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Happy 1st shoppiversary. A small victory is underselling it, it’s been amazing to be a part of your journey from buying a new building to creating a thriving business in your small town. Hoping for continued success for Broad Porch in the future. And keep the new merch coming, please!
This past week was my busiest in at least a month. One factor is that I haven’t skipped a day of listing since February, and of course there is always a randomness factor to when and why things sell.
But I also saw a huge increase in sales after I started a Promoted Listings Standard campaign on Thursday. I had never used Promoted Listings before, and all of the options were overwhelming, so I went with a standard 5% ad rate on every listing in my store.
I wasn’t sure how it would work, but there was an immediate impact. At least 8 items sold every day since. I only started the campaign because I received a promotional offer for 75% off Promoted Listings fees through May 5th. Now I wish I had started the campaign a few weeks ago. But at least I know. Maybe it’s a one-time fluke, or maybe promoted listings are worth trying every so often, even without a promo.
4/24/2022 – 4/30/2022
Total items in store: 2084 (down from 2174)
Items sold: 55 (28 via best offer, 14 via seller initiated offer)
Gross sales: $2917.89 (up 36% from one year ago)
Net sales: $2019.38 (up 28% from one year ago)
Quantity sold: 55 (up 5% from one year ago)
Average sales price: $53.05 (up 29% from one year ago)
Lowest price sold (net): $12.84 — Shaheen Holloway Press Pass autograph
Shaheen Holloway probably would have had a long and prosperous professional career either in the NBA or one of the many other professional leagues in Europe or Asia if it wasn’t for suffering repeated injuries. But there can always be silver linings in life if you look for them. The injuries led Holloway to the path of coaching college ball, and after years working his way up the ladder to head coaching, this past March he led the unheralded Saint Peter’s Peacocks on a magical run through the NCAA tournament, defeating Kentucky, Murray State and Purdue before finally losing to North Carolina.
I actually attended the game when the Peacocks lost to UNC. The game happened to be in Philadelphia and I live just outside the city. I hadn’t been to a basketball game in years and now I’m good for at least another 5 years, maybe 10. Maybe I’d like going to another if the game was more exciting, but UNC won that game from beginning to end. But the entire experience was still special. So many people cheering for the underdog and random bonding moments with strangers.
As Saint Peter’s miracle run was happening, I had the thought to look up Shaheen Holloway autographs on eBay. None of the players had cards, but I figured he might have a few and the team really seemed to love him as their coach. Most of his cards were $5 each or less since he had never made the pros and he only had autographs in a few obscure college sets. There are so many new sets and new designs and new players that the market for cards from 20 years ago is pretty small, unless it’s an obsessive collector or cards of a legendary player like Tom Brady. Or something random like this occurs.
After Saint Peter’s first win over Kentucky, I figured it couldn’t hurt to buy a few Shaheen Holloway autographs just to see what would happen. After their win over Murray State, I started expanding beyond eBay into every card site I could think of. After their third win over Purdue, which made Saint Peter’s run the longest in history by such a small school, I realized that this had been a nice victory for both the underdog team and my business. I wouldn’t have been this aggressive with my purchases even a year ago. I might have bought one or two of his autographs and profited $20 total. But I followed my hunch all the way through and it is still paying off.
Holloway picked up a new job not long after the tournament at the same school where he played his college ball, Seton Hall. It will be interesting to see how his team does next year and what the fan reaction is like. Maybe he will end up an NBA coach in the future and get his first NBA cards that way.
Until then, and probably for at least the next year or two, I will sell 1 or 2 of his autographs for $10 to $20 each every few weeks. It’s not quite ICP hats or old markers, but it’s a good feeling every time I see one of his cards has sold.
Highest price sold (net): $126.09 — Aidan Hutchinson 2018 Leaf autograph #4/10
This was a really interesting sale for a few different reasons.
A big factor in card sales is always the calendar. There are a few times each year where something exciting is happening in every sport, and late April/early May is one of those times. Baseball season has just started and speculators always buy up the players who get off to a fast start. Basketball and hockey seasons are entering their playoffs. And this past weekend was the NFL football draft.
