General Forum

So i call the people who go in places and buy boxes and then sell them for 10$ more on eBay sharks.  And they did it again by having a dustupe in the parking lot and one then pulls a gun.  So target will not be selling baseball cards anymore. what are every ones thoughts?

I saw that. It's pathetic and it's not something the hobby needs right now. I'm done with sports cards now because it's become an investment instead of a hobby, with some people in it just to make a buck. Never thought I'd see the day that a box of Score football was unaffordable.

this does not affect me much, as I do not buy much new product.

I spend my hobby dollars more on vintage singles, and to a lesser extent, modern singles when I am close to a team set or hand collated set..

I do have two card shops in my city that I can get a few packs here and there..

I do feel for the collectors that do not have a card shop near them at all and retail is their card shop....

I also wonder what will happen to the inventory that has already been printed and packed into retail blasters that were originally destined for the big retailers...will those retailers sell online at their stores, or will they not take delivery of any more product the rest of this year?

mark

My guess is they will send them to other stores or hobby shops. Its sad to see it like that but probably what will happen. Or they flip them online for a profit.

There is already a pretty long thread on this. Look back a few days if you would like some more discussion.

Good.

And from the sounds of it, if Target employees and store managers had any say they would never sell cards again. 

Supposedly, Panini is going to sell their retail products on Amazon. That's what I've heard anyway. No idea about Topps, UD or others.

Its funny that the card hobby seems to be the one area that I see the opposite trend I see elsewhere when it comes to the internet.

Rare books for example.  There were books stores that would specialize in out of print books and would be the go to place to get new books when they came out.  Along comes sites like Amazon where anyone anywhere could sell the same book and the prices dropped, even for the older rare books because now you could find someone in another state willing to sell it and they each try to undercut to be the person selling at the lowest price.

Books that used to sell for thousands are now affordable.

Trading cards however seem to be going the opposite way.  Even the common cards are going up and up and up in price and the flippers are buying them up everywhere, even online just to hord them and selling them off one card at a time. 
This begs the question, just how much are these people flipping cards actually making on them when you figure the time, gas etc it takes them to get the cards in the first place and how much time and energy they spend putting them all online.  Is it really worth it?  Based on the types of cars I see some of these flippers loading their cards into, I'm not seeing anything to make me beleive they are making 6 figures doing it.

When is the last time you saw a story in social media or in the news of a vintage book selling for millions more than the last time it was sold?  The media hype over trading cards is a contributor to what we are seeing.

Not only does social media hurt what's happening with prices, this pandemic hurts it. People are living off the inflated unemployment so they have time during the day to sit at Walmart and father waiting for the delivery and then they flip the product for extra income. But if panini is going to Amazon it might bring down the price of flippers because anyone with an Amazon account can now find them.