General Forum

And in other breaking news, water makes things wet. 

Seriously though, hobby shops, card show dealers, and even "true collectors" (whatever THAT means) have been buying up boxes at retail locations for over 40 years, and most likely, even longer. I only know back to 41 years ago because that's when *I* was doing that and I knew others that were as well.

Yes, our hobby is a business to many. If the shops didn't make money, they wouldn't be able to stay in business, now would they? I have yet to see a card shop turn up as a "non-profit" organization. And it's very difficult to make money in a hobby-based business, unless you do it in huge volumes. That's why only the biggest card shops have survived.

If I ever open my shop I will offer both, why? So the kids can buy the lower priced items or choose to upgrade to Hobby .... their choice. All I got this year was two Retail OPC boxes as it was all the wife could afford. I just cant justify what Hobby boxes go for. My kid likes bowling, eating and underwear. LOL

My LCS does a little buying of retail.  It is usually on the hot products like Prism Basketball.  He does not mark it up a lot tho and only when he thinks that the restocking of the product is too high.  

I might have a different perspective than some of you. But I was a bookstore manager in the mid to late 90s. Now I know this was a different industry but it's the same thing. 

I would go to the local Sam's Club and buy books to resell.  Why?  Because sometimes I could get them cheaper than directly from the publisher plus I didn't have to pay for shipping and I eliminated my competition all at the same time. 

I HATED it!  But I had to do what I could to try to stay in business. 

Now I just priced them at the normal retail price. But I can't fault anyone for doing what they have to to keep their doors open. 

I also let my manufacturers rep know what I was doing and told them in no uncertain terms just how unhappy I was about it and that they were losing money too.

I've witnessed this first hand myself. The LCS I used to frequent was a habitual doer of this, much to my dismay. He was so bad about it that I'd run into other collector's at a WalMart and we'd be staring at empty shelves. Twice the other person mentioned that XXXX had come by. He even asked me to do it for it, on my dime, though he supposedly would pay me back. Did I say that it was a LCS that I used to frequent.

No one has given the correct answer yet! It's NOT the store owner buying them from Target/Walmart/etc. It is Panini that is to blame here!!! Panini allows any company buying products to purchase both the hobby and retail products. For example: when Panini first got into the NASCAR market in 2016, I was connected with a wholesaler. He was able to buy hobby boxes AND blasters by the case. I bought 2 hobby boxes and 2 blasters from the 2016 Prizm release. I did the same thing for the 2017 Panini Absolute Racing release.

Panini doesn't care where the "retail" products go, as long as they hit the market. I wasn't allowed to buy blasters of a few products b/c all of them had been bought by the hobby shops and the re-sellers to Target and Walmart. It seems to be "first come, first serve" when it comes to the "retail" packages from Panini. Retail from Panini back then was only blasters and fat packs. They seem to have changed a bit of that the past couple of years, but I'm sure the distribution is still the same.

After talking to my LCS and hearing what he had to say; I think it has to also go on the company because he described to me the process and hoops to jump through to purchase Hobby boxes direct from them. I do agree that the company should stick with what they claim and release Retail to stores and Hobby only to card shops. 

 I was there at his shop one day when a couple of guys came in and had a large tote of blaster boxes they were trying to sell. When I got the chance I advised him that I didn't think it would be a good idea. I am almost positive they were stolen as they were only asking 6 or 7 bucks per box. I left after that so don't know if he took my advice. I wouldn't fault him as this is his business and he is entitled to make money to.

After Tom's reply, I want to clarify something about what I typed earlier. The term "wholesaler" does not apply ONLY to card-related companies! ANY wholesale company can get products from Panini! It's not like the restrictions put out by Topps and UD where you have to have proof of a store-front card business to be able to buy directly from the company (unless Topps/UD changed it recently). The wholesaler I was dealing with as a 3rd party for Panini products only bought as many cases/boxes as he had orders to fill before the product released. He wasn't keeping anything in-stock and cards were not his main business or more than a small part. I think the main reason he was buying them was b/c of my internet friend getting them bought and sold. My connection was only because I knew the person getting the wholesaler to buy cases and then sell them to him at-cost or close to it. I was really only saving 10-20% on single hobby boxes, but about 40% on retail blasters. I'm only talking about new products right at the release date though.

As for people trying to sell blasters to a card shop for $6-7 each, there are 2 ways that is possible without them being stolen. If they were NEW products, it would have to be wholesalers trying to get their money back b/c they didn't sell them to regular customers. If it was older products, they can easily buy them at Target/Walmart, etc. at discount prices of about $5 but that takes years for the price to get that low. As for the term "stolen", I'm not sure how that could happen. I can elaborate more on how difficult that would be, but I'll stop with what I've already said.