It was a hectic week at the shop, full of people bringing in a wide range of items for us to purchase and it happened pretty much every single day.
We enjoy every second of these interactions and seeing all of the great stuff that gets placed on our countertops, it reminds me of one of the most well known movie characters of all time, Forest Gump, and his most iconic phrase because when someone brings in a box (not chocolates) we open it up but we just never know what we’re going to get.
Some of our regulars, such as Colin, stopped in to sell us a lot of modern cards, some from higher end lines and products including a number of autographs and other hits that we can definitely use for our showcases and our repacks.
And we don’t just buy cards. As a full service hobby shop, we have customers across a varied spectrum. We have an entire 8×8 foot section devoted to pro wrestling in our shop. Its a category that has been a part of the store since its inception. We have anywhere between 30 and a 150 figures available at all times. Some are sold locally. Many are sold online. This past week, we had a customer bring in over a 100 figures all by himself, mainly AEW, for us to take a look at. We bought the entire collection and that completely filled our section… and then some.
I even got in on the buying this week as we had a local gentleman bring in some vintage football items, which mostly consisted of 1979 through 1981 Topps cards but the collection also featured a really cool vintage Franco Harris replica helmet and some great NFL superstar postcards.
We got all the big releases of the week, including 2023 Topps Chrome Cosmic, which sold pretty well. We received an entire case and only have one sealed box left on the shelf. That might be gone by the time you read this article.
We received two cases of 2023 Donruss Elite Football hobby. The Elite definitely carries some weight, and with the rookies appearing in their pro unis, it flew out of the shop and completely sold out by Monday morning. We are hoping to get some in for restock.
We also scored a case of the 2023 Prizm Draft Football hobby, a product that features four autographs per box. The word on the street was the only highly drafted quarterback found in the product in autograph form is Colts starter Anthony Richardson. From the looks of things on eBay, that appeared to be true and the checklist confirms it. There are some all-time greats and current stars in the product, though.
My wife and I decided on a day trip to take Isabella to her first Philadelphia Phillies game mid week. I wanted to go see my favorite player, Shohei Ohtani as this will be the last east coast trip before the season ends… and no one’s quite sure of his future at this point. It was such a great experience as we had pretty good seats and got to see the unicorn in person. I consider myself someone who greatly admires baseball history and it was really special to see Ohtani perform. My daughter Isabella had an awesome time as she met the legendary Phillie Phanatic, had some soft serve ice cream in a red Phillies helmet and also got to eat some great Philly pizza. What could be a better first trip to a Phils game than that?
Our week ended with a bang as we hit up our reserved space on the patio at our local Buffalo Wild Wings for our annual fantasy football draft. Our 12 team league is pretty competitive, with everyone knowing football extensively. It’s a really fun league and it makes it that much more fun when everyone truly knows their stuff. I was the champion a few years back but have struggled the past few years. Hopefully we turn things around with my selection of Fantasy studs.
We came in and prepared stacks of packages for a few hours Monday morning but took the rest of the day off for the holiday.
After the Labor Day weekend, we were back at the shop Tuesday morning in full swing and looking for a busy week ahead as the NFL season approaches.
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