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Hi all! I created an account here quite a while back (looks like around 5 years ago or so), started up one of these welcome posts, and then life hit like a freight train, and I never got back on to the site. Well, recently I’ve been relistening to the podcast and it inspired me to see if ya’ll are still lurking around here, and I was delighted to see that so many of you are!
A bit about me: age 31, full time eBayer, and within the last few months TCGPlayer..er. I’ve been full time since I dropped out of college about 12 years ago to pursue this lifestyle. I live in Pittsburgh, PA and I make it all work by keeping my day-to-day costs quite low (with the exception of rent, of course). A huge chunk of my eBay inventory, and groceries, comes from dumpster diving, while my trading card inventory (Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh, for anyone interested) is self-sustaining for now. eBay covers the bills, TCGPlayer funds itself, with everything goes back into that side of the business.
I’ve been doing this gig by myself for so long, but in the last few months my lovely fiancee has gotten more and more involved with the business, and we’re currently working toward getting her full-time alongside me. She also doesn’t work a traditional job, but she does do house cleaning gigs, Lyft, DoorDash, and other various odd jobs to make ends meet. Funnily enough, she had a grown-up job at a bank, working customer service, when I met her, but a couple of months of me proselytizing to quit her job and chase her dreams did away with that distraction, haha.
Anyway, I’m sure there’s plenty more I could ramble on about, but for now I’ll just say hello to you all and that I look forward to spending some time here! Joining in on the weekly sales reports sounds like it could really help me get in touch with my numbers, which is something I’ve always struggled with.
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Hi there CT! I grew up in a suburb south of Pittsburgh (Upper St. Clair), and my sister still lives there. I have family in the city/Squirrel Hill. I visit once or twice a year. Love the area, although, I appreciate the slightly warmer weather in NJ.
A friend of mine has told me that Pittsburgh has some good thrifts, but that is from someone looking to buy for themselves, not resell. What is your opinion?
With the trading cards, do you just play games or do you buy and sell in the category?
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Hi, Sharyn! I’m pretty close to Squirrel Hill, just over in Wilkinsburg!
Well, there’s the Goodwill Outlets if that’s your thing (it is my thing, haha), the Red White and Blue stores are usually pretty cheap, but they’re heavily shopped so there’s a ton of turnover. It’s a numbers game going shopping there. The regular Goodwills are all pretty terrible. Within the last year we’ve lost two of my favorite thrift stores (Thrift King and Swissvale’s St. Vincent DePaul’s), which has been a huge bummer for me. They were both nice and junky, and VERY cheap.
Overall, I’d say there’s a good thrifting “scene” here, but you’ve gotta know where to look. There are a few hole in the wall shops as well, but they don’t get as many donations as some of the bigger stores, so you can’t frequent them. Not enough turnover, you know?
As for the trading cards, for Pokemon I’ve been a collector on and off since 1999, having gotten back into it quite heavily in 2017. I played the game for a year or so at a league, but have since stuck to collecting and selling. I’d like to get back into playing, again, though! It just keeps being one of those “someday” things that gets pushed to the side. Then with Yu-Gi-Oh I exclusively buy and sell it. I like the art work on a lot of the cards, so it’s fun to handle, but I have no drive to collect it or play the game, which makes it easy to sell. You know, no temptation to keep that $75 card for myself, haha.
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Thanks, Jay! I’m proud to say I’ve never held a “real job” to this day, haha. I may not be rich, and some stretches of those twelve years have been very tight, but I’ve always managed to get by. Plus, as you always say, I own my time. That’s huge.
As for dumpster diving, I’ve made it a part of my day-to-day life! There’s an apartment complex near me that I check pretty much every day, sometimes twice a day, while walking my dog. It’s about 12 dumpsters that produce something just about every day. When the weather is nice, I have a walking route that covers about a square mile radius from my apartment that usually gets me some stuff to sell, some stuff to save / donate (I get a lot of household goods that I donate to free stores and shelters), and some food.
When I need certain things, like dog food or shampoo or what have you, we’ll take a drive to the suburbs and do some commercial diving at the big box stores.
I haven’t stepped foot in a thrift store or auction for, gosh, four or five months and I’ve had no shortage of inventory to work through and list. It’s insane how much waste there is on an individual level in this country, let alone on a corporate one.
One last thought, last year I kept track of every pound of clothing I saved from the dumpsters and either resold or rehomed and it came out to around 2,200 pounds. A literal TON of clothing, all from residential dumpsters. Most of those clothes were in perfectly good used condition, often having been freshly laundered and thrown away. One bag that stuck with me was filled with sweaters, coats, and other wintery garments still on their clothes hangers. It was like they opened their closet and just dumped it directly into a bag.
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Hey, CT. Welcome (back) and great posts. I have focused heavily on sports and non-sports trading cards in the last few years, but I know very little about TCG, so I will learn a lot from your posts I’m sure. I use eBay for 90% of my buying, picking through auction listings (mostly the big consignment sellers) and reselling using BIN/best offer. It is amazing how inefficient the modern trading card market is. This year, I also started using COMC which has become its own self-sustaining income stream like TCGPlayer is for you.
Aside from the trading cards and dumpster finds, do you ever hit any rummage sales or library sales? Aside from the occasional good independent thrift store, those are the best places I’ve found for true scavenging, at least in the Philly area.
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Craig,
Sports is such an intimidating category to get into, to me! That’s cool that you’ve gone so deep with it. I’m not much of a sports guy myself, so I won’t be your competition any time soon, haha. I haven’t heard of COMC before, I’ll have to look into it!
I do it all, really. Rummage / estate sales, estate auctions, even storage unit sales! I haven’t done much of the auctions since moving to Pittsburgh, because I’m always so well stocked on inventory that I haven’t felt the need to, but I’ve been thinking about getting back into the circuit just to spice things up a bit. I love rummage and estate sales. Definitely great deals to be had. I’m a big bundler, and love haggling. My mother likes to tell stories of me as a small child haggling with adults at sales, talking them down from a quarter to a dime, lmao. It’s in my blood, what can I say?
Also, thanks, Jay! I do love the thrill of the hunt, and getting something for nothing. I’m especially excited to be bringing my fiancee into the business. She’s also big into finding deals, and doesn’t mind hopping in a dumpster herself from time to time. We’re always checking Craigslist/Facebook for free stuff. You’ve just got to make scavenging a part of your every day life. I don’t think I could ever quit the lifestyle completely. It’s too deeply ingrained at this point.
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