Aidan Hutchinson was the #2 overall draft pick from the University of Michigan and went to his hometown team the Detroit Lions. No surprise that my buyer was located in Michigan, and the $150 sale price mostly reflects the modern card world. Boxes of cards contain as few as 5 or 6 cards and regularly command prices of $500 and up. There is a whole culture of online breaking — companies buy dozens of boxes of the newest hot set, then sell off the contents by team. You buy your team (better teams go for higher prices) and get all the cards from the boxes in the break. Sometimes you spend $20 on your break and get an amazing unique autograph of the hot rookie. More often, you get a boring unautographed card of the third-string kicker. But you can try again with the new set next week…and the week after that…and the week after that. That’s the hobby for tens of thousands of card buyers and sellers, and in that world it makes sense that a nice colorful autograph of the new #2 draft pick would sell for $150. You could even say that the buyer got a good deal, considering that once Hutchinson’s new Lions autographs come out, any that are numbered xx/10 or less will probably cost more than $150.
This was one of my biggest profits by percentage. I bought this Aidan Hutchinson card two years ago at auction for a mere $2. $2 to $150. A 7400% increase!
I did not buy the card then because I had any amazing foresight into Aidan Hutchinson as a player. That would be a smart way to make money buying and selling cards and I’m sure there are many in the card world who have an incredible knowledge of individual players and their skills and who will be great and who won’t. I know a little bit of that, but mostly I know what collectors look for in terms of the quality of sets and types of cards.
I bought this card because of the autograph and low serial number, and because the seller was one of many who list hundreds of auctions every week and offer a combined shipping term. Buying one card might cost $4 shipping, but 40 cards is only $10 shipping. Buy and sell in enough bulk and there’s a business in a nutshell. Or my business at least.
I buy dozens of cards for $5 or less. I would be thrilled to sell almost any of them for $20. The vast majority of them don’t even make it to my to-be-listed pile. That was what happened with this $150 Aidan Hutchinson card. I found it a few weeks ago in a box of low value cards. After all this time, I didn’t even remember buying it. In this case, that worked out nicely for me. If I had been paying closer attention, I probably would have sold this card six months ago for $10. My strategy for buying and organizing inventory is much more deliberate now. But it was fun to see my old disorganized ways pay off.
Sometimes with selling on eBay, your sales are a result of figuring out a strategy and seeing it through. Keep listing and good things happen. Or maybe you’ll lose track of some inventory and find it again down the road. I wouldn’t recommend it, but sometimes you’ll get lucky.
These alone appear pretty special even without the added refractor coating and have a completely different look than the basic trading card, which is why I assumed I had something special.
The Topps Finest “look” (even without the refractor finish) has influenced a lot (maybe the majority) of modern cards sets for the last 25+ years, so your assumption was a pretty good one. The cards you found were just a few years before manufacturers really started adding a “chase” element to the cards with many different types of refractors, autographs, serial numbers, etc, and that’s basically what led to where the modern card market is today where buying a special individual card for $20 or $200 or even $2,000 and above is just normal.
I ended up with around 50 of these basketball cards, another 4500 football cards and 5000 baseball cards.
If you have any others which you’re having trouble identifying, let me know. Likewise if you want to discuss how to break down lots of this size or how to best sell them. Every collector or reseller has boxes full of random cards like this, myself included. I’ve had enough success in the past selling boxes of 100 to 150 cards for $5 to $10 each that I am thinking about getting a table again sometime in the next month or two. I have other things to sell, but the cards alone will probably cover the cost of the table, lunch and anything I wanted to buy for myself. I know that others use Craigslist or Facebook Marketplace to buy or sell in the same way.
For someone that isn’t a rabid fan, and primarily knows only the biggest names, I am astounded at the volume of names I’ve never heard of.
This is a constant education for me as well. I know a lot about sports because of the cards, but that knowledge often occurs in hindsight — I sell a card, then I Google the player and see they were traded or got drafted to the local team. Both of those sales were from this past weekend. That’s not always why the cards sell, but it can be a factor sometimes. I’ve been doing this full-time (or close to it) that I have a pretty large knowledge base built up, but there are a lot of gaps in it. I have friends who are fans of specific teams but not into cards who know a lot more than me about individual players and the rival teams players.
