The State of the Hobby....

Just wanting to get an idea on what people thing the state of the hobby is.

Reason I ask, I have had two of my best mates contact me over the past 24 hours wanting to get into trading cards as an investment. I'd say they would be motivated by the Gary V videos on Facebook...

I can see the attraction for them. I bought 4 Jayson Tatum Rookie cards in July last year for a total of $22.50USD. Now combined they're worth more than $300USD...

The other thing I've noticed is that Paul George Optic Gold base cards are going for well over $100USD. The only time I've spent over $100USD on a PG card was a 1/1. PG gold's usually go for $20-50USD.

Is this added interest a positive for the hobby or is it just all bad???

I think the continued interest and hype will continue to push up box prices, forcing many people (many already priced out) to more breaks.

People then get frustrated by bad/no return from breaks go back to singles. Can't get the player they want, settle for a cheaper player, stash or can't sell that player and have no more money to put into the hobby, Panini creates another junk wax era bubble bursts, people get sick of graded cards and leave the card hobby to go do family stuff and be outdoors.

Upper Deck buys licence for NBA in order to attempt to revitalise the hobby. And around we go.

Am I too jaded? lol

To be honest I can see this happening to a degree especially graded stuff .
Box prices are rising fast compared to last year's prices especially optic. If Upperdeck do get the license mj auto products will be super expensive

I mean where’s the limit right? Panini are certainly testing the boundaries! $800 for a box like Optic that should be $300. I guess Upper Deck MAY have got to that point after Exquisite $500 boxes but I dunno, I don’t think they said “well people are hitting these Luka and Zion cards and making way more than the price of a box so f that lets up the box price to the price of the highest selling rc or hit in the product so we make the money instead”. Looks like what they are doing.

People have to have that chance of hitting a huge card in a collector friendly priced product. They shouldn’t have to immediately want to sell everything they get to enable them to buy another box or two.

Now I hear you say “if you can’t afford to buy the box or have to sell what comes out of the box and have to sell to buy another box then you can’t afford to be doing it”.....well come on.

Hobbyists and gamblers have done this since the beginning of time. I used to use my last $15 pocket money to go buy 3 packs of Skybox. This is fun. This is chasing cool cards and hits in product. This is gambling. Buying in to case breaks is gambling. It’s a way to spread out the risk and potentially hit something cool or worth a lot to keep, or flip to get into something else you want. Panini knows this and are milking us for everything. There’s zero chance this lasts.

Investors want to come in a make money? I think they might in the short term then it will crash worse than bitcoin.

Sorry, who started this thread, now I’m pissed off at Panini lolol

Jk, happy Saturday all!

It's not Panini jacking up the prices though. Their original wholesale prices and SRP prices have largely not changed at all.

There's other bottlenecks in the distribution chain. Major US distributors are receiving way more demand for product than they can supply. While in a lot of industries, distribution pricing is set and doesn't fluctuate based on supply/demand, for whatever reason, it's allowed to run rampant in this case.

Panini's next steps are important ones. Even if they addressed distribution by spreading it through more channels, it's not likely to fix the pricing issues at all as demand will still far outweigh supply. What's to stop new distributors from doing the same thing. And the kicker is, even if somehow you could get distribution to maintain a price closer to where it is supposed to be, the next in line businesses and customers that buy from these distributors end up in the exact same position, with a demand for the product that far outweighs the volume they can get their hands on....so the same thing happens.

If Panini go the other way and start increasing production exponentially to meet current demand, then they put themselves at risk of creating the next junk wax era. From an interview I've listened to with Panini's marketing guy, they're stressing "scarcity" in the business model to create the value or potential value concept. So while they may increase production for a few select products (most likely those that have retail equivalents) to satisfy the market, I'd largely expect a lot of their brands to maintain similar print runs to try and avoid some of the mistakes made in the past.

It will be really interesting to see how things develop over the next 6-12 months. A lot of people are hopeful that the much weaker draft class next season will help alleviate some of the pricing pressures. They are probably correct to some extent. However, the growth has been huge over the last year. All the new and returning collectors will still be focused on something, if it's not 20/21 Boxes then it will likely be continued demand for 18/19 and 19/20 product as well as renewed interest in previous collections.

I like the idea of the reverse Dutch auction though I must say. They get to make money and people actually buy in when they want.

Good info @Diggaz TC - see what happens when people (me) just get on a rant, we just ignore actual facts

GarnettFan4Life said:

I like the idea of the reverse Dutch auction though I must say. They get to make money and people actually buy in when they want.

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Now if only they wouldn't run them at 3am AEDT

I completely understand the whole supply and demand model and it is easy to see during this current run of back to back MASSIVE draft classes.

What happens next year when the Zion rookie hype is over and these 'investors' leave as they're not getting their ROI or they don't have someone to invest in? Bulk sales of Prizm Rookie cards?

Whilst it is good to see a massive spike in value in my PG PC, it is a shame to see some of the long term true hobbyists leave as they can't afford to continue in the hobby.

Any company who wants to revamp the hobby just needs to take this concept on board... or even better, just cut the middle man and give me a job in promotion and design

i really dont think it will last long term. the 'collectors' will disipate and almost all players come crashing back to regular prices in the end. its all based off of hype and quite alot of dodgy bids/sales.
every few years a new batch of people find their old cards and return to the hobby to try and make some bank. once they realise how little the returns are on most cards and especially boxes, or how volatile the market actually is, they disappear again. its just a disruption to the market for actual collectors, but usually evens out.
its usually player based, which is why the last couple of years have been particularly insane...

I agree that it is up and down (bit like the economy).

Also, for eg. what if Zion does his ACL? What's his rookie card now worth?

Not that Paul George had the hype that Zion does, but I know when PG broke his leg his card prices came crashing right down... I was picking up autos for around $10.

It was actually a turning point for me as I had made the decision to sell my PG collection a few days before his injury. His injury was the reason why I kept collecting him!

That is a fair point. Although I do think age comes into it.

For eg. if Lebron goes down today with an ACL, he will not come back as the same player at this stage of his career. With Paul George he was still young and not yet peaked in his career.

Just my 2 cents

Lebron is locked in HOF all-time great, titles etc etc - nothing he did from here could affect his values. Zion is just starting, would be devastating to the basketball economy atm

I think if Lebron wins another title this year with the most storied franchise in NBA, his values will skyrocket even further.

Though I do agree he is locked in HOF and Zion just starting out.

In other news.. who else here has seen a surge in demand and price for certain 90's cards? And it's not just MJ cards either looks like any type of higher end numbered 90's cards are going through the roof at the moment!

That Steve Francis can’t be legit surely

GarnettFan4Life said:

That Steve Francis can’t be legit surely

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Not too sure Matt but these are one of first ever patch cards and I had bids on it too.

Jordan_Cards_Fan said:

Not too sure Matt but these are one of first ever patch cards and I had bids on it too.

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Craaaazzzy. I’m finding stuff I like atm that I can afford, a lot of psa 9 KG’s since the gap is so big to PSA10 versions. Still cool to get though

zephyr_213 said:

I think if Lebron wins another title this year with the most storied franchise in NBA, his values will skyrocket even further.

Though I do agree he is locked in HOF and Zion just starting out.

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i think thats unlikely. hes already reached the peak of the player he is. another title wont make any difference to that...at least not long-term.