Speaker 1: Good morning, hobby Verse. It must be Saturday, because it's
another episode of Hobby Hotline. I believe this is three ninety.
I'm joined by two people I consider good friends and
glad that the case, Orlando Collector's Dream and Tony Duh
you know, representing Philly, which I'll be going to in
a few weeks myself. I want to start off, unfortunately
with some somber news. Both of these gentlemen were gracious
enough to jump on almost last minute. Last day or two,
we had, you know, unfortunately two deaths how Hotline members
with uh, you know, Samuel Evans lost a family member
this week and couldn't come on, and then just yesterday,
Victor Roman, who was supposed to be on his mother
in law passed away. So we send our thoughts and
condolences to the Evans and Roman family during this difficult time.
I know probably everyone else would echo that sentiment always
thinks an unfortunately part of life as well. So uh,
but Victor and Orlando jumping in I much appreciated, guys.
Thank you for for doing us as solid. All right,
so let's get in. We got some great topics, but
let's get into some hellos here.
Speaker 2: This morning.
Speaker 1: There's Scott. Good morning from sunny Minnesota. Is not sunny
in New York, guys, So I wish, I wish I
could say the same Mad City brew Upstate sports Cards
in Aubany, New York. I'm gonna guess cloudy Aubany in
New York as well. Uh, Western Colorado, small, small act town.
Jim at the bank, he's driving across Alligator Alley. So
fellow Floridian Orlando fiulfly Ball, Good morning, sir, Confluence sports Cards.
Speaker 2: Good morning. He's at your mom's house, so you might
want to call your mom a check hunter.
Speaker 1: Uh so, uh yank me card Steve A funny name,
Howdy from Sonny Tucson. So another sunny city pe Peter
b Good morning, Larry Gitlin, good morning, or from Nova
Summer is here? Uh Bamboozo says sorry, I'm late. I
was busy scopting my mustache. You and Roly fingers both,
So we'll give you both a past there, all right, guys,
and I'll put up comments, uh, you know, as as
we go along. So we're going to start out with
the big one, or at least I think it's it's
the big one. So it's the Manto redemption card from
the twenty twenty six tops was pulled. That's not the redemption,
that's the grade of the card. I don't know if
it's the actual card that is in play, but it's
a five and a half from PSA and a father
and son from Houston, Texas pulled the card the redemption.
Obviously they didn't put it's great and so it's not
going in a pack, but they pulled a redemption, which
is good for this card, and it's already on Golden.
Last I checked was ninety four K five and a
half's guys, and we kind of did some talking before
we went live. Five and a half generally, you know,
between two and a quarter two hundred and twenty five
three hundred thousand dollars. But the person that pulled the
card wasted no time getting the redemption on Golden. So
if you want APSA five and a half from of
making Mantle fifty two tops, you know that golden h guys,
kind of your thoughts here on this card, you know,
and and selling it that quick, you know, I say
the card, but the redemption is good for Linda.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean I think it's first, it's great that
a breaker, didn't pull it as a father and son,
and it's always good to see that, you know versus
big breakers like back here like that pulling that. And
you know they put up the you know, the redemption
without even knowing what the grade or what the card was.
So I think that was a little bit of a
risk because you know, they just showed shared the card.
I mean, you know, Tom's just shared the card, I think,
just a few days ago, So I think it was
kind of risky just to put it up there.
Speaker 4: Now.
Speaker 3: Most people thought it was going to be a lower grade. Personally,
I thought it was going to be, you know, a
one or a two or three. I never expected to
be a five and a half. So I was surprised
with that. And I think this is the actual car
that was released. It came out on the Sports Collector's
Digest article, so I'm assuming this is the actual card,
which looks really really nice, like a little bit off centered,
but those cards are always off centered, so its just right. Now,
it's a great deal that ninety thousand at Golden when
it's probably more like a two hundred and fifty thousand
dollars card.
Speaker 2: And there's Tony with the update.
Speaker 1: He's doing double duties commenting, and but the car bid
one hundred and fifty k.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, that's the number price currently great card. I
think it's the first fifty two TOPS redemption maybe since the.
Speaker 6: Ninety one set Orlando. Yeah is that correct?
Speaker 3: Yes?
Speaker 2: All right?
Speaker 5: And that car has a lot of history to it,
so I anticipate since this is a full blown redemption
it's handled by TOPS, I think it's going to surpass
to two hundred and fifty thousand mark with Bar's premium.
It's already out one hundred and fifty thousand.
Speaker 6: As we said, just based on the.
Speaker 5: Commer And when I first saw the card, the first
thing that came to me was I wonder if Top
spotted off of Ash because he seems to have about
eight of them in his cases at any given time.
Speaker 6: But I think it's a great card.
Speaker 5: All fifty two TOPS mantles are going to have some slant,
whether it's the top order the ripe order, is just
how the plates were made, and there were two different plates.
Speaker 6: As folks know, type one and Type two.
Speaker 5: But I think it's a wonderful card and I'm happy
for whoever's going to win the card and especially for
the father and son duo.
Speaker 1: Let me ask you guys this, would you what are
your thoughts on this? Where PSA re slabs the card
and not changing the grade the cards graded, but reslabs
the card and put something on the flip to signify
like this card was the card in the Tops redemption giveaway.
Speaker 2: Does that make any difference? You don't want to see that.
Speaker 1: You'd like to see that to kind of maybe set
the card a little apart from just all the five
and a halfs or fives, you know, just give some
additional provenence to what the card represents or the backstory,
or you rather not whoever wants to go first.
Speaker 3: Oh, I do think that they probably should have done
that already, because I guess it would have been really
great providence to know. And you know, some people will definitely,
you know, pay up for providence. You know, I already
have a fifty two mano and mine I know the
providence of mind, which is great to have. And I
paid up because of I know the history of the card,
and I know that mine came right from the original
owner to me, so the guy that pulled it from
the pack. So for me, that means a lot and
I paid up for that. So I do really think
that the providence is something that we would add value
to the card, and it would be great if if
I won that card, I would definitely like to have,
you know, the PSA put that on their redemption because
I think that that will add to the value. But
you know, it's a great idea. I wish that TOPS
would have thought of that and have done that already
for that one, and of course the rest of them,
like Maze that was also pulled, et cetera.
Speaker 5: Knowing Golden as in Ken and his relationship with PSA,
I think he will have the card holdered in a
brand new slab just for the aesthetics of it. Regarding
the pedigree, if this was the Joe Orlando led collectors,
I think the pedigree would be there. I don't think
it's going to happen because collectors under that turner seems
not to like to create brand new pedigrees. And I
think when Golden sold the Pokemon card that what's his
name owned, I should know his name because my kids
used to watch him. They didn't have a pet agree
on that card either, and that was real and that
was a reholded card.
Speaker 6: Too, which Ken had done with the necklace on.
Speaker 5: So I don't think it's gonna get the pedigree, but
it will be refolded and it will help the value,
regardless of what's holded or not, I mean, whether it's
reholded or.
Speaker 6: Not, but it's gonna help.
Speaker 5: And then with the pedigree, I think it will go
for more if it had it, But people are always
going to remember about where the car came from, and
if it gets sold down the road, any auction house
will will mention that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Cooner says, you know that those added things are
just let's scan the milk more money.
Speaker 2: At a buyer.
Speaker 1: I can't really disagree, but you know, give a little
story or backstory to the card itself.
Speaker 2: I don't excuse me.
