The Football Card Blog

When I was a child collecting sports cards (mostly baseball, back in those days), I always dreamed of opening my own card shop. The closest true shop to my house was a comic/card shop about 20 miles away in a much bigger city, which always seemed like the ultimate place to work (I was into comics for a while in that time period too).  There was a video rental store in my home town that sold cards, too--the owner was a collector, and that's where I got most of my collection.

Of course, this was in the days before hobby vs. retail, jersey patch cards, autograph inserts and serial numbered cards. In fact, when he started getting in the 1990 Upper Deck, and packs went up to $1 apiece, is when I started to lose interest in collecting (the first time).  I probably hung on a bit for a year or so after that, but it was never quite the same.

Fast forward about 20 years, and while I still think owning a card shop would be cool, I don't have the same passion for the industry I once did.  In fact, I don't believe I've bought a pack in at least two years, which goes a long way to explaining why I hardly ever post anything here anymore. I still stop into my local card shop somewhat frequently, but mostly because I've become friends with the owner, and I've done some business with him (selling cards and building websites).

While the concept of running a card shop still appeals to me, I also seriously doubt that the hobby could support many more stores in our market--there are at least four physical stores in the Twin Cities (although one focuses on vintage stuff), fairly spread out--even if I were to want to look at opening one, the best markets would be considerably out of the way for me.

However, being a bit of a web geek, the idea of starting an online shop has also always been in the back of my mind.  The main reasons for not doing so are that, while I am a web geek, I'm not really a technical web geek, so coding a shop (even starting with an open source platform) would have been a time consuming challenge, and the payment gateways that allow you to take credit cards typically charge fees that would discourage somebody from dabbling in running a store.

However, a couple months back, I came across an article in a magazine about a service called Goodsie, which was an online ecommerce platform designed to make it easy for not-so-technically savvy people to put up a ecommerce store. I filed it away, but then came across another article a few weeks ago talking about it, and took it to be a sign that I should at least check it out.

So I started playing around with it, and found it fairly interesting--setup was a breeze, design wasn't too hard (not that I've pushed the envelope there), and product entry was relatively painless.  It's not perfect, but I've had a positive enough experience that I thought I would open it up to the public and see what happens.

So, if you have a few minutes, please check out www.TheSportsCardMarket.com and let me know what you think.

A couple of things--there's only about 20-30 cards on there right now (all football right now), and I never expect to be a super high volume seller--more just selling off some of the stuff from my collection that I think people might be most interested in, at prices that I think are reasonable. If you'd like to find out if I have more cards of a player, or haggle on a price, in most cases I'll be open to it--think of it as an eBay store that is more open to communicating and with fewer fees for me as a seller.

So let me know what you think!

Stopped by the local card shop yesterday, as per usual with no real intent of picking anything up (I was actually dropping something off this time). And, as often happens, I walked out with a box of cards, as it was the first time I'd been in since 2008 Topps Progressions came out.

A few things conspired against me--first, my wife is out of town, and for some reason, I tend to buy cards when she's gone (I wonder if she actually reads the blog?  Guess I'll find out).  Second, the boxes were cheaper than I expected, priced at under $100.  Third, there was a guy there opening some, and he was loving it--the Adrian Peterson jersey he pulled certainly helped, but he really was enjoying the cards.

So, despite the reservations I've had about this new Topps product, I grabbed a box and thought, "Maybe Gellman got it wrong."  Hoped, might be a better way to describe it.

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Sorry for the lack of posts lately--I haven't forgotten or given up, I just picked a really crappy time to start a blog devoted to football cards, heading into the offseason.  And even with the new product coming out, it's kind of a lull right now, as mandatory mini camps just don't do much for me. 

I will get back on the Card of the Week bandwagon here pretty soon--been working on another couple of themes ideas to run with, and trying to pull together enough interesting cards to last hopefully until training camp.

Like I said, though, there are some new products hitting the shelves, like 2008 Playoff Prestige.  Unfortunately, I'm on a bit of a budget right now, since I went a little nuts on eBay a couple months back, and I'm getting ready for a little side trip to Vegas (I really hate it when the wife's company sends her there).  More on that in a bit.

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I was trading emails with fellow Minnesota Football Card Collector and new TheFootballCardBlog.com reader Daryl last night and this morning, and he dropped a bit of a big one on us when he said:

"I did go to [unnamed local card shop] a couple weeks ago it was the only card store I was able to find and I bought a pack of 2008 Sage Hit and pulled a Matt Ryan Gold Autograph out of it."

Somehow, 2008 Sage Hit hit the shelves in the last couple weeks, and I didn't even know it.  Granted, Sage Hit has never been something I've bought, other than a few packs mixed in with the re-packed retail sucker boxes I've bought--but you know what this news meant--I happened to find myself in the neighborhood of said unnamed card shop this afternoon, and grabbed a box.

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Just in time for the Super Bowl, Donruss is releasing the second installment of its Playoff National Treasures line.  In addition to the standard short print rookies, autographs, and jersey cut cards, the set will once again also feature cut signatures from hall of famers and historical figures, including presidents (like the Benjamin Harrison shown).

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Topps will be releasing what will apparently be the final set for the 2007 season in the second week of February, after the Super Bowl and even Pro Bowl have taken place.

The new high end set, dubbed "Topps Performance Football," will feature 1 pack per box, and the set will include 100 base cards with gold, silver and bronze parallels.  Each pack will contain two autographs and one autographed relic card, and 1 in 2 boxes will include an additional relic card serial numbered to 60 or less. A full breakdown of the set is posted on the Topps Web site.

Each case will also feature an Autographed Adrian Peterson card, numbered to 249 or less.

As for pricing, we've heard that the SRP will be $150 per box, but an early check on eBay shows some boxes selling for as little as $100+ shipping.

Our take: Not sure I'm willing to spend $100 for a single pack of 16 cards--but maybe our minds will change when the release date actually comes closer.