But I have too many other interests to sink a lot of time into watching games regularly, especially since researching players is kind of the easy part. Learning about the different sets and which types of cards are more valuable than others is what’s really important. A rookie autograph of the same player can go for $10 if it’s a cheaply made card from one set and $100 or more if it’s a low serial number or desirable insert from a higher quality set.
That is, I think, the knowledge that this forum and podcast has always focused on — finding good quality items out in the world, figuring out why they’re worth a lot or a little, and turning someone’s trash into someone else’s treasure.
I see so many cards for sale at estate sales, usually at high prices, and always feel like I might be passing up money.
This is why I started going into detail in my posts. Well, that and the process of going over the numbers and writing the posts inspires me to list more and think more critically about what I want from this life, now that I’m doing it full time.
I would bet that a lot of the cards you’ve seen at estate sales are not the cards I sell but cards from the 60s and 70s and 80s, almost all overpriced unless condition on the cards is perfect which it never is. Maybe cards from the 1950s if you get lucky. But the more common players from even the 1940s and 1950s are not always worth much. You have to go back to early 1900s tobacco baseball cards for a random card in a random condition to be worth $20 and up. But in general, an individual card’s value is always dependent on quality of set, rarity of card, player and the condition of the card itself.
I would expect that modern card collections (mid-1990s to present) will become a lot more common at estate sales and out in the wild. Cards have had a fairly sizable niche audience for 30+ years now. Even within that world, not everyone has a good understanding of what’s valuable and why. Not everyone is motivated to profit off of their hobby, either, and a lot of collectors hold on to their PC (personal collection) cards for a very long time. Even if the cards are valuable!
Plus there has been so much money thrown around on high-end cards the last few years that I’m sure it’s got more people in the game. And when that happens, you get people buying cards trying to make money without educating themselves about the cards (or how to sell them) in any real way. I don’t know if these are the types of people who would sell at a townwide yard sale or flea market, and maybe all of their cards will be wildly overpriced too. But I’m sure some of us will find out this spring and summer.
1993-94 Topps Finest was one of the earliest sets to include the “chase” cards (in this case, refractors) which are basically the foundation of modern cards today. Topps refractors are still a thing and the other large companies have their own versions — for example, every week I sell a few Panini prizm cards with various flourishes like a serial number or an autograph. Here is a good article which explains the influence of the Finest refractor.
My guess from your picture is that you have a much more common regular base card, not a refractor. Take a look at this listing which is definitely a refractor and compare it to the front of your card. If your card shines and shimmers like a rainbow when you tilt it in the light, you have a refractor. If not (and I suspect it won’t), it’s a regular base. Later years of Finest refractors are easy to identify because the front is even shinier (often with different patterns and colors) and Topps put the word refractor on the back of the card. It’s just the first year or two where you have to do the tilt test.
A lot of the $0.99 sales in Terapeak of David Robinson 1993-94 Topps Finest refractors are regular base cards which are listed (intentionally or not) as a refractor. The last few sales of real refractors that I see are:
$35 April 8th fixed price
$25 April 2nd fixed price
$21.50 March 18th auction
$13.02 March 4th auction (really bad picture on this listing though)
$27 February 9th auction
$20 January 29th fixed price
The prices are fairly consistent (except for the listing with bad picture) because the set’s been around for 30 years now. Also, Robinson was a great player, a Hall of Famer, but he had been in the league for a few years before this set was released. Rookie cards are always the most valuable — for example, a rookie refractor from the same 1993-94 Topps Finest set of another great player, Penny Hardaway, regularly sells for over $100. Same set, same type of refractor card, but it’s his rookie so it’s valued more highly by collectors. If there were Topps Finest refractors made in the 1980s, David Robinson’s rookie would probably be worth $500+ today.
One more thing I should mention: graded cards are one of the biggest misunderstandings about the modern card industry. There are a few well known grading companies (PSA, BGS, SGC) with (mostly) professional standards and expensive fees. There are also about a million smaller companies (including the one you linked) whose standards are mostly dubious at best. Calling these operations “companies” is being generous; it’s usually just one guy (or gal) encapsulating the cards for a nominal fee.