Speaker 1: I don't care either way because I don't have the card,
but maybe if I did, i'd feel a different sort
of way. But it probably would increase the value, if
you know, if you add me, would it it would?
So here's my next question, and this is to the
chat room as well as well as Orlando and Tony.
If you would have had pulled the redemption card, what
would have you done? In Orlando's case, he already has
a copy of this card, So his answer might vary
or maybe not. So I don't know who again, who
wants to go first? I'm gonna pull the slide off here.
But you know what would you have done if you
pulled the redemption?
Speaker 3: Well, mean, yeah, I guess I'll go first with some
of the top of here. But yeah, for me, already
have my copy. I'm happy with my copy. It's actually
better center to that card, even though it's a lot
of lower grade. I don't have a you know, I
would have I would have redeemed the card first of all,
and I just sold the redemption certificate. I would have
redeemed the card, and then I would have sold the card.
If I can get a quarter of a million dollars
for that card, hey, I'll definitely do that and have
a huge credible budget to go to the national just
to pay off out of the bills, you know, pay
off my.
Speaker 4: House with that.
Speaker 5: Since I don't have a fifty two tops Mantle, I
and if I would have pulled it, I would have
redeemed it and I would have kept it. Because buying
a fifty two tops Mantle right now it's extremely tough.
Speaker 6: You might as well buy a Wagner.
Speaker 5: To some extent, because you know, the same group of
five to ten dealers have a monopoly on all the cards.
It just makes it tough to win one at auction
unless you get lucky and you're able to buy one privately.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'll tell you what I'm gonna do. But there
was a mookie makes a great comment.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: The actual redemption card itself will be worth something, right
because of what it signifies. But here's a question you
have to does tops take you know, top slash fanatics
take that back and then destroy it like? Or does
the does the person who pull they get it back?
Speaker 2: Still? Like, I don't know the Yeah, you know, I
know some redemption Do you have a code?
Speaker 1: Uh you scratch off the code yet or in the
system and you have a used redemption card, which in
this case will have some value.
Speaker 2: But did they do I don't know. I don't think
they did.
Speaker 1: I don't think you're putting in the code for fifty
two time. I think that's more like, hey, contact us
at this number or something like that.
Speaker 2: We need to card.
Speaker 1: Like, I don't know where the redemption card winds up,
but if the puller gets to keep it, there's an
additional sale right in a sense, because you can sell
the Manto card itself and the Redemption card. So but
it's a great point by Mookie there. You don't even
think about that. Sometimes for me, I don't have this card,
I would sell it, whether that's sell the redemption, get
the actual card.
Speaker 2: And you know I would.
Speaker 1: I almost think i'd sell the redemption, guys. And here's why,
because then you don't have to worry about shipping the
actual card. Like if you redeem the card, get the mantle,
then sell it, then you got to ship fit and
cross you you know, be nervous it gets an ouption
house or wherever your whatever platform or way you are
selling it. So I think i'd sell the redemption, uh.
And I think I probably you know, I know, I know, Tony,
you said, you know it's getting harder to buy this
particular card. I'd buy a lesser grade for for you know,
lesser money, if you will, and like the Upstate Sports
card says, Uh, you know I'd buy. I'd buy a
lesser grade man and a bunch of other cards I
might target and maybe even put some money into the
bank or some stuff like that. So that's what I
do that way, you still get a mantle. It's not
the actual man of the redemption was for, but you
still you still have that.
Speaker 2: You check that box off.
Speaker 1: And you can check a bunch of other boxes off
at the same time. That's that's what I would sell.
Speaker 5: It just became public that different couple's fifty two mantle,
which was nicely centered I think was a two point five.
It was that auption h Heritage maybe two or three
months ago. The purchaser of that made it public who
he is, So I'll just say Brady Hill Bolte card
it's his fourth bantle of various creeds. And if that
was like two hundred thousand, give or takes. So if
that two point five is two hundred or two twenty five,
and you have a five point five, even if you
cut that grade in half and you go to a two,
you're still spending, you know, depending on the ipeel, over.
Speaker 6: One hundred and twenty five thousand dollars.
Speaker 2: So that's why I would.
Speaker 5: Just keep it instead of just playing the gamblin game
going for a lower copy.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's toughless and it's a it's a nice problem
to have, right it sure is. Those are the kind
of those are the kind of problems I'd rather have
than some of the ones we actually get. But you know,
Bob Buzo says he needs a special chain to display
his redeem Manicott and walk around and show that bad boy.
Speaker 2: But who else we have?
Speaker 1: Fo File five Ball says, I keep my rough fifth
and keep this man, why not don't too? So he's like, hey,
I'm I'm not with Orlando. I'm keeping both of them.
Speaker 3: So if you go ahead and definitely keep the redemption,
to keep the part that's part of the story, So
you keep it together, I think, and that's probably yeah.
Speaker 2: Right here there there's Upstate.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, Upstate Sports Card says redeemed cards should be
sold along with the slag to create Yeah yeah. I mean,
there's lots of ways you can go. But I guess
the one thing that stood out to me, you know,
is how fast this seemed to get to market, Like
you know, and I get it, mate, we don't know
this father and son. Maybe they're not even vintage. Obviously
they're open twenty twenty six tops modern cards, so maybe
the vintage doesn't move their meter like it does ours.
Speaker 2: And a lot of the people in the chat room. No,
that's not a crime.
Speaker 1: And they happen to pull it and they're like, you
know what, we don't have any vintage cards, so why
you know, this is a great one, but you know,
we're gonna cash out. And that's apparently what's what looks
like what they'd so Uh Babozo says, uh, start your
man O grade rainbow, good luck, good luck to you,
and Tony would say good luck to you too. Uh
but uh so yeah, so congrats to the father and
son that pulled it. Uh, they're gonna get a payday
anyway you slice it right. And you know, we'll see
what TOPS does in the future. We're gonna see, you know,
another iconic cards as a redemption. It's almost like they
have to do something. Maybe maybe not another man O,
but they almost you almost feel like each year of
Flagship they're gonna have to do another card, whatever that
card uh may be. So it'll be interesting to see
what they do. Might be hard to top. That's sort
of like, you know, the godfather of TOPS cards, But
we'll see what.
Speaker 3: Uh don't remember this is a series one. I think
that would series too. They were also gonna insert other
vintage cards in their other redemption cards for vintage.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, But what I'm saying is even like
for like twenty twenty seven Series one, what direction? Obviously
I think in the series two you're not gonna get
more mantles. But you know, they always try to create
that buzz. There's already a buzz, but they sort of
up the anti the mantle this year, like what will
they do next year as well? So Tony wants a
tops Tiffany Steve Jelt So if you.
Speaker 5: Listens as redemption as the redemption.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Mookie says, I don't know how old the sun
was in this case, but he's Mookie says, I worry
my son would cash out cut off his father too
any time. My son's twenty six. He does collect cards
a little bit, but.
Speaker 2: Not I got on the same weightlet that I do.
Speaker 1: So again, you know, if I pull this card and
sold that, I'd buy him something.
Speaker 2: I'd buy him something. Put it that way.
Speaker 6: So Bob just brought up a good point.
