeling. We would rather under-describe a piece than overstate it, and you should be wary of anyone who does the opposite.