It was a bit of a sobering week at the shop in terms of sports cards and prices.
We probably don’t comp and adjust the pricing of our sealed boxes and packs as much as we should. There can be a lot to do on any given day and with little help, sometimes this very important task falls through the cracks…until it cracks us right in the face.
Well, we went down our lineup from top to bottom this past week and made drastic price cuts, almost across the board, on sealed product. We are talking upwards of a $100 reductions or more on some of our sealed football boxes.
On the same topic, we also received a few emails this week from our distributors who were sending out “blowout” lists with “great deals” on sealed product. As it has been for quite some time now we can still find 95% of the boxes offered in these emails cheaper elsewhere online. We’ve openly wondered when the time is going to come where not only distributors but card shops, dealers and buyers come to the realization that prices are continuing to drop and eventually bite that bullet of lowering prices to a point where things will actually sell. It’s almost like some people are waiting for the other shoe to drop, as many vendors and dealers are holding out hopes that things aren’t going to continue to drop or that, at some point in the near future, these prices will go back up but the writing on the wall is telling us all otherwise.
Aside from when certain products are just flat out more expensive from distributors, there are times when it’s close enough to consider but you really have to pay attention to all the factors that go into a sale. There was an instance this week where the cost of a box was $105. This same box sells for right around $115 online. Well, by the time we offer free shipping and include eBay fees we’re in the hole. That’s just one of many examples of similar circumstances that, frankly, just don’t make sense to buy from vendors in a lot of instances.
On a positive note, we received the wildly popular 2022 Topps Archives Baseball this week which we sold out pretty quickly in store.
We also finally received our 2022 Topps Chrome Baseball silver packs. These little shiny packs were sent to make up for the insert snafu in the initial Topps Chrome Baseball offering. The silver packs have been the talk of the industry for some time now, so to actually see some in store and be able to take care of our better customers by handing them out has been a really rewarding experience this week.
Aside from the new releases we got some new restocks in the shop, too. From 2021-22 Optic Basketball blasters, 2021-22 Chronicles Basketball to 2021-22 Prizm Basketball retail to more Collegiate National Treasures, we have more new product on our shelves. Seeing new cards come in the door is one of my favorite parts of the job.
It was another fun weekend full of football and between Friday night lights, college football Saturday and NFL Sunday we almost need a break from our weekend but we just don’t have time for all of that. We were right back at it Monday morning, shipping off weekend orders and getting ready for what we hope will be an interesting week.
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