Speaker 5: Sorry I know there, Yeah, go ahead, but uh, same
thing that happened with the fifty two mini old back
in ninety one and also the Hannus Wagner card. Two
people to winners couldn't get couldn't keep the car. It's
because of the IRS taxes, So that's may have maybe
the story here.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know what, that's a good point because I'll
even it's not card related, but my wife's cousin was
on the price is right and they won an expensive
car and they didn't need a car. They had cars,
and rather than pay the taxes, they just sold the
car that they want on the prices. So it's not
it's not cards, it was a car, but the same
concept right to get out, like I don't want to
pay taxes, I don't need another car. Our cars are fine,
and they just sold it. They never even took ownership
and never they just you know, sold the title and
I don't know how to the whole deal went down,
but they never took possession of the car. They went
on the prices, right, So so yeah, that's a great point, right,
you know, depending on where is the taxes you pay
based on the state you live or where tops it.
Speaker 2: Like, how does that work? No, Tony Orlando, I'm not sure.
Speaker 4: Probably by the state I would have me.
Speaker 3: But you know, the one that pulled the Honus Wagner,
I think it was a post woman, post postman or
a post lady from Florida because it was and she
sold it immediately because of the taxes, Yeah, it might
be like a bonus for you have to pay the
federal tax and then state comes into you too. So yeah,
and they did say I RS so and that's usually federal.
Speaker 2: Yeah all right, guys.
Speaker 1: Well, so you know, congrats to the people who pulled it,
and they're going to have a financial windfall from it,
you know, and I hope they use it wisely. And
you know, again, I don't know how how all the
sun is his twenties is the young son. Maybe his
college education could be paid for and then some but
or they could just you know, cash out and buy
a bunch more twenty twenty top swax. There's no shortage
of it, so so and up State Sports says you
can get out of payment system.
Speaker 2: With the IRS.
Speaker 1: That is true, I know, even with sales tax, like
if you owe a lot of sales tax.
Speaker 2: Like a payment schedule. So there you all right, guys.
Speaker 1: So the next story here that we're going to cover
is and it's not as big as the one we
just talked about, but you know, CTCA Certified Trading Card
Association is launching a global trading card registry system where
you know, you can upload your certain numbers. You can
report like if your graded cards were stolen someone who's
going to buy a large deal, maybe they get a
bad vibe. They can cross reference to make sure that
these cards are not on the stolen UH list.
Speaker 2: It's and and the CTCA.
Speaker 1: They've got a lot of programs that they want to
implement besides this one.
Speaker 2: This was the one we're going to talk about today.
Speaker 1: But they want to do like a you know, certified
Retailer UH certified breaker where people it's almost like a.
Speaker 2: Better business bureau where as long as you.
Speaker 1: Do everything above board, you would be on the certified list,
full transparency. I'm a very honest guy, so I want
to I want to state this so someone doesn't say, oh, nicee,
you to mention them, but you didn't mention the second part.
The second part is this. They are a sponsor of
Sports Cardination and I am on the board of directors.
I haven't attended a board meet yet. They've only had
one UH and there I'll be at the second one.
So here's my thing, guys, Before I kind of let
you guys do I'm for anything that can make the
hobby a safer and better place, and you know, so
I'll support that as someone who sets up at show still,
I've been a show dealer since the age of fifteen
who does things above board, and I support anything that
wants to make the hobby safer and better and that's
really their goal. Guys, kend of your thoughts, and I
know I'll start with Atlanto because you said, you know,
I want to get proper credit, right. I think you
mentioned Orlando, what is it? A Tiffany Cards has a
list as well.
Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, you know, of course with all of the
cards going up, you know, theft has become a big thing,
not just that shows, but also at card shop and
almost every week you hear of a card shop somewhere
that's broken into and stuff is stolen from there. And
I think that it's a great thing for a CTCA
to be able to post cards that have been stolen
either from you or you know personally, or from dealers.
I mean, what happened to Ash a few years ago
was just horrendous, and you know it's hard to recover
cards like that, and I know a lot of guys
are going to say those cards probably were cracked out
or submitted, but you know, many of those cards were
probably just resold somewhere in some marketplace or just somewhere
out there, or maybe even to other dealers. So I
think it's a great idea for someone to be able
to put cards that have been stolen somewhere on a website,
especially when you're talking higher end cards. If you're going
to buy a card that's you know, five figure or
six figure card, you know, I think it's a good
thing to go out there and check to make sure
you're not buying a stolen card, and especially when a
lot of these cards are going to be sold for
way under market valley because they were stolen. So I
think that, you know, anything you could do to recover
some of these cards is great for the hobby. And
even better, I think the Tiffany Cards site which is
going to have both stolen cards, but more importantly, they're
gonna have altered cards, and it's already up. You can
go ahead to go on that Tiffany cards dot Com
I think it is and just look at look through
there and you can see altered cards. So if you're
gonna buy a card. It's always good to search there,
you know. I know that they have a lot of
that stuff, you know, other websites. You know, I can't
remember right now, not just net fifty four, but I
can't remember any of the other side.
Speaker 6: There's a there's a there's a few of them currently.
Speaker 5: So they have a I just saw that they got
stolen cards dot info, which is okay, they got card legit.
Then you got the typical forms like like what you
just talked about, and now you have the new player
in the in the in the game.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but I think, you know, it's a great thing
people should look. If you're gonna buy a high end card,
you know, take a look at it. Make sure it's
not stolen, because you know what, if you you buy
a stolen card, eventually it gets found out and it
comes back to you.
Speaker 4: You know, you have to probably return that card.
Speaker 2: That's it.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's what happened to me.
Speaker 1: Do you want to tell us I have a story
with Durham from my store days, Tony, I don't know
if you want to share.
Speaker 6: Police.
Speaker 1: So I had a card store many moons ago ago,
but years ago, and I had a person come into
the store say, hey, do you buy cards? I said, always,
you know, I'll take a look. I bought I don't know,
five to seven cards. I don't remember all of them.
It was probably like a Henderson rookie. I seem to
stand out. I'm in New York, so I think there
was a couple of manly rookies in there. They had
a lot of New York flavor to it. So I
bought like five or six cards, put them out, and literally,
I don't know if it was the next day or
two days later, two uniformed police offers came up. I
was on the second floor in the building. They came
up the stairs and they had had a printed uh
you know, none of the cards were grated, but they
had a printed piece of paper with the five or
six cards on it and said, these cards were stolen.
We have uh you know, we have we think that
they might have. You might have bought them on you know,
you didn't know they were stolen. And I'm you know,
like I said, I'm very transparent. I said, yeah, I literally,
they're just put out. I did buy this lot. And
they're like, we know who stole them, and they had
a picture of the gentleman and they're like, there was
this the guy you bought these from, like it is
and they're like, well, I hate to tell you this.
Speaker 2: Uh you know, John, we're gonna need those cards.
Speaker 1: So I had to you know, pull them out from
the showcase, give the officers to cards.
Speaker 2: They gave me like an.
Speaker 1: Affidavid of taking them a pick, you know, all all
the paperwork. And they basically I said, well, well, you're like,
how does this work? Like am I out the money
I paid for him? They're like, here's what's gonna happen.
We're gonna arrest this individual, will prosecute him. He's gonna
have to pay restitution, and then you'll get you'll get
your money back.
Speaker 2: And so.
Speaker 1: Six months later, to make a long store. Six months later,
everything was resolved. I don't know you got any jail time.
I would venture not, but he had to pay back
the money and I got a check on police, you know,
a police check for thet what I paid. But in
a sense, for six months I was out the money
with nothing to show for it until the police check came. So, uh,
you know, that's that's the story.
Speaker 2: So you gotta be careful if you buy.