Make no mistake: a card in a high grade from a reputable company (gem mint which is either 9.5 or 10 depending on the company) often increases the value, especially with ultra high value ($1000+) cards or for popular players or types of cards. But most cards are not 10s either due to slight manufacturing flaws or tiny amounts of wear on the front or back of the card.
Were you to submit your card for grading (please don’t, you’ll be throwing away money), I can tell just from the left to right centering on the front that it would receive a 9 at best, and more likely an 8 or lower. For modern cards, 8s or 9s tend to sell for similar prices to ungraded cards.
With all that said, the fact that you bought a lot with some early Topps Finest cards in it, and not just 1988 Upper Deck, shows that you have an eye for what might be valuable. Keep digging and researching and you will find the $10 and $20 more consistently. At which point we can start to discuss scanning and shipping!
Can’t hardly imagine 60 sales in a single week. It’s a wonder you got so many items listed with all that packing.
This was my life a lot of the last 18 months or so. I’m closer to 30-40 sales a week now that I’ve spent a lot of time downsizing my inventory. 30-40 sales a week is a good baseline level, I think. The time spent on packing the extra sales from 40 to 60 and beyond adds up. I had less energy for listing and organizing my space. It’s one thing to pack those extra sales during the holidays when you expect it will be busy but another to do it every week.
And I sell almost all small items which get packed the same way in the same small envelope or small flat rate box. It would be even more time consuming with a store like @debitendcredits with a lot of random items and different types of packaging.
But a good label printer and organizing your shipping supplies make life a lot easier during the busy weeks. And the busy times make the slow times (like the next few months) a lot more bearable.
You’re welcome. My store wouldn’t exist without this podcast which changed my thinking about eBay (and everything, really) and I’ve learned so much from posting on the forums and the collective wisdom and encouragement of this community. I’m so happy to contribute to that in any small way.
If you want to post some pictures of the cards you bought, I’d love to see them. And if you think you have any possible hidden gems, I’d be happy to give you some tips on how to quickly figure out value.
Fanning the cards in rows on a table (like this listing which I really ought to cut the price on to just get it sold) is an easy way to show a large number of cards in one picture.
I have noticed those slow days this week as well. Figured it’s a combination of the nice weather plus the ongoing uncertainty in the world.
One suggestion I can make is to see if you are able to activate the promoted listings 75% off fees promotion that eBay is running through May 5th. I don’t know if it will work for everyone but it’s worth checking. I created a campaign for the first time this afternoon and received two sales from them tonight. I have always been skeptical of promoted listings, but like all the other tools eBay has given us sellers over the last few years, they are all probably worth experimenting with and giving a try once or twice a year.
I would say it is probably a 50/50 split between slow and fast sales.
Fast sales are listed for less than a day or a few days. Like the Kerrigan and Yamaguchi autograph above, where the initial listing had some kind of error and the right deep-pocketed collector (or flipper) couldn’t find the card until I came into the equation to list the card properly. Or sometimes a player is in the news for an incredible game, and if I have any of their valuable cards in my to-be-listed pile, I try to get them listed before the news cycle changes.
Slow sales take anywhere from a few weeks to a few months. I buy all my inventory through auctions, and auctions are not the best method to sell most items. But I had a lot less money to work with a few years ago since I was still building up my inventory. This meant a lot of buying cards for $1-$10 each and selling them through BIN/BO for $20-$40. These cards usually have less valuable features (like an autograph with an average serial number like xx/100 as opposed to a more desirable xx/10 or x/5) or feature less desirable players.
This card which sold tonight for $15 is a good example — a rookie card with a serial number of 25 of popular wide receiver Mike Evans of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, who are Tom Brady’s current team. So there are a lot of possible collectors or flippers out there. But this card is from a set, Upper Deck Quantum, that is not produced anymore and wasn’t popular when it was manufactured. This is primarily because of the college uniforms on the card which most collectors don’t value as highly as pro uniforms. And obviously no autograph on the card or other embellishment besides the serial number.
I originally purchased the card in August for about $5. Who knows why it sold tonight. The only other sale in Terapeak was in November (middle of football season) for $20. But another copy will pop up next month…or next year…or sometime. Less likely for the rarer serial number cards which is why they’re so prized by collectors and can fetch high prices.
