If you haven’t gotten the Panini World Cup sticker fever yet, there’s still time. While we have several days this week with no World Cup games, it’s perfect timing to catch up on either filling your Panini World Cup sticker album with World Cup stars, or buying some more stickers before they’re all sold out.

Yesterday was a very wet and stormy day in Florida, so it was a good day to stay inside and catch up on my World Cup sticker collection. I set aside ten minutes to video tape my Panini World Cup sticker collection to share with you. Everything from an introduction to what Panini is, what the sticker album looks like, how to peel stickers and put them into the book.

Collecting Panini World Cup stickers is extremely addictive and a lot of fun. Opening a pack of stickers is like opening a present under a Christmas tree. You’re never quite sure what you’re going to get until you open the package (or in this case, a packet).

Now if you live in the United States and you want to buy Panini World Cup stickers (and the album), here’s where you can find them:

• Walgreens drugstores (but only in Hispanic markets),
• Soccer specialty stores throughout the US (call them first to see if they have them), and
• Online via World Soccer Shop.

When you buy Panini World Cup stickers online, you can order an entire box for $49.99 which contains 50 packs. If you don’t have the sticker album, buy the Panini World Cup sticker album online and you’ll get your first four packs of Panini World Cup stickers with it. And last, but not least, if you don’t want to order an entire box, you can order five packs of Panini World Cup stickers.

Panini World Cup stickers have been in existence since the 1970s. Whether you’re a newbie or a veteran Panini collector, here are some highlights of previous collections from the Panini World Cup series for 1970 through 2006:

World Cup 2006:

World Cup 1990 through World Cup 2002:

World Cup 1970 through World Cup 1986:

Panini, the company, was founded in 1961 by the Panini brothers in Modena, Italy. They became quite successful in the early years selling soccer stickers. From 1970 onwards, Panini has published sticker collections to celebrate each World Cup. Panini is now so popular that they have more than 750 employees and annual revenues of approximately $776 million.

Don’t panic, I’m not going to go all Oprah on you all, but I’ve got a confession to make that a man of my age can’t hide. Every 4 years, the World Cup comes around and over here in Europe we’ve a company called Panini who make sticker books for most major tournaments and leagues. Since the 1980′s I used to collect them until about 1988 until the surly teenager in me decided I was far too mature to muck about with such childish entertainment. No more swapping  Ian Rush for Gary Lineker in the school yard, oh no. I’d got beer, music and girls to keep me interested instead.

I know in the States that the big thing for junior sports fans is trading cards, which have only recently taken off here in the UK, so I’m unsure as to what anyone based in North America will make of them or even know what they are, but in Europe they’re big business. Yet, since the 1998 World Cup, I’ve always bought a Panini World Cup sticker book. I can’t help myself and I got the latest one last week. No really, I did.

Of course these days, the Internet is here and I can trawl through cyberspace laughing away at some of the ridiculous haircuts, mustaches and kits of yesteryear. There is such a wave of nostalgia for these sticker books that I’ve even seen articles from Germany discussing the way players used to look, which you can read at Bild’s website here and see if you recognise any of the names mentioned!!

It’s just weird that here I am with all the modern entertainment I have at my disposal, from my X-Box, to Digital TV, DVD’s and my I-pod that something so basic, so simple should still have such an emotional attachment to me. On the Guardian website the other week, someone sent in a link to this fantastic site which has scanned the entire Italia 90 sticker book online! A virtual reality treasure trove of memories, both good and bad of such an amazing tournament.Have a scroll through it, I guarantee you won’t be disappointed.

That was probably the catalyst for me to delve back in to trying, once again to complete the album, which I know now I won’t do, even though I tell myself I shall. It’s amazing that something so trivial can transport you back to a more innocent time and looking back you can see so many names that have drifted away in to the depths of time.

Grown men all over the UK have started to secretly pretend they’ve got kids now to try and cover up their sticker based addictions, as this current thread on a Crystal Palace message board proves. I am not alone in my addiction, though I doubt I can seek counseling over such vices but it’s nice to know I’m not the saddest man out there. After purchasing my latest sticker book, I was disappointed to only get 2 England players out of 70 stickers which means of course that’ll keep buying them! The seminal British magazine When Saturday Comes has also seen some of its contributors weigh in with some memories of those days too. An amusing discussion is still trundling along here.

For me, it’s a fundamental part of the World Cup experience for fans over here young and old and even now, nearly 30 years on from my first sticker book, Espana 1982, it’s heartwarming to see the Panini World Cup sticker book on the shelves in stores. It’s one of those things that sets the clock ticking down towards the kick off to the tournament and with it, a little bit of me thinks back to those faraway days of swapping stickers with school friends.

Panini is making a comeback this summer (although they never really left us) with their series of Euro 2008 stickers and its de rigueur sticker album. But they’re also trying something brand new. The Italian sticker company has entered the world of, gasp, digital stickers.Surely Panini doesn’t get the point, you wonder? The whole pleasure of Panini stickers was the cathartic experience of peeling the sticker and carefully pasting it inside the sticker album, being mindful to place it exactly in the square provided and not create any bubbles or cracks beneath the hallowed space.Then there was the whole appeal of the social aspect (before social was even social Facebook users). The buzz of trading your sticker collection with your pals and, if you were fortunate, quietly showing off your impressive stack of stickers to the gobsmacked fellow pupils.By launching the Euro 2008 sticker collection in both the traditional way and digitally, you would think that the electronic version has no chance of competing with the traditional stickers, but you may be surprised with the results.The web site for Panini’s UEFA Euro 2008 Album is beautifully designed. First, the site designers tease you with a sample of Panini stickers that seem to come alive on the screen when you hover your mouse over them. Second, the accompanying video on the page is wonderfully created with soothing music, neat animation and constructive information on how the virtual sticker album works.After registering, the site allows you to paste your starter pack of stickers into your virtual sticker album. The web site also has MSN Messenger integrated into it so you can chat with your network and encourage them to join the sticker collecting. Panini’s Euro 2008 Album also allows you to trade stickers with your friends. For example, if you have doubles (or “swaps”), you can exchange those with your network and gain new stickers in return.Despite being a work of art, the site is not perfect. For example, the night when I tried to critique the site, I was unable to log in (the page froze after repeated attempts to try to sign me in via my Windows Live ID). The issue could be a Microsoft-related one, but regardless the experience reflects poorly on Panini and needs to be fixed.The true test for whether this site will be successful or not are the soccer fans. If they embrace it and grow the community virally, then Panini may have a new hit on its hands. The other important factor to consider is whether the site will have staying power. It’s easy to pick up a sticker album and get the tangible rewards from leafing through the pages, but will Panini’s Euro 2008 sticker album have the same lasting appeal? We’ll have to wait and see.