Speaker 1: And obviously I didn't know they were stolen guys, But
that's the risk you take, right, So anything that if
you you know, I didn't really get a weird vibe
necessarily on that purchase. But there's been other times when
I'm I'm you know, dealing with someone where something feels
off right, and and especially if it's a your purchase
and you want to just err on the side of caution,
and you have a tool that you know can maybe
save you from something like that happening ahead of time,
why not, right, It's especially if it's free, it's free
to use, why not utilize it?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 1: If it saves you one time, or saves anybody one time, right,
it's well worth what it costs, which is nothing nothing
to the user. I mean obviously, you know you got
to pay your website fees and all that, but as
far as the user price, you know, it's nice that
that tool is available.
Speaker 2: Go ahead, and if anyone wants to your story.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I was gonna say so the Great So the
Global Trading Card Registry's great. I typed in assert of
a car that I purchased in early twenty twenty four.
It was a name, It's Rookie. It was in a
PSA three point five. So I'm actually looking get the
card right now. I checked the cert note issues. I
bought it in February of that year. It was like
a birthday gift for myself. Then later in March, I
realized I forgot to put it inside my PSA set registry,
not for a set of registry purposes, just so it's
tied to my account so in case if anything does happen,
I'll know, you know, I'll get a verification.
Speaker 6: So when I did that in late.
Speaker 5: March, not even a month later, month and a half later,
I've realized that it's the SERT was deactivated along with
other cards, and so I called up collectors and they
said police report was filed with other vintage football cards.
And so I asked them, well, okay, what do I
do with this card? And this was twenty twenty four,
so I'm sure collectors has a different policy now. They
just said, uh, just return the card back to the
person who you bought it from. I asked, well, what
if I can I we give it back to the
owner of the card. We don't have a process in
place for that. And then unless it's in the same
slab with the same SERT. So a week later I
find out these cars are now in SGC slabs.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 5: Also part of the police report had a Bronco in
the Jerski PSA one in their toe, so I found
that card also, and I sent collectors pictures of both
cards that said, we can't do anything with these, even
though both cards had unique identifying marks, increases and centering.
Speaker 6: And then when you go to the PSA.
Speaker 5: Website, they don't keep, they don't archive the photos of
cards that had deactivated SERTs. So with this new solution
John that you're talking about, if they keep the pictures
of the cards on there and their high resolution scans
as much as what you can get for the people
that are reporting the card stolen, I think it's great
because even if it finds its way into a different slab,
there's unique identifying marks, stains, gumstains, creases. At least there's
a chance you can go to the authorities and now
you say, oh, my card is in this different slab.
Speaker 6: Now here's a new SYRP, but it's still my card.
I think it's gonna help the hobby, Yeah.
Speaker 2: No doubt.
Speaker 1: Here's the here's a comment from foul five foul five ball.
Apparently there was something next you in my copy. I
think this is towards me with the story I told
about those five or six stolen cards. He says, stolen
question mark. Do they have proof that it was those
exact cards?
Speaker 2: The proof was yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean they weren't greated, so there was no certain numbers.
But again they weren't gemman cards. So like the pictures
matched the card like with like, if there was a
slightly dinged corners, it was the exact corner.
Speaker 2: And then they had a picture of the gentleman.
Speaker 1: Uh they were looking for, which was the gentleman I
bought the card, So every everything matched up.
Speaker 2: The backstory too.
Speaker 1: To add one more wrinkle, Uh, the gentleman who stole
the cards stole it from someone he knew. It wasn't
like he broke in the store. It was an acquaintance
of him. Of his I'd say, friend, but you don't.
You shouldn't be stealing at all, and let alone friends.
So he took the cards from someone he knew that
person and reported to the police.
Speaker 2: They got a picture.
Speaker 1: Of them, and so every everything cross referenced and matched up.
Had it not, I probably would have been more like, hey, how.
Speaker 2: Do we know? You know these are these? But it
was the exact.
Speaker 1: Six cards, you know, it wasn't three or four. Was
every card I bought. They had, you know, the print
out of and the picture of the person I bought
the cards from. So in the end, like I said,
six months later, I was, I got my money back.
But it was that six months like you paid money
and you have now you don't have the cards either.
Speaker 2: So but you know that's the chance you take.
Speaker 1: And the person who the cards went back to the
original owner and I had to wait the six months
to get what I paid for the cards back. So
had a happy ending in the end. It just took
six months to get there. So there you go.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and you know those things happened. And so the
altered card issues. You know, the website I was thinking
about was Blowout Cards, who they put out a whole
list of altered cards. And you know that helped me
years ago because I had purchased you.
Speaker 4: Know, I'm big with the eighteen eighty eight.
Speaker 3: Good Win Champion cards and I've got the whole set there.
So as I was upgrading my set, I purchased some
cards many years ago from PWCC. Unfortunately, and checking the
Blowout forum, I found out that some of them, a
few of them were cleaned, they were altered, and you know,
unfortunately I didn't get an opportunity to do anything about
it because of PWCC going out of business and all that.
And even though I sent them, you know, the information,
you know, I think it was Betsy over there, you know,
said I needed more proof. I don't know what more proof,
but you know, so when the Tiffany cards came out
with their altered card list, you know, I'm always up
to checking all of my cards from that set, especially
they're so old and they could be cleaned. And as
I looked up, you know, I saw that they had
a Beacher card, which is the first football card ever
to come out, and they had a PSA five. I
was altered, and I have a PSA five. So I
went to check and course it wasn't mine minus clean
minus fine, thank god. But you know, it showed there
that that PSA five used to be a two and
a half and they literally have pictures of it as a.
Speaker 4: Two and a half with the glue stain.
Speaker 3: In the back, and then it was cleaned and now
it's a five and a PSA holder, and it went
from an SGC two and a half to a PSA five.
So you know, those are things that if you're going
to spend money on a card like that, which is
a pretty expensive card, you need to be very, very careful.
And you know, I've been screwed in the past, and
I want to make sure that anybody that you know
is going to buy a card that is rather expensive.
Check blowout Tack, tiffany cards. Check to make sure that
that card, you know again, is not stolen and more importantly,
is not altered.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, it's it's it's a great point.
Speaker 1: And obviously some of these cards go for right, I
mean the story I told you know memory certainly correct.
There was a couple hundred bucks at the time, which
years ago was more than a couple hundred bucks today,
but still wasn't thousands of dollars in the sense where
a lot of transactions are at today. On File five,
Bulls says, Yeah, you're lucky to get your money back
from the cops.
Speaker 2: It's a great point. And even after like four or.
Speaker 1: Five months, I'm like, I'm probably out this money, Like
hadn't heard nothing. Every once in a while, I called
the police office and just try to get an update,
and they're like, we've made the arrest. It's got to
go through the court system. The judges got to issue
you know, his proclamation and then the restitution. So there
was different points. I'm like, I'm probably never going to
see my money back, but six months later I did
get it back.
Speaker 2: But sometimes, like.
Speaker 1: Filefly Ball says, that's not always what happened if they
don't either catch the person. Uh you know, in this case,
you know, they caught him, but that's not always the case. Uh,
And so you know, I was fortunate. I guess uh
that uh that it had a good ending for for
everybody except for the thief.
Speaker 2: Right, the ending wasn't as good for him.
Speaker 1: But the original owner of the cards got his six
cards back. I got my money back, and I'm not
sure what punishment. I'm gonna guess probation, you know, or
something like that. Community service. Maybe he had to go
pick up some trash on the side of the highway.
Speaker 2: I don't know. That wasn't privy. Uh. The only thing
they told me was they caught him.
Speaker 1: He was prosecute, he plea bargained whatever, that looks like
and so, uh, you know, that's that's that story.