For a while, cards like the Mike Evans were the majority (1000+) of my listings, now it’s probably closer to 1/3 or 1/4. These lower value cards sell once in a while just like Mike did tonight. List it and forget it always has a place and it’s a great way to build up your store from 100 listings to 500 and 1000 and those leaps are so important.
But in my case, it’s possible that the “true” value of a lot of my lower priced inventory might be closer to what I paid for them and not what I have had them listed at. So I have been trying to downsize my inventory lately and focus exclusively on either fast sales or more profitable slower sales. So far, so good and I really enjoy experimenting and tweaking now that the income pipeline is steadier.
Like a lot of eBay’s interface changes, once they get the initial kinks worked out I think it will be a more streamlined improvement. Remember all the fuss over required and recommended item specifics last year, or the year before? But those are just one easy part of the listing flow now.
Rumor has it that there was a 5% eBay bucks promo circulating today, so if you haven’t been listing much lately, now is definitely the time!
Today was the 85th consecutive day that I listed at least three new items in my store, and the 25th straight that I created five new listings. It’s been a real change to list with this consistency but I like the routine. I’ve also had good sales numbers throughout the whole stretch.
I’m confident that this consistent pipeline of new listings, and a higher average sales price, are the biggest reasons that my numbers remain mostly steady even though I am still downsizing my inventory.
4/17/2022 – 4/23/2022
Total items in store: 2174 (down from 2370)
Items sold: 32 (17 via best offer, 9 via seller initiated offer)
Gross sales: $1992.25 (down 37% from one year ago)
Net sales: $1355.26 (down 38% from one year ago)
Quantity sold: 32 (down 68% from one year ago)
Average sales price: $62.26 (up 63% from one year ago)
Lowest price sold (net): $8.02 — Jose Siri autographed 8×10 Houston Astros photo
Most of the sellers whose auctions I bid on every week sell on consignment, and every so often they’ll have other items mixed in with all the cards listings. I guess when you sell that way, you sell whatever shows up in your mailbox. I used to ignore these listings to focus on bidding on, and learning about, all the different types of cards. But I’ve been researching and bidding on the random stuff more often over the last six months. It will be a learning process figuring out what sells well and what doesn’t. But that’s one of my favorite things about selling on eBay.
Highest price sold (net): $164.48 — Nancy Kerrigan and Kristi Yamaguchi Leaf 1/1 autograph card
Sometimes the smaller manufacturers come up with valuable unique cards. There is not a huge history of Olympics trading cards, so the top olympians nicer cards (especially autographs) sell for nice money. And Nancy Kerrigan is more famous than your average olympian. The serial number 1/1 means the version of the card (in this case, the color) is completely unique. These are always desirable cards for collectors. I’ve never watched an Olympic event but I knew this card would sell quickly if it was listed correctly. I was right. It sold the same night I listed it.
I love hearing scavenger tales about how well the coffee shop is doing. Scavenger Mecca would make for a great woodcut sign. I’m surprised there’s not an Etsy shop with that name, honestly.
Had one cancelled order because I couldn’t find the item. That is only the 3rd time I recall having lost an item. This was a 4th of July program from the 1800s. Only thing I can figure is I shipped it along with another piece.
This is such a stressful situation in the moment, right up there with a message from a buyer who’s already received their item. The good thing is, in my experience, most buyers are very understanding. As your customers were with the reshipping. It’s always been strange to me how most other forums are so negative about selling on eBay when the vast majority of transactions are painless and most customers are reasonable. I guess there will always be complainers, regardless of venue. Like I’m sure at the local flea market there is an old timer bitching about the increase in fees for a 6 foot table or grumbling about hipsters who never buy anything.
Glad to see the consignment pipeline doing well. It’d a dream for any scavenger to just have the fun of finding stuff….and making someone else do the work!
The consignment sales have been my first time ever selling through any platform besides eBay or a flea market. It’s been an interesting learning experience. High fees, especially to keep feeding that pipeline, but I woke up this morning to 90 new cards posted to my account, just waiting for my prices. Usually it’s more of a trickle, a few new items at a time, but it’s like having an employee. It’s nice. Interesting to see what sells quickly on there versus eBay.
