Wax or a Repack?

Welcome to the Sports Card Lessons Podcast with your host, Big Ken. A retired teacher bringing you lessons each week. He's learned in the hobby by taking you behind the table and inside the mind of a dealer and a collector. Sit back and relax. There won't be a test. The only thing being graded here is the cards. Welcome to the Sports Card Lessons Podcast. I'm your host, Big Ken. Whether you're watching on YouTube or listening on a streaming service, please like subscribe and hit that notification bell so you'll be notified whenever I drop any new content. What is going on? Thanks for being here. Happy Sunday. Happy Father's Day to all the fathers and stepfathers out there. Enjoy the day. You deserve it. This weekend, EC3 con at Mohegan sun here in Connecticut. First show in the convention center. This show started in a smaller ballroom, then it outgrew it, then to a bigger ballroom, outgrew that, and now to the convention center. The room is massive. In fact the show show is only using about 60% of the room. I absolutely love the new room. Load in, load out. Super easy lighting, awesome bathrooms, two thumbs up. So much more room in and around the tables. Plenty of aisle space for foot traffic. This show has been a work in in progress for many years. And I remember Scott, the promoter always saying the goal was to make it to the convention center. And now I see why. Now I see why. It's so much more of an upgrade there. The floor, the lighting, everything, everything was so much better. The show itself, the room is so big it was hard to judge the attendance. And, and it's not just me talking to other people. I said I know there's a lot of people in this room, but it just doesn't feel like it. And, and that's where you notice that the show outgrew the other rooms because now there's so much more room in here. People don't feel like they're on top of each other. I know the early bird attendance was light and then the 10 o' clock when the show opened to the public it started to get noticeably busy. Steady traffic all day. I say this all the time. I started saying it in May, I'm saying it in June, and I'll probably say it again in July. I wasn't sure what to expect in June. 85 degrees and sunny outside. But this show really has a good following. In all always seems to be a good draw for attendance. I can say it was definitely more difficult buying at this show with all the buying stations set up. But it was definitely Easier to sell at this show with all the repackers in the room. I've been talking about, you know, stockpiling all my inventory for Chicago and, and putting anything I can from my office and storage in my cases at these shows just to generate some income to buy more inventory to take to the national. I had one case of WNBA cards. I had one case of mixed sports, and that mixed sports is what some people would call trash. I also had a discount box of WNBA cards on the table. So I had two cases, two showcases, and a discount box. I sold some cards to a handful of WNBA collectors. And that's one cool thing about this show. I talk about. Know the show. No, no. Who you're going to be selling to. And this show, I, I mean, I'm sure because the Connecticut sun is there really has. Has a big WNBA collector group that comes through this show all the time. More than any other show that I set up, I, I have set up at this show. Definitely has more, you know, women's basketball collectors, a lot of deep roots. And I'm not talking about just, you know, over the last few years since, you know, Caitlyn Clark or, or Paige Beckers. Like, these are, these are people who've had, you know, season tickets to Yukon women's basketball since the 90s, going back to the Rebecca Lobo days. You know, so it's, and it's so co. Be able to just chop it up, you know, with, for, for me out at shows, I probably have one or two conversations, you know, WNBA conversations with people at my table per show. But this show here is probably about 10 to 15% of the day I'll be talking to people about WNBA. So it's really cool, it's really cool to have, you know, the, the, the, the, those connections with people, you know, outside of the cards or, or beyond the cards, I should say. I was extremely happy to see all the repackers in the room coming around, buying up all my mixed sports, amongst other things in the room. And trust me, I had some sales today that left me shaking my head, or, I mean, yesterday left me shaking my head. Just like cards that, I mean, I, when I said I had to dust them off, I had to use a cloth to dust them off. Like that's how low they were, you know, in the, in the, in the storage area back here and just pulling cards out and I'm like, what the heck? I'll throw them in. Maybe somebody will want them. You know, maybe there'll be a need for them out there. And I'm talking about players like Kyle Trask, Will Levis, Trey Lance, Kenny Pickett. I, I'm definitely have to say I had better cards obviously in there that sold as well. But selling these cards, they're engrated, they're granted, they were all PSA 10s, right? But it was just, I never thought I would sell those cards. I thought they would be giveaways or throw outs or, or something. So, yeah, yesterday just left me scratching my head and wondering, where are these cards going? I mean, they were bought by a repacker, but where are they going, right? What kind of repack are they going into? I, I do not want to be buying into that repack. I, I couldn't even imagine. And, and, and who knows, may, maybe they, there's something I'm missing here. Maybe somebody's gonna say, ah, they're not going to repack, they're going here, Big Ken or they're going there or this is the reason they're buying them. Maybe so, I don't know. But I was happy to find them. I was happy to put them out and I was happy. I had one repacker walk up to my, my table and say, look, I'll buy all your basketball cards. Let's go, let's go through it, figure it out. They're all yours. Have at it. I