Speaker 2: So never a knock on wood. I've never had that.
Speaker 1: Happen again, whether at the store or even as a dealer.
But again, it's nice to have tools, right, I do
buy cards all the time if you just get a
weird feeling, even if you don't get a weird feeling,
if it's a large transaction and you just want to
err on the side of caution and look some of
these cards up just to make sure there's nothing funny
going on with them. And again, you could look them
up on a database and not find nothing, and it
could still I mean, that's the chance you take. It's
not one hundred percent foolproof. But it's nice that there
is a tool there that maybe can prevent you from
losing money or getting taken right. So, all right, guys,
another topic we're gonna get into. And I know Tony,
you gotta you gotta run. You got some things going
on at home. I appreciate you today. Yeah, we can
get Yeah, so we got the you know, enfranchising of
lcs's right, but we're seeing some of the lcs's take,
you know, in Jeff Wilson and card HQ case. I
know he's not everyone's favorite. He's taking investment money and
plans on opening more card HQ's across across the nation.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 1: And we've seen other stores right the road show at
different locations and others. I probably forget someone unintentional, but
we're seeing you know, you know, stores kind of the
same store, just franchise and being a location. The next gentleman,
I'm actually gonna bring my friend Rex goach you'r on?
Speaker 2: Uh?
Speaker 1: And he uh, he has two stores, uh.
Speaker 2: One in Indiana and in Michigan. I wanted, I said,
who better?
Speaker 1: If we're going to talk about this topic, who better
someone that owns more than one store? And I what
he thinks of this corporate corporalization if that's not eaten
up of lcs's is it good?
Speaker 2: Is it bad?
Speaker 1: Does it hurt the little guy so to speak?
Speaker 2: Uh?
Speaker 1: You know what? What is his thoughts? So I'm gonna
bring Rex on now, uh as well? So morning, sir.
Speaker 7: Hey guys, thanks for having me.
Speaker 8: I'm in the shop today, so if I'm needed, I
might have to jump up and yeah, and so pardon
me if that happens.
Speaker 7: But it's usually kind of slow in the morning, so
we'll see what happens.
Speaker 1: Yeah, another one someone met, you know card involved the
Tom Brady deal. We're seeing more of those pop up
in cities, especially close to like sporting stadiums and arenas
and that sort of thing.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: I brought this up with as a topic on pre like,
you know, oversaturation of card shows. Can we get there
where card stores like, I'm an LCS guy as a
former owner one, I just talked about that there's nothing
beats it in person transaction. I think Rex and most
of us are here and in the jet room will agree. Yes,
it's it's convenient to buy cards on eBay or an
auction house or online, but nothing beats it in person
transaction where you either buy or sell that card, get
to the money instantly, or get the card right there,
that's in your hand, you can look at it up close.
So I'm an l c S guy. I think they're
so important and vital to the hobby. But can we
get to you know, a place where maybe we have
too many or the corporate feel of it maybe is
a bit much. I'll start with you, Rex, I mean
you have, like I said, you have two stores.
Speaker 2: You're not so much. Not really, I don't know. I
don't think you'd.
Speaker 1: Called a franchise. You just have two locations. I'll let
you speak to that. But your thoughts on kind of
this current trend when it comes.
Speaker 2: To your thoughts on current trend when it comes.
Speaker 7: Sorry, John, having some audio.
Speaker 2: Yeah I'm hearing myself again. Yeah, I'm hearing myself again.
Speaker 7: So I've lost a volume on the phone.
Speaker 4: So hold on.
Speaker 7: Sorry.
Speaker 1: All right, let's while you're working on that, Rex, we'll
start would Orlando.
Speaker 2: I mean, your thoughts on this, you.
Speaker 8: Know, hello, all right, let me jump out and then
come back in.
Speaker 1: Okay, okay, all right, so Orlando again, Like it's kind
of what are your feelings here?
Speaker 3: Yeah, John, I mean, you know, it just seems like,
you know, all these bigger companies and it's not just
Tom Brady. Now you're going to have Lewis Hamilton coming
in and opening up a bunch of shops also, and
of course Jeff Wilson, and you know, it's just a
shame that fanatics and Tops fanatics basically is looks like
to me, they're kind of trying to.
Speaker 4: Drive out the smaller lcs.
Speaker 3: And you know, they're limiting a lot of the distribution
of the new products and focusing more on giving it
to the bigger guys and the breakers. So it's kind
of disappointing, and I think it's going to hurt a
lot of the smaller guys like Rex, who even though
he's got two locations, you know, that's not considered one
of the type of guys that Fanatics wants. They've become
so picky with who they accept. You know, you have
to have a lot of media social media presence now
you have to share almost.
Speaker 4: All of your records with them.
Speaker 3: You know, they're limiting the distribution of new products to
the smaller guys. So you know, I feel bad for
the small guys like Rex that you know, they may
be driven out because of the the way that Fanatics
is focusing on some of these much bigger and main
brand type Tom Brady's and Lewis Hamilton's and Jeff Wilson's.
Speaker 2: Of the world.
Speaker 4: I think we got Rex back. I'd like to hear
his opinion.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Rex, you, I mean your thoughts on this sort
of I don't want to say.
Speaker 7: Sorry, guys, I can't let me try this one.
Speaker 1: Yeah, all right, let me. Well, here's what I think,
what do you think? I kind of agree with you
earlier though, I think you know it's you here. You know,
obviously Tops is not short printing a lot of their product,
especially on their their lower end. I don't know if
there is a lower end anymore, but they're they're base
my if you will, to use a car term, right,
flagship and and it's everywhere right.
Speaker 4: Uh.
Speaker 1: Someone a buddy of mine who knows that what I do,
he went to the true value hardware store to buy something.
He went a project at his house and he sent
me a picture and it was a whole section. Wasn't
even just it was a whole section of wax like
you'd see it like Walmart or Target. And he's like,
I'm at the hardware store, man, Nick. There we even
got like a section of sports cards. Like that's that's crazy,
and uh, but that's where we're at. So like, but
then you hear people like my local store here is
called Gideon's Gallery, h run by two gentlemen, really nice guys,
and for for a long time they couldn't even get
direct with Tops. And I think, so I worry about that. Right,
You're going to have like ten franchise stores of one
company like tom Brady, maybe ten card HQs, and you
know they're all going to have direct with with fanatics, right,
so they're going to get the product at all those stores.
But you know, guys that are really putting a lot
of elbow grease and hard work and determination and might
have to wait years, and like the story Metrowa Gideons,
they had to wait years. They are they are online
with tops, but even now they're like they can't get everything.
They're only allotted a certain amount and of only certain products,
and not all those products are the big winners, as
we would say in the hobby. So that's my fear, right,
it's for those people who are doing really the trench
work that they're going to sort of be like on
the outside looking in and they're trying to build their
business organically, and you know, you know I have to
use you know, Tom Brady doesn't need the money. And
listen to when we talk about the card wall, tom Brady,
he's paid it, he's charging a license. He's not like
he's always at the store sorting cards. So keep that
as well. So I think we got rex again. Let's
third time the chart.
Speaker 8: Maybe I hope so I kept losing audio. Every time
you would let me join, the audio would go off.
Speaker 7: I can hear you. So I switched devices.
Speaker 2: Okay, all right, so you know me and Arland, I'll
sort of wait in here.
Speaker 1: But you you know I used to own a cards
to a Rex, as you know, I don't now you
have two, like I said, two states kind of close,
you know, in the vicinity of other each other. But
your thoughts on this franchising of lcs's good bad both.
