I always mention how I like to pull the curtain back and offer insight into the daily operations of our little local card shop but this week is a little bit different.I'll start by pulling back a curtain but it's the curtain to a bed in the emergency room of our local hospital. My daughter had been sick with what we assume was the 24-hour flu at daycare late last week. My wife … [Read more...]
Shop Talk: Still Buying, Kaboom Hits and New Releases
Another week at the shop has passed and the cards are still coming in by the hundreds. Each day has offered more opportunities to buy from collectors or those who've finally gotten around to liquidating that box of stuff in the closet. Prices have dipped for some issues and summer's arrival means there's a need for cash.As I've mentioned in some recent Shop Talk pieces, … [Read more...]
Shop Talk: Hobby’s Current State a Roller Coaster Ride
I was just joking the other day with the shop owner that we really haven't seen many, if any, customers bringing in sports cards to sell us lately.That is, by far, one of my favorite job perks. I love rifling through top loaders and three, four and five-row cardboard boxes looking for some buried treasure, whether to add to my collection or for use in the shop. It's always the … [Read more...]
Shop Talk: Basketball Releases, Super Select and Possible Zion 1/1 Pull
This week offered a nice mixture of new releases of sports cards at the shop. With the NBA playoffs right around the corner, we received a good amount of 2020-21 Crown Royale Basketball. This particular product offers one autograph and one memorabilia hit per box, on average. It's been selling well for us in store and online this past week. We also got the … [Read more...]
Mike’s Hot List: Not Just a Baseball, Football, Basketball Card World
It's been an interesting month and specifically the last few days around the shop and within the hobby (but when is it not?). The good news - My shop has partnered with Denver Card Shows for the first large show to hit the Mile High City in well over a decade. As you may have read on SC Daily, we are hosting a 200+ table gathering at the National Western Complex in … [Read more...]
Shop Talk: T-Mall Fall, Flawless Football, Tom Brady Score
As often as I can, I like to pull back the curtain and share insight with our readers as far as what goes on behind the scenes at a sports card shop in current times.A few months back, we had the opportunity to purchase 2020 Prizm Football T-Mall from one of our generous vendors. Well, in the current market nearly every sports card release sells well. Also, the current state … [Read more...]
Shop Talk: New Releases, Shipping Frenzy and Dreaming of Upper Deck
It was a great week for our little sports card shop here in Central PA. It was a great week for sports cards in general. The owner was away on a vacation all week which meant for a hellacious amount of shipping for yours truly but beyond that, there were a number of really fun sports card releases to look forward to checking out during my moments of downtime. 2021 … [Read more...]
Shop Talk: Investing in Junk
Here's a sentence I never thought I'd write. After spending years and years passing on every late 1980s and early 90s collection or stack of unopened boxes that walked into the shop, we've recently made a concerted effort to start stocking some of it. While I can't go quite so far as to scream "the junk wax era is back, baby!," we've actually spent time … [Read more...]
Shop Talk: Waiting Hours Outside Target for Cards? Count Me Out
This week's Shop Talk finds itself piggybacking of sorts off of last week's topic of retail sports card madness.Dave, one of our long-time customers, is known to make the trek out in the wild and try to track down sports cards all over creation. We spoke to him this week and he informed us that he went to our local Target at 3:45 in the morning-- yes, you read that right-- to … [Read more...]
Shop Talk: Prizm, Pre Sales and Power Slams
The sun was shining nearly every day last week and so were the new Prizm basketball cards. Sales have been phenomenal--so much so that we even had a group of young guys come in earlier this week and tell us war stories about trying to find the elusive beast out in the wild in retail locations. We've all heard the stories by now about lines of people 20 to 30 deep … [Read more...]