had a girl come up to my table. She was buying for Courtyard. She was, she bought Caitlyn Clark Paige Becker's graded cards for repacks. Happy to sell them. Happy to sell them. And they're paying strong. I mean, it's not like the, it's not like it's a battle. I mean, especially the girl from Courtyard. I mean, she came in at 95 just offering me, I'm like, perfect. I mean, I, I do that all day long here with those. Happy to sell them. The only cards I bought yesterday to put back in my case. And that's something I haven't been doing in a long time. Probably can go back, you know, two seasons, two I on the podcast and me buying for a future date. And that's always been what I've been doing. And I'll find a card here or there, I'll say, oh, I'll drop that back in my case. But I think I'm gonna get back more back into that after the national, just, you know, more faster, you know, faster flips, quicker turnover type things, you know, I was able to buy. So here I'm at the show and I'm thinking to myself, as cars came up to My table. Like, you know, I obviously I'm buying football. I, you know, I'm looking to take that out to Chicago. But then I had somebody come up with a handful of az FUD cards. I'm like, this is perfect. I'll buy all these cards, I'll put them in my case. You know, knowing the show, knowing she's probably going to sell well right here. You know, at Mohegan a lot of Yukon fans coming in here. I bought them all. I sold them all but one card and they were easy sells, easy sales on those. What's what people are looking for. So if you know, you know the show, you know what people are looking for that it's easy to pick something up and just drop it back into your case and sell it. You know, normally at shows, something I don't talk about, I talk about ripping wax a lot. But normally it shows. You know, after I get set up, I'll walk around and I'll look for something, a box of wax to rip. I'll buy it. You know, it's kind of like I just do it for myself. I'll buy it, I'll bring it back to the table and at a point when the show gets slow, I'll open it up, right. Gives me something to do, kind of a little bit of a reward, Right. Yesterday morning I walked around the show. Everybody's selling. I mean there's a lot of Pokemon in the room too, but everybody's selling tops. Chrome football, right? And the last thing I want to buy, could not find anything to buy. I went to see my, my guy, Tyler Elemental Breaks. He had just put out a fresh repack. So instead of buying a box of what, you know, some wax to rip, I bought one of his repacks instead. I spent a hundred dollars and I pulled this Saquon Barkley sky high Pink auto to 15, right. So I did pretty well. Probably better ROI than I would have gotten from a couple of tops Chrome football boxes. A double up for sure, right? Absolutely happy with that. As I look around the room yesterday at all the buying stations, people lined up to sell their cards, the repackers going from table to table, paying cash, buying out people's cases. I think to myself that the, that the money in the hobby just doesn't feel real. Just. It's just unbelievable to see that much happening in a room. Watching all that money exchange hands all day long. It almost feels like fake money. I mean, I know it's not, but it, it just feels like it just, it, it boggles My mind, and I'm not just talking about, you know, the repackers that are showing up with bags and bags of cash, but still the little kids showing up 8, 10, 12 years old, showing up with, you know, four figure, five figure cards. It's just like, it's, it's, it's unbelievable just to see where this hobby has gone to, you know, and, and the cards and the cash exchanging hands in the room is just mind boggling. It almost feels like fake. Like it, like it's fake money. I know it's not. And, and for an individual and individually, we're all doing something a little different, but similar on different levels. Everybody has a different budget, but it's just incredible to see someone who's walk up to a table and be like, oh, I'm gonna buy this card 10k all right? And just start dropping, you know, 10 piles of, of a th. You know, a thousand dollars on somebody's case and just buying the card and walking off with it. Just. I don't know. Or a repacker going from table to table, just spending thousands emptying people's cases, cashing them out. You know, the buying stations. I, you know, I, I don't really see the buying stations, but I mean, I'm sure it's the same thing, right? Just, just look around. Card shows. Just take the time to step back and just take a look around. It's just unbelievable just to think what's happening in that room. And even if you, even if you're just, you know, you want to do a little quick calculation in your head, just walk up to people's cases and just look in and just, especially if they have their stuff priced and just calculate in your head how much inventory is sitting in there. And then that's one case. And then go to the next case, then the next case, and then stand back and look around that room. How many cases in that room? I don't know how many tables? I, I think There were over 300 tables yesterday. I should have asked Scott. I think, think maybe 350. I'm gonna say 353 to 350 on tables in that room. But you know, there's, there's no cheap cases in that room. So it's, yeah, it's, it, it's insane. And everybody's saying it's harder and harder to buy. And, and the percentages keep going up and up and up. Right. The, the, the re. Packers seem to be changing the game. Just keep trying to outdo each other just so they can, they, they can make the sales. You know, I just talked about buying a repack at a show for the first time instead of buying a wax to rip, you know, and, and my thought process on that, right, I'm spending a hundred dollars. The floor is 50, the ceiling is a thousand, right? So worst case scenario to me, I get a $50 card, right? Versus two tops. Chrome football megas at $70 each, 140 total. There's no