Speaker 2: How does it affect you or not affect you?
Speaker 7: Well, I think it's interesting.
Speaker 8: It's sort of inevitable, you know, from for fanatics to
know their stated goal to uh ten x the hobby
to really push cards out in a lot of different
a lot of different ways. But if you look at
our Cigar Valparaiso location, for example, town of about thirty
five thousand people, and right in our market, in that
market in Valparaiso, we have us. We have a second
card shop that that's a competitor. We have Walmart, Meyer, Target, Barnes,
and Noble game Stop I probably forgetting Ace Hardware, Dick
Sporting Goods, all selling cards to the same thirty five
thousand dollars thirty five thousand people market and whatever visitors
are and.
Speaker 7: We all currently peacefully coexist.
Speaker 8: But there's a big difference between a hobby shop, as
you guys know, and a Target or a Walmart. You know,
other than the other LCS, the experience that you're going
to get buying cards, even at like a Dix or
a ACE hardware for righting out loud, is going to
be much different.
Speaker 7: Than the experience you're going to get in an LCS.
Speaker 8: From from a standpoint from fanatics, I mean, their stated
goal of ten axing.
Speaker 7: The hobby is one thing, but they've also been very clear.
Speaker 8: That they've believe the best way to attract and retain
new collectors is through a well functioning local card shop.
They're very clear they recognize that the experience that you're
going to get in a Target or a big box
is not going to necessarily keep you in the hobby.
Speaker 7: Most of those people don't know anything about cards.
Speaker 8: They don't actively buy and sell singles, which is a
huge part of the business. As you know, it's not
just about selling wax, which is really what those guys
are doing, and LCS does it all. So I think
it's sort of inevitable that you'll get the big players
like you know, Tom Brady and card dates Q to
spread their wings and open more lcs's of a bigger variety.
I think the pain point for them is going to
be staffing, quality, staffing, finding the talent to run these
operations like a local card shop. As you guys know,
it's not the easiest thing to do to people the
number one that are that you can trust, but you
also have to be able to make the financial decisions
on a daily basis of buying, selling, and trading that
will impact your business.
Speaker 7: And if you don't have the right people in.
Speaker 8: Place to do that, it's a big part of the
ecosystem that will that will be lost.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a great point too with the singles Rex right,
that was you know, even back in my dad obviously
singles and wax and this was the junk wax era,
so I had I had.
Speaker 2: Flear calling me every other day.
Speaker 1: You want more cases of ninety two Flear, you know,
the ugly green stuff that's still ugly even thirty four
years later. But is a great point, right that the
and plus besides the singles rex right, and you know
this or Lando knows as people. Right, the conversations you
have well with the owners of the shop or the
employees of the store.
Speaker 2: And then the other customers.
Speaker 1: Right, that camaraderie, that fraternity of the hobby that you
get uh inn n l cs not in you know
necessarily a Target or Walmart or a hardware store that
is selling a wax boxes. Do you you know there
was a comment let me see if I can find it,
let me Yeah, go ahead, yeah.
Speaker 2: Go ahead.
Speaker 3: You know we we hear that fanatics is encouraging a
lot of the smaller lcs to do more social media,
to have breaking side, you know, things like that so
they can continue to get more distribution. Are they, you know,
pushing you to do more of that kind of stuff?
Speaker 4: Rex?
Speaker 8: Not necessarily. What they have is a they have a
seller scorecard. I think it's called a seller scorecard. So
there's a lot of different things that factor into it
that impact your allocations.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 8: The biggest one is how much you spend with them
both on way one, well sometimes there's more than two
waves Way one, Wave two, sometimes Wave three. Also, you know,
are you participating in their other parts of their business
there supplies that they sell. Are you consigning with fanatics
collect are you are you setting up at you know,
their their event, you know every year, uh, fanatics Fest.
And then also are you buying memorabilia through Fanatics? All
those things can impact your scorecard. But beyond that, the
way your store looks, how well organized it is. Do
you participate in ribnites and other special events and promote
actively promote tops products via your social channels, your websites,
over and so on. So it's all, it's all part
of it. They're not dictating, hey, you must do this
x y Z. It's just you know, look, the people
that are doing all those things in a big way
are getting the most allocate and if you choose not
to do one or more, just understand that it's going
to impact your you know, so far, they've treated us
very well. I I, you know, not in every case.
I don't love the dynamic pricing piece, but that's the
ways of the world.
Speaker 7: Now.
Speaker 8: Uh, they have you know, been very clear that you know,
they they they're not opening any any more new accounts
for the foreseeable future. They said they may open it
up the application process to new stores after the national
I'm not sure why that was the timeline, but That's
what they stated a few months ago.
Speaker 7: But yeah, allocations are tight.
Speaker 8: Everybody wants their product, and you know there's no shortage
of companies like ours lining up to try to get it.
Speaker 1: So here's a question, Rex, Like, so you've mentioned how
they've sort of locked or closed, you know, new accounts
and being able to get online for products, right, but
then you have like, let's use card HQ because of
you know, their planning to really go across country with
investment money from investment.
Speaker 2: Firms and seed money.
Speaker 1: Should they be a lot like if he's already and
I'm sure he is, if you're already with Tops and
you open nine stores, do those should those nine new
stores automatically be should you get nine times more?
Speaker 2: Or you know what? How does that work? I guess
I'll ask you.
Speaker 7: Well, I can't speak on behalf of them.
Speaker 8: I will say this, And and Cards the x Q
is probably a different animal because of their size and
Jeff's connection with Tops through all the different ways that
he deals with them. So their agreement whatever they have
is probably very specific to them. But you know, in general,
they they told us clearly in a town hall a
few months ago. Don't assume that you're gonna get allocations
if you open a second shop. They're very keen to
or second, third, or fourth or whatever. They're very keen
to to to give allocations to shops that have proven
themselves as a valuable tops representative. But there's no guarantee.
And then and the reality of it is is that
there just isn't There isn't enough for the product to
go around because they don't want to overprint, you know.
And some people will say they already are in certain sets,
you know, they'll print to the moon. But you know,
allocations is a weird are a weird game. I mean,
I don't want to get too deep into it, but
sometimes we'll get an initial allocation on a product product
that is we know, all know is a massive print run,
you know, and the allocation is very minimal. And I
think sometimes that's because they're anticipating a huge initial surge
of people that want to buy the product when it
hits and they want to offer more on.
Speaker 7: Wave two and three as opposed to waive one pricing.
Speaker 8: I assume that's what they're doing because they're trying to
maximize their profits. But I mean, it's talked about all
the time I mean, everybody at the TOPS conference, everybody's like,
how can we get more allocations? How can we get
more how can we shure you know every time I
only got one case of this, or I didn't get
any of this, and so on. It's a constant conversation.
But I'll just say this. You know, we we moved
a couple of years ago to to really push areas
of our business that are not impacted by any outside entity,
meaning you know, PSA, Tops and any upper deck whatever.
So we deal with all of them in some capacity.
And Tops is, of course now because of all the licenses,
we have a lot of inventory tied up you know,
with them, so they're our main supplier of new inventory clearly,
and it's not a great position for a retailer to
be in, in my opinion, to be that reliant on
one entity. So we've started creating our own products. We've
really pushed into singles, We've expanded our TCG selection to
really kind of diversify so that whatever Tops or any
other company might decide to do, you know, won't impact
us as drastically as if we just sort of sat
and begged effort allocation from Tops. Because that's just not
a great business strategy. You can kind of see where
things are going. The bigger players are gonna get bigger allocations.
