The lack of competition this year doesn’t mean those who produce football card products at Panini America won’t be busy. The company’s NFL/NFLPA trading card exclusive means they’ll be involved with roughly twice as many programs as in years past.
Not every football card product will be in hobby shops. Seven will be retail exclusives and only six will be found at both Target/Walmart stores and your local card shop.
Panini has created a few new brands, brought others over from its NBA trading card line and tweaked some of those it’s been cranking out for years.
While they’re now the only football card manufacturer, many of the challenges haven’t changed. From 
concept to design to production, there are still a lot of hurdles involved in getting a product to market and even then, there are no guarantees collectors and box breakers will embrace it.
One ongoing issue is getting past and present players to sign their cards and return them for pack out in a timely fashion.
Panini’s Director of Product Development for NFL brands, Nick Matijevich, talked with GTS Distribution about the company’s NFL plans and offered insight on what goes into getting a single product produced.
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