-
Subscribe
-
Categories
- Announcers
- Authentication
- Autographs
- Beckett
- Bowman
- Box Breaks
- Business
- Card Shows
- Cardcollectingrambler
- Cards
- Cool Sites
- Customs
- Donruss
- eBay
- Grading
- Interviews
- Market Conditions
- McFarlane
- MLB
- NAXCOM
- NBA
- NFL
- NHL
- PR
- Price Guide
- PSA
- SCD
- Site News
- Sportkings
- SportsBuy
- Starting Lineups
- Topps
- Tuff Stuff
- Uncategorized
- Upper Deck
- Videos
-
Recent Posts
- Quick Revamp Update, Thoughts on Beckett’s New Site
- NAXCOM Changes Name to…
- New SportsLizard Logo
- Good Performance + Sub Par Record = Falling Values
- Now That I Think About It…
- Blogs - How I Think the Card Industry Will Be Saved
- MLB Briefs
- Would We Be Better Without Beckett and Tuff Stuff?
- New Customs Submission Form
- PSA Launches Marketplace on Collectors Corner
-
Misc
-
Monthly Archives
- Older Stories
- Older Newsletters
- Older Press
Blogs - How I Think the Card Industry Will Be Saved
By Adam McFarland | Posted at 7:21 am | Filed Under Cool Sites, Cards, Beckett, Tuff Stuff, Authentication
Way back in 2004 when I started SportsLizard I couldn’t find too many other sites where collectors spoke their minds. In the past four years my role in the industry has changed. I went from collector, to collector who owned a collectibles business and wrote about it, to business owner who rarely collects and spends more time on his core business but still finds the industry fascinating. You know, the way you find a troubled ex-girlfriend fascinating - you used to really care, you gave up truly caring a while ago, but nonetheless you still have some vested interest in what’s happening…even if it’s just to see her crash and burn in style.
There was a time where I would do anything I could to get under the skin of anyone big in the hobby. Case in point, this article ripping James Spence, which prompted a nasty letter from him that made him come across as having the maturity of a three year old (and to be honest, most three year olds have a more controlled temper). SportsLizard was also featured in Jeff Clow’s column that same months issue of Tuff Stuff, but I didn’t care.
Now a days I know that this blog has a solid readership and I am content to voice my opinions here and let them go where they may. If I write a good post, it generally gets commented up and passed around in the hobby. If not, it doesn’t. I don’t go to any effort to email Beckett and Tuff Stuff to notify them how I just tore them a new one like I used to. It’s not that it isn’t fun, I just prefer to spend my time on other things. In short, I gave up on trying to organize a mass change in the hobby.
HOWEVER, there are a lot of other active collectors who feel the same way I do on a lot of topics, sometimes even stronger. They will be the ones to change the hobby. As I’ve been saying since 2004, the web neutrilizes everything. My article questioning autograph authentication ranks at the top of Google searches when someone types in “autograph authentication”. You think that pisses of PSA at all? I wonder how much money my one article cost them…
That’s just one example. But I’ve noticed a really, really promising trend lately: collectors who are fed up and have decided to blog. Unlike just posting on a moderated forum, blogs allow anyone to say what they truly think without repercussions. Not always a good thing, but in this case it is. If you get enough quality content floating around the web it will have a huge influence on collectors. More of them will start reading their news from “unbiased” sources like Sports Collectors Daily. Even more of them will look for “real” opinions from blogs like Sports Cards Uncensored, The Football Card Blog, and Awesomely Bad Wax Packs.
Eventually - be it next week or five years from now - these opinions will overwhelm whatever Beckett, Tuff Stuff, and the card companies can put out. The consumers will take over in this industry like they have in just about every other one. When that happens, card companies will have some difficult questions to ask themselves. As long as sports thrive there will always be a card collecting hobby. Now, if they keep screwing their consumers it will become a smaller and smaller niche. In business, when your industry is exploding, it’s really really hard to not grow. Somehow the card industry defies all reasoning and continues to dig it’s own grave.