I mean, that's that's the way they're gonna have it.
I mean, it's already happening with breakers. They get the
breakers get a ton of nice compared to the shop.
I mean it's not even close to mean, some of
these breakers are doing hundreds of cases where shops are
getting one case or two cases.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's you know, I think like if I'm let's
say I'm in Seattle and I'm trying to get like
direct with Tops and I'm just not getting in right,
and then cards Hu comes in, and I know we're
picking on them, but.
Speaker 2: It's easy, a little fun, too full disclosure.
Speaker 1: Right, They they open a Seattle store and they get
right online with Tops.
Speaker 2: That would rub me obviously the wrong way, right.
Speaker 1: I get that there's some previous, you know, with his
original locations. But on one hand they're saying we're not
taking new any really new accounts at the moment. But
then they're in a sense they are with certain people.
I think, to me, that's a bad look. You don't
have to go in the detailed recks like, you know,
like your gut feeling when you see like this franchise deal,
are you indifferent?
Speaker 2: Do you sort of froud at it? Like what do
you think?
Speaker 8: Like, well, you know, I'll you know, from a selfish perspective,
I'll give you a real life example. So it looks
like the Chicago Bears are probably going to move to
our neighborhood, Northwest Indiana, So they're probably going to move
out of Chicago. So our stores are located, both of
them about an hour and a half outside of Chicago.
The proposed site in Hammond is twenty five thirty minutes
from our Vapparaiso shop, probably forty to forty five minutes
from our new Buffalo shop.
Speaker 7: So cards HQ and card.
Speaker 8: Vault are, in my view, are very likely to you know,
open a shop near that stadium. So that could impact
us in a way. But again you go back to
what I originally stated. We have all those other competitors
literally right in our backyard already. Plus you at tops
dot com, Fanatics dot com, Benini's website, the Big Three,
you know, David Adams, Steel City, Blowout, Midwest Cards in there.
Speaker 7: We compete with all those people now, and we do
very well.
Speaker 8: So we just need to focus on our experience and
our customers experience to make sure that we give them
the best experience when they're in our shops. And that's
what we're that's what we're focused on, as the in
person experience and making it the best we can.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Now it's well said and probably the best approach. You know,
control what you can control, and don't you know, if
you can't control it.
Speaker 2: What are you gonna do? Right? So focus uh inwardly?
Speaker 1: Uh that this bears news not to you know, go
to sports, but it is like, that's crazy.
Speaker 2: If you would have told me, you know, the Bears
wouldn't be.
Speaker 1: In Chicago like an iconic franchise, I would have thought you,
you're crazy. Are they I haven't read a lot of
it because this kind of stories in the last couple
of days. Are they not obviously they're going to be
the Bears. Are they still going to use the name Chicago.
Speaker 7: Or they would change in it? No?
Speaker 8: I mean, so the thing you have to and I
guess if you're not in the geography, you probably don't
understand it.
Speaker 7: So I wouldn't expect everybody to.
Speaker 8: But Northwest Indiana is on the same time zone as Chicago.
It's the only part of Indiana that's on the Central
time zone. And the reason why is because it really,
for all intentsive purposes, is a suburb of Chicago. So
you've got I don't know, the best thing I should
probably compare it to is the Jets and the Giants
or the New York but they play in New Jersey.
Speaker 2: So yeah, Mookie, just yeah, it's.
Speaker 7: The same sort of thing.
Speaker 8: I mean that New York is a much bigger town
in the Chicago or city in the Chicago, but Chicago's
I assume, still number three in the country in terms
of population, so it's very similar to that. I assume
that be the Chicago Bears and the same logo, and
as always I can't see in the related change.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you're you know, the train goes right to there anyway,
you know, it's not that far away. And you know,
going back to the lcs, the local lcs, you know,
there's nothing better than for me, you know, I'll go
to my local LCS and they know me my name,
the owner knows me, they know the collectors that go
in there, versus going to a Tom Brady shop or
a car's HQ where they have no idea who you are.
You're just another person coming in the store. So I
do think that that personalized service that the LCS gives
is for me as a collector, is extremely important to
go in there and they say, hey, Orlando, how you doing,
Thanks for coming back in. They know what I collect,
they know what I like. You know, that personalized thing
I think is the key to stores like what Rex.
Speaker 7: Yeah, it's a good point, Orlando.
Speaker 8: So and I assume those bigger operations have some sort
of loyalty program or something, but the reality of it
is in a small LCS, a reputable lcs like like
there are so many like us around the country and
that that do this, they treat those regular customers better.
Speaker 7: They just do, and they do it because they reward
the loyalty. And that's what we do.
Speaker 8: So, you know, if you come to our shop and
you're buying stuff at Walmart, Target and ripping it and
you want to come and sell it to us, great,
we'll take a look. But if you're not buying from us,
you're not going to get as good of a deal
as one.
Speaker 7: Of our regular customers.
Speaker 8: If if you're selling or trading, you're also not going
to get first access to you know, hot product or
loyalty discounts or whatever else. We that's one of the
things is a small business owner that we can do.
That's an advantage over any of the big bosses. They
just can't, no doubt.
Speaker 1: All right, guys, like Brody said, we're going a little
over time. It is one of the topics I advertise.
So let's go through a kind of quickly and I'll
Wrex you can add in here too. And I know
you have prior like other than for obvious reasons, right,
God forbid a death or an illness, you know what
wouldn't cause you to consider.
Speaker 2: Not going to the National Uh?
Speaker 1: And I'll start with Orlando, Like you know, I know
you go to pretty much all of them, where at
least try like what would there ever be a scenario
Orlando where you're like, you know what, I'm going to Strongsville,
I'm not going to the Nationalist year.
Speaker 2: I'll catch it next year or not necessarily.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean the money situation, of course, in expensive
to go to the National It just seems to get
more expensive every year, you know, the hotel and the
plane flight and all that. Because I can't drive to
you know, some of you guys can, So for me,
I think that's it.
Speaker 4: But you know, I go every year, you know, and
I'm retired.
Speaker 3: That's kind of my my trip to Disney World type thing,
you know, and I really go more for the friendship
see people that I see you once a year. So
for me, I won't miss it, continue to attend the
National every year. But I think the biggest issue is
what's going on now with everything with with.
Speaker 4: With the National.
Speaker 3: The hotels are more expensive, they're being locked up by
the National, They're controlling all.
Speaker 4: Of these things like that. I think it's one of
the things that's kind of hurting.
Speaker 3: It's a little bit, but overall, I'll continue to go
no matter what.
Speaker 4: That's just who I.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So for me, I've done this in the last couple
of years, last year and this year where I'm like, hey,
can I like maybe you know, for Chicago, I got
a fly so I can't drive, so that adds airfare
and that sort of thing.
Speaker 2: I have to run a car, so I'm renting a car.
Speaker 1: So each of the every time it's in Chicago, I
don't want to say every time, well, whenever it's in Chicago.
I really have to weigh out, like do I want
to buck up and pay or can I can I
sit this one out and catch the next, you know,
the next one and listen, I'm no spring chicken, right.
So then the other you know, you got the two
voices on each shoulder, right, the other one's like, how.
Speaker 2: Many nationals do you think you have?
Speaker 4: Left?
Speaker 2: Newman? You know what I mean? Don't miss one?
Speaker 1: And so you played tug of war in your own mind.
So last year I made some late scram like my
wife asked me, have you done any of your She
calls it the big show.