Now that your death piles have a place to be sold, you once mentioned possibly scavenging other items that are not card-related. Is this still the plan? Or do cards still take up your days/interest?
In March, and again last week, I spent a day scanning a huge batch of cards to list in the store, a few hundred total, and every day I list five or six from that pile. I am still browsing auctions from the sellers I regularly buy from on a regular basis, so the card pipeline is still overflowing for sure. And I enjoy it, even the tedious parts like cropping photos. But most of the sub-$50 cards, or items which I think will take a while to sell (like obscure autographs in oversized cases), head straight to consignment without me listing them in my eBay store.
Starting in May, I plan to start sprinkling in listing other items every so often. Maybe one day a week or something like that. I’ve hit a few local library sales in the last few weeks and found some neat old books and obscure DVDs which I am excited to list. And I plan on making more of an effort to check out estate sales and thrift stores and flea markets as the weather gets warm.
In the past, before I got into the cards, I would go scavenge out in the wild but rarely find anything worth much. I was in a much worse place financially then and I wasn’t reading the forums as much and didn’t really know what things were worth. I was desperate to make $100 or so in profit every time i went out because I needed the money to supplement my dead end jobs. Now, the card sales cover my bills with room to spare.
Scavenging is really difficult when you need it to go perfectly every single time. It’s a long game and has its ups and downs. Especially when you’re growing your business.
The National Sports Card Show is in July, and happens to be in Atlantic City, NJ this year. I plan on attending primarily because the consignment company I use accepts drop offs at the show. Also, the whole thing is quite the spectacle. There are deals to be found, but nothing like browsing eBay auctions. Since that is three months out, it feels like a good point to reassess where I’m at. This will give me a few months to explore scavenging other types of items and continue to organize my inventory.
Another deadline in my mind is that the lease on my apartment is up in September. I’m tight on space already just with the cards inventory, even after consolidating quite a bit, so it might be time to upgrade and give myself more space to grow my business. I’ve always wanted to move out of New Jersey, but never had the financial means to go anywhere except another apartment in a different town. But that is not really my situation anymore. I still have some debt, and I like the town I live in and the Philadelphia area as well, so I might not make the big leap this year. But we’ll see how I feel in a few months.
Congratulations on the great sales week. I don’t know anything about Airedales or vintage Kodak transparencies, but I loved skimming through your listings. The photos are spectacular and really show the quality of your items.
It’s tempting to believe that I somehow goosed the algorithm by adding so many new items, but the reality is I listed things people wanted. $623.00 worth of sales came from items that sold between 1 and 3 days from the time of listing.
This is such an important piece of the puzzle to keep in mind along with List it and forget it. Old listings will eventually sell if your item is priced well and buyers can find your listing. Maybe you have to run a markdown sale or send an offer to get the sale. But the pipeline of new listings is really what keeps sales numbers up.
Anecdotally, the last three months I’ve been listing at least 3-5 new items every day for the first time, and I’ve seen an end to the occasional slow days where nothing sells or only one item sells. I don’t think it’s a coincidence.
It felt like a slower week, which is something I’ve expected as I’ve sent a good chunk of slower moving inventory (along with a lot of death piles) to sell on consignment. I’m still listing every day, but rarely more than five items a day. Most of my eBay energy is going towards organization to maximize storage space as I think about possible next steps for my future.
But my sales this week were right in line with the previous week and previous year. A few high dollar sales helped me out, but generally my average sales price is 10 to 15% higher than one year ago. I’ve been trying to focus on listing nicer items, instead of stuff that will maybe sell for $20, and it’s nice to see that pay off.
4/10/2022 – 4/16/2022
Total items in store: 2370 (down from 2373)
Items sold: 40 (25 via best offer, 2 via seller initiated offer)
Gross sales: $2454.37 (up 3% from one year ago)
Net sales: $1772.84 (up 7% from one year ago)
Lowest price sold (net): $13.70 — Sammy Watkins 2014 Topps Chrome autograph pink refractor rookie card
It’s not football season for quite a while, but it is football transaction season with the college draft just a few weeks away, so I am seeing occasional bursts of activity when players sign with popular teams. I sold three Sammy Watkins autographed cards for $15 to $30 each this week after he signed with the Green Bay Packers, and all three cards had been in the inventory for 2+ years and originally cost me $5 or less. These are the kinds of cards I would now send to sell on consignment immediately after I receive them. The card market relies on big sellers who run weekly auctions, and there are so many inefficiencies that there are always deals to be found if you know what to look for.
