by Keith Neuhart
Basketball Cards are on FIRE!
Here in our little piece of Heaven, (Delaware, Ohio) we sell very little basketball. Football is by far our biggest seller, followed by baseball, while basketball is a distant third and hockey is almost non-existent.
However, there is one trend I am beginning to notice, and I have began to move some store funds into some basketball product over the past 30 days or so.
Very Little New Product
The NBA lockout has had an effect on all basketball, and it hasn’t been all bad. All of the older boxes have sold out and the new product is beginning to appear on the horizon. Panini is bringing back the Hoops brand and that looks to be the first new licensed product of the year. Collectors are ready to buy and a lot
of that is because of Jeremy Lin.
Phenom
It seemed as though every pack of 2010-11 product had a Jeremy Lin autograph hidden inside. We sold them in the shop and on eBay for about $3.00 apiece for the longest time. And then, like something I have never seen, this kid from California has become the Hobby’s biggest thing.
Of course, when the Linsanity began, I could not find any Lin cards in our shop at all. I found one base card and my 11 year old son also had a Lin RC he had pulled months earlier. I put it in one of our showcases for $3.00 and it set for two weeks. Finally, I put it on eBay and it sold for more than $25.
Now, everyone is asking for Lin cards. The 2010-11 products are on fire and we couldn’t give them away for months. The Panini Update boxes were selling for $50 and now they are upwards of $75/$80. I am not sure how long this is going to last, but it is great for the hobby and really great for those able to pull those Lin cards out of the closet.
Keith Neuhart of Neuhart Cards in Delaware, Ohio will be posting a short piece every week, helping us take the pulse of the hobby. He’ll tell us what’s hot and what’s heating up in the retail world of sports cards and sports memorabilia. Keith traded in his stockbroker uniform after 16 years to follow his dream and open a sports card shop about a year ago. He’s sold on eBay since shortly after the site launched in the 1990s. You can reach Keith through his website, NeuhartCards.com.
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