Speaker 2: She doesn't know.
Speaker 1: She goes, have you booked your big show? Like I
tinerary your hotel and I hadn't.
Speaker 2: Yet, and she's like, well, you're gonna do it. And
I'm like, what do you have a boyfriend? You're trying
to get rid of me?
Speaker 1: And she goes, no, but if you don't go, you
know you're gonna be home and like miserable.
Speaker 2: And so I said, well let me try.
Speaker 1: Tonight, you know, And I use like Expedia or traveloci
or orbits to sort of get a package deal with
a room, a car in a flight, and I got
a great deal. I was surprised that late in the
game last year. This year again I had to same debate,
but I didn't need that conversation with my wife. I
kind of logged on and found a good package deal.
But it's in Chicago again next year, so I'm sure
in my own mind I will debate, you.
Speaker 2: Know, like, hey, three years in a row, could.
Speaker 1: I could I take next year Chicago went off and
then just go to Detroit in twenty twenty eight, you know,
God willing. But so so that's that's my that's my thing.
You know, it's just and I see a lot of
comments with you know, with with finances, right, the more
money the trip costs, most likely the less money you're
gonna have to buy cards.
Speaker 2: And I know it's not all about just buying cards.
Speaker 1: It's seeing all of our hobby friends and the events
during the show, after the show, dinners and and all
that's got to be taken into account. But you know, finance,
finances are finances, right, It's an important part of whether
we can make something happen or not.
Speaker 2: So that's that's sort of my take.
Speaker 1: Whether I would miss one, I haven't missed one since
twenty eighteen at this point. But if I did that,
like my wife says, I'm sure I'd be probably like,
you know, disappointed I'm not there yet. You know that
it is so for you, Rex, I know, you know
running the two stores that that changes the equation to
getting there, And like you're saying, having staff in place
that maybe could handle things, you know what if you're
not there.
Speaker 7: So yeah, that's part of it. The other part too.
Speaker 8: I mean, Chicago's office is easy for us because it's close.
But personally I don't love air travel because I in
another lifetime I was on a plane every single day,
it seemed like, for about four years. So if I
don't have to air travel, I try not to. So
location means a lot. I missed the two years ago
in Cleveland, even though I wouldn't have had to fly
to that could have driven, but I had a knee injury,
so I had a tornamentiscus, so I couldn't make that one.
I went to Atlantic City, even though I wasn't really
thrilled about doing it, but I did go to Atlantic City,
So I guess Detroit is drivable for us, you know,
from Michigan. It's actually a lot farther away from Chicago,
so we'll probably go to that one because we don't
have to fly to it, and then we'll see what
happens from there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, I know people bag on on Atlantic City,
and I get why I'm not defending for me and
a selfish bias point of view. I love it because
it was it was not a not a bad drive
for me. The other nice thing is my wife's a
beach girl, so she went on that trip and just
stayed at the beach every day and so that trip,
that trip came out of our joint account, so that
actually save me, save me some money as well. So selfishly,
I like it when it's drivable and it and it's
a city that has a beach because I can rook
my wife. I don't want to say rook, but my
wife will go and instead of coming out of just
my account, it comes out of our joint account.
Speaker 2: Detroit is similar.
Speaker 1: I think Detroit's a six hour drive from where I
am here in Syracuse, uh, and I will drive to that.
They're eliminates airfare, They're eliminates a rent a car obviously
if I'm driving my vehicle. So I love when it's
in drivable range because it checks two things. The only
thing I gotta do is find a room because I'll
have a vehicle and I won't need a flight. So
I definitely got again God willing. I won't miss anything
that's drivable, but it's when it's that airfare and where
it is and the finance and obviously God forbid like
any little worse.
Speaker 2: Uh So, you.
Speaker 3: Know, that's the tough part for me, is that I
can't drive anywhere because I'm in South Florida. I'm far
from everything. I mean, I was hoping maybe they would
go to Atlanta. I'd probably drive there, but unless it's
an event in Florida, maybe in Orlando, Disney World is
be great. But other than that, you know, I have
to fly everywhere, and that makes it real difficult.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 3: Like Rex said, you know, I hate flying myself, but
it's once a year, so I kind of forced myself
to go anyway.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I used to be a nervous flyer.
Speaker 2: The first time I flew.
Speaker 1: Here's a crazy story, real quick, And the first time
I flew was on my honeymoon. We went to Disney World,
and I was like a nervous wreck and my wife's
a nurse and she's like, take this, and I'm like,
what is it, Like, you're trying to kill me for
the insurance money already we just got married. And she's like, no,
it's his annex. It'll it'll take the edge off. It's
the only time I used it on the flight. I've
flown many times, I don't want to say many times,
well quite a bit since my honeymoon, and I don't
I don't have to use anything, but I definitely can't sleep.
I have trouble sleeping in anything moving in general, whether
it's a car, a train, a bus, a plane. It's
just because I'm not in control and it that I'm
that nervous energy right, So rarely will I sleep. Probably
the only time I'll fall asleep is in the car
when someone else is driving, and it depends who that
the driver is out my level of comfortable.
Speaker 2: So so yeah, But if.
Speaker 1: It's if the national driveable, I'm for sure in or
going to try to make it happen. If it's a
flight location, that's where I debate in my mind. And
someone said, my shoulders talk to each other, so uh
but uh uh, you know, I'm looking forward to the
Detroit one, because I've never I like going places that
I've never been before. Right in, Detroit's the city. I've
been to Chicago quite a bit now and Detroit never.
Speaker 2: So kind of you know.
Speaker 1: And I always try whatever city Orlando it's in, I
try to catch something, you know, Chicago, I try to
go to either a White Sox or Cubs game. Detroit,
I'm going to see if the Tigers are in town
that week and check out that stadium I've never been to.
And the Tigers, you know, in a perfect world, they'd
be playing the Mets, and so I'd watch my Mets
uh in Detroit. So but all right, guys, we went.
We went into some overtime. Rex, thank you for popping
out and give it sharing some of your insight as
an LCS owner times two and your thoughts.
Speaker 7: You're welcome.
Speaker 2: Orlando. Yeah, Orlando, thank you for pinch hitting.
Speaker 1: Unfortunately, you know again, we'll kind of close, you know,
keep uh, keep the families of Victor and Samuel Evans
and Victor Roman in your thoughts any deal during this
with the loss of a loved one during this little time.
Speaker 2: We'll be back next week. As always.
Speaker 1: Also, I say it all the time because I mean
it and it's true, and I'm sincere. Thank you to
everybody in the chat room who joined us live. Uh,
you know, I love it. It's a great banter. You know,
you probably see me put up a comment. I'm laughing
as I put it up, some funny stuff and uh
if even if you're not live and you're just one
of those people who download the show after the fact, right,
you're still giving of your time, uh and affection to
the show, and we appreciate that. So with that being said,
thanks Orlando, thanks for Rex, Thanks everyone at chat and listening,
and we'll see you in seven days. Thank you for
listening to this episode of Hobby Hotline. Just want to
remind everyone we are a live show every Saturday morning,
eleven am Eastern eight am Pacific on the four Collectors
channel on YouTube. That's the number four, the word Collector's
channel on YouTube. We hope to see many of you
live on a future Saturday. We have a great interactive
chat room and we always provide a link for anyone
that wants to come on the show and chop it
up with us. So that's a reminder. Every Saturday, eleven
am Eastern eight am Pacific, only four collectors channel on YouTube.
Hope to see you on the show.