Comments
11 Responses to “Blogs - How I Think the Card Industry Will Be Saved”
Leave a Reply
Thank god, there are some other people who get it! Companies bigger than Beckett (and Topps and Upper Deck, for that matter) have been brought down (at least a couple of pegs) by average joes on the Web. If they don’t start paying serious attention to us, in a few years, they may be gone–or at least they won’t be so lonely at the top.
Great post!
[…] McFarland at SportsLizard.com posted a blog today about ‘How [He] Thinks the Card Industry Will Be Saved‘ - and I just wanted to post a link to it, just in case there is anyone who happens to read […]
Thanks Tony - keep up the great work on your blog.
Great blog entry. You are so right. The web is the equalizer - we no longer have to hear and read a handful of opinions. The web 2.0 allows us to share ideas, collection ideas, and hear other voices 24/7. This will only help the community grow, be more informed, and make the hobby better.
Thanks again for the great blog and entry.
Another home run with this one. You are quickly becoming one of my favorite bloggers to read. Thanks for the link and keep up the good work!
I’m glad to know there are others out there like me that are fed up with the industry. I find myself wanting more and more to start my own card company. I wish I had the capital to go after a MLBPA contract and start to produce cards like they did in the 80s/early 90s. Be up front with the public, where game used will be of rookies and some stars, autos will be of mainly rookies. No refractors, no parallels, no one of ones. Forget the $3 for 5 cards, go back to $1 a pack. Sure the “investors” won’t come running, but it would be fun to collect again. Anyways, thanks for the shoutout, and keep up the excellent posting!
Thanks Mike - totally agree. Wish I could go back and “do it right”. Unfortunately now a days it’s damn near impossible to compete since everyone that publicizes Upper Deck and Topps (i.e. Beckett) is in bed with them.
They tried going back to a $1 a pack with Topps Total and no one was interested. You can buy a pack of Topps at Walmart for $1.99 with 12 cards, which adjusted for inflation is not much higher than 20 years ago. And considering the quality of cards today is 10 times better…..
The price of cards isn’t the problem, the problem is adults have totally taken over or hijacked the card hobby. Adult pack-searchers have really given a black eye. Even Toppstown, which was designed only for kids, the adult bloggers have signed up for it. Yea, it’s that bad.
Kids still collect cards and pay good prices for them, just not baseball cards but Pokemon and other like cards.
Also the problem is that the adults (even in this thread) are nothing but rookie chasers for everything including autographs. 20 years ago, an adult male going around for an autograph would have been laughed at, today they are the only ones doing it.
Card companies also know they can’t turn a profit just on a base set so they have to come out with 20 different sets each year.
Also the big difference now is that anyone can look up stats and photos of a player… it used to be that a baseball card was about the only way to checking out a player stats.
It’s a dying hobby, be happy with what we got.
[…] Blogs - How I Think the Card Industry Will Be Saved […]
Hey, I just found your site yesterday, thought it was great, and signed up. I am a moderate collector that really only recently started researching pricing online, but it took about 70 online searches for baseball card collecting related sites to come across this one. I’ve found that e-bay has terrorized the card collecting hobby. There are way to many items for sale at anyone instant for buyers to bid on them all. In turn valuable cards are won at low prices, which ends up dictating a standard. Whos going to pay a price guide’s price of $13 for a card when it could be won on e-bay for $2. I think that you should encourage the site members that list on ebay to insert links to your site in their listings. This will advertise your site, and draw in more people who agree with your ideas while also making people more informed about the legitimate price standards for cards. Hopefully this would increase the seller’s chances of recieving “book” value on their items and keep them from settling for $.99 sales on their valuable cards.
Thanks Nico - having some sort of link or badge for collectors to display in their eBay auctions is a great idea! Definitely something I/we will do.