Highest price sold (net): $190.10 — Jimmie Wilson 2018 Historic Strips autograph booklet card
This sale was a pleasant surprise, a high dollar item which sold for full price. Kind of an unusual set from one of the small manufacturers who lack licensing agreements with pro leagues and have to get creative with their cards to avoid breaking any copyright laws. So, these companies sets often feature retired or deceased former players and card designs without a lot of pictures to avoid the team logos. I like this company, Historic Autographs, since they like to combine a certified autograph (usually cut from a larger document) with an old vintage card of the player from decades ago. The full booklet is oversized and a bit clunky, but there are special holders made for them, and the final product looks like a nice piece of Americana.
This booklet was more valuable than most because the player, Jimmie Wilson, died in 1947. So it’s a really unique item since his autographs only pop up on eBay a few times a year. Despite the rarity, it took the perfect buyer for this item over a year to find my item. I’m sure I could have sold this much sooner to another reseller for 40 to 60 percent of the sale price, and still made a profit, but some sales are worth the wait.
Scavenge of the Week: Santa Claus card with a piece of sleigh in it, #03/25
Despite a large inventory that’s mostly card related (at least for now), I don’t have a collection or a desire to keep any cards. I like to use my knowledge to find deals and I enjoy the rituals of buying, listing and shipping, and of course the freedom and flexibility. It’s a good life and very rewarding.
I won this silly Santa Claus card with a piece of sleigh for about $10 last week and I had a momentary fantasy to save a search for its companion from the set, the Workshop Elves tools card, and set both of them up near the Christmas tree this holiday season. I don’t have kids so it would have been just for me.
I won’t do it, mostly because there’s a recent $84 sale in Terapeak for the same Santa sleigh card. I can’t pass up that kind of profit. Another example of how inefficient the modern cards market is. That sale price seems really high for a card with a relic that is “not from anything at all”, but Topps only made 25 of these sleigh cards. I can see how collectors with young kids who also like the cards would spend a few bucks to unwrap this card on Christmas. Especially since modern card boxes are hundreds of dollars.
There have been a lot of attempts at kitschy holiday themed cards over the last twenty years, so maybe after my Santa sleigh card sells, I’ll spend a few dollars of the profit on some Ornaments cards and hang those up on the tree. This seems like a scavenger’s way of getting some Christmas spirit from these cards.
Really a shame he risked his business for such a shady low margin deal.
I seriously doubt the margins were as low as he claimed — probably quite the opposite.
I also think that when we start talking about sales numbers this large, specifically with ultra-rare/high end “collector’s items,” there is almost always more than meets the eye. For example, earlier this year Logan Paul made some headlines for buying an extremely rare sealed box of first-edition Pokemon cards — which turned out to be resealed with junk cards.
https://kotaku.com/oh-no-logan-pauls-3-5-million-box-of-pokemon-cards-wa-1848356807
If that’s where you stop paying attention, then you might think that Logan Paul was out $3.5 million. However, eventually he got refunded.
https://www.thegamer.com/logan-paul-35-million-refund-fake-pokemon-cards/
The other buyers and sellers in the string of sales of the box (it passed through a bunch of people who are well-known in the card world) also all got refunded. This wasn’t a scenario where some random guy had a box of cards in his attic and found a way to get in touch with a celebrity billionaire who got screwed, or the random guy got screwed. It’s always more complicated than that. Add social media to that, and there is almost always more than meets in the eye.
But at least we all have our little oasis in the interwebs. Sell trash, be free…$20 to $40 at a time.
On the surface maybe PWCC hasn’t suffered consequences. But I would bet their sales are much lower now simply because the majority of card sales happen on eBay. There is really no way to replicate that kind of marketplace on an individual website. And I won’t be surprised if they end up facing some kind of criminal charges in the next few years.