tax here. And a card show, worst case scenario, I don't even know what it is. I've opened them up, I've got some cards out. I mean, I'm saying 20 or $25 in cards. You know, I've pulled some cards out that I thought were great and I'm like, oh, wow, let's look this one up. Oh, wow, it's only $9 or $11 or something like that because a thousand of them have already on, on ebay. So I mean, the value in those boxes is so low. At least with the repack, I, I knew what my calculated loss was if I was going to have one. And in my case, I was a winner. I doubled up on my investment. But if I was a kid at a card show and I pulled that and I doubled up, where am I going? Straight to the buying station, right? And it take the money, I'm going to keep on ripping. And, and you know, online companies offering to immediately buy your cards back at 90%, it's, it's just quickly, it's accelerating the, the, the, the lifespan. Not the lifespan, but the, you know, the, the rotation of that card, right? From being in a case to being, being purchased to going back and being put in a repack and they're going, I mean, it's just, it's just a cycle that can just keep on going, just keep on spinning, right? In my case, my, my card that I pulled, it gets added to my national inventory. And yeah, you're probably right. A repacker will probably buy it in Chicago and it'll just be cycled right back into to something else. And I'm thinking to myself, with Tops really screwing themselves this year with overprinting and overpriced boxes, I think you're gonna see a lot more people like me showing up to the shows that have an itch to rip or being at home or, you know, wherever, just having an itch to rip and thinking maybe I'll just buy a repack instead. At least I can calculate, you know, what I have versus buying retail wax and just ripping it and being mostly garbage these days, overpriced garbage, you definitely can't trust the wax anymore. Even the majority of the cards I saw coming to my table yesterday, people trying to sell were top scrolling football singles, virtually worthless. And, and now you know, nobody else in the room is buying it. You know, What are we doing with this? What do we do with these cards? I mean if somebody's building a set, they, they could build as many sets as they want for free. Because I'm sure people are just trying to give these things away at this point. Tell me what you think. Have you been buying into repacks more? Have you been abandoning the retail wax? Is your thought like, are you getting tired? Like if you've been here, if you've been on this journey with me, you know, I was, I was buying cases, I was buying cases of stuff and ripping it and now I'm just like no matter what I buy I, I never seem to really pull anything good out of anything. Just seems to be a lot. And it's, it's funny, you open it up two boxes and you start to see the packs. This, the cards are lined up in the packs. Identical like these packs are just, are just the same in every single box. So tell me what you think. You buying into repacks, Are you abandoning the retail wax? What's your go to now when you have an itch to rip? I did have some pickups. Xavier worthy rookie color blast. Happy to have that. That will sell quickly. So this card was an interesting card. This card showed up at my table yesterday. I looked at it, I was just going to pass on it and then I realized it was numbered to 10 of a player that I wasn't familiar with. So I started, you know, looking up the comps on it and then from there when, when the person selling the card thought I was looking up comps, I was actually looking up the stats and, and who. This girl was a college, you know, women's college basketball player. You think I would know them all right, I would be your guy. I was unfamiliar with her, but I ended up buying this card. I took a flyer on it. It was a great card. It's Clara Strack from Kentucky. It's black number to 10 and I say I take a flyer. I didn't spend that much on that card. So two cards I picked up, I've been talking about picking up more 50s and 60s football. 1964, Philadelphia, number 30, Jim Brown, SGC 6 and 1963 tops. Number one, Johnny Unitis, SGC 7 and late in the day yesterday I had a couple show up with a box of 80s and 90s football cards. All the stars all penny sleeved and top loaded all in fantastic condition condition. You know the, the Bo Jackson, the Barry Sanders, the Dion Sanders. All I so many names in there, just really nice cards in really good condition. So I ended up just buying the whole box of them off of them. Talking about getting more into that and maybe maybe starting to PC not maybe starting to PC more of the players that I watched growing up, you know in football more than nostalgic piece of it. Now obviously not the 50s and 60s but you know I was, I was a Youngin in the 70s so I you know I started in the 70s right up through to modern day right watching football. So yeah I think that's going to be kind of my, my lane getting learning about it and investing a little bit more time and money into it. But next week I know there's the Thousand table show at in Worcester Mass. And There's a local 70 table show next town over from me so I'm probably gonna attend both of those shows. I'm not setting up. In fact besides my local Hamden card show and Danberry card show I don't have any other shows planned now between now and and and the national I'm really out of inventory so most going to these shows would more or less would just be buying but it's, it's you know, percentages that you talk about. It's probably a little late to be buying football but we can find a deal. We'll take it right so that you know, next week I'm not sure where I'll be. Maybe I'll have more clarity on Thursday. I'll be back with zip on the Hobby chop Thursday night and I'll probably talk again about where I'll be for the weekend but either way I'll be back next Sunday with a brand new episode. Until then take care of yourselves and everyone around you.