quote:

Originally posted by Raven:
Black Friday sale on Leaf website has Decadence boxes at $799.99,

Do you know i'm fairly confident i could buy gold cheaper than trading cards these days.

quote:

Originally posted by wolfie:
Do you know i'm fairly confident i could buy gold cheaper than trading cards these days.

A gold collector, what a radical idea.

Seriously I think the situation with Leaf bears watching, as it kind of reminds me of a similar exit done by Inkworks a dozen or so years ago. Nobody seems to really know what happened right now, except that Leaf has announced new ownership by some new entity.

The fact that Decadence boxes are still available on Leaf's website as of yesterday, means that they did not sell out to the big or little guys. Gray has high tailed it out of there, although someone on Blowout says he opened another company under his name. That could just be gossip, I don't know.

The thing nobody is talking about is what's in the vault? How much inventory may be involved in the sale? How much merchandise, especially autograph cards, are they holding? But also what does the sticker inventory look like, and who has it, if it exists?

These stickers are the autographs, and they can go anywhere, although there may be a question of who is guaranteeing authenticity if someone other than Leaf's successor starts attaching them somewhere.

Finally, there is the impact on Leaf's customers. Both those dealers and bulk buyers who are part of the distribution process and regular card collectors of recent product have to see if the market for Leaf products is affected.

There is a lot to unpack here and not a lot of information at the moment because everything happened so fast, and right after the highest retail priced, autograph based non-sport product dropped too.

Surprised no one has commented on Leaf's Pop Century weekly Continuum packs that is a 2024 product with direct ties to their 2023 Metal. Basically, you have 5 signers released each week and for $99.99 a pack, you will pull one of them. There are supposed to be equal numbers of each card, so the same odds. Now generally speaking, 2 signers are big and bargains, 1 is so-so, and 2 aren't worth that much. So that is the risk you take.

What this all proves is that Leaf still has plenty of stickers and hype left in it, whoever is in charge. I would be looking for a couple of these cards, so happy they are out there, but the overall groups have too many people I don't need for $99.99 to try the blind packs.

BTW this is the last week to buy a pack direct from Leaf.

I have a correction to make since I foolishly talked before I looked at the Leaf website. I am not shilling for the product, but I wrongly ASSUMED that these were one week offerings and done.

It seems that the card packs from all six weekly groupings are still available on the website and have not sold out. I don't know if this is a continuing promotion after the week of 3/18/24 or not, but that's what they are up to now.

Hope that helps anyone interested.

I get their emails, I think I have ordered twice in the past two years. I thought the Cillian Murphy Oppenheimer cards were interesting until I saw the price.

quote:

Originally posted by mykdude:
I get their emails, I think I have ordered twice in the past two years. I thought the Cillian Murphy Oppenheimer cards were interesting until I saw the price.

I don't know how much it was offered to you, but some sellers on eBay have it with an inscription for North of $1,100 now. It's a nice card to have, but it's on a sticker. His "Batman Begins" card has an on-card autograph that is more complete, is also rare and is still cheaper. Who would have thought it would become his secondary card?

It was 700 and I believe stated only 40 were made. Will be curious to see what one sells for...if flipping was my game I might have jumped on it.

Yeah, motivation is the thing. Card flippers are the day-traders of the hobby world. Day-traders buy into a stock at what they think is a low price, hang around just long enough to make a few cents a share and then sell it, often to another day-trader. Real investors choose their stocks and funds carefully and keep them over long periods for the dividends and splits.

Card collectors keep what they buy. So they may make money if the card goes up, but it's still only on paper. To really profit, you must sell. So, you'd still be out the $700.

That card does say limited to 40, but he signed stickers. Judging by their habit of cycling repeat signers, it may not be Murphy's last signed Leaf card.

For a few years I have toyed with the idea of getting a case of Pop Century but there was never enough in the release to justify it. This year when my want list went past 25 I decided to put the cost of a case on the side and see how well I could do in the aftermarket.

This was my result at $2900

Note: I did allow for me to shop both Decadence and Pop Century titles. I did not go cheapest and picked up only cards I liked. Had I gone completely frugal and waited out auction after auction I probably could have shaved a few hundred dollars in the end.

31 signatures / when you eliminate cards I'm not interested in, a case will produce about 36 cards.

Clint Eastwood Decadence
Joe Pesci Decadence
Jean-Claude Van Damme 1/1
Marisa Tomei Decadence
Salma Hayek
Jessica Alba
Frankie Muniz
Heather Thomas
Ray Liotta Decadence
Dave Foley
James Lafferty
Pete Davidson Full Signature Decadence
Lorraine Bracco
Megan Cavanagh
Jon Cryer Full Signature
Cara Delevingne
Cailey Fleming
Tiffany Haddish
Michael Imperioli
Kate Jackson
Paul Johansson
Harvey Kietel
Simu Liu
Ed Marinaro
Lupita Nyong’o Full Signature Decadence
John Pankow
Ryan Phillippe
Linda Ronstadt
Brittany Snow
Suzanne Somers Cut
Paige Turco Full Signature

How many cases do you think one would have to bust just to get the first six cards?

That's awesome -- tons of great cards there.

It really puts it into perspective when you look at it like that.

quote:

Originally posted by mykdude:
How many cases do you think one would have to bust just to get the first six cards?

This is the only way a smart autograph card collector can approach the hobby now and congratulations on your acquisitions.

Now here are the two stumbling blocks and the reasons why this way of forcing card collectors to buy has seriously hurt the hobby in my opinion.

You had to put aside $2900 to do this. You didn't buy the case, but you needed the available pile of cash. In the past we didn't have to shell out so much, all at once. We could buy a couple of boxes a month. We could buy boxes from multiple titles. The total may have wound up the same, but it was over a period of time, which made it less impacting. These days the cost of a group of cards, even when bought as individuals, is beyond the price of major appliances and that has to stop many a collector.

The second thing is, someone busted those boxes and cases giving you the opportunity to cherry pick your autographs cards. There was a first breaker, whether or not they sold directly to you, or to someone else who sold to you second or third hand. On the secondary market, a card can be flipped many times, but only one seller took the risk of opening the box. Did that first breaker make money or lose money?

If they made money most of the time the secondary market will be strong. But once the first breaker is more likely to lose money, the secondary market will have fewer new cards and more sealed product that no one will want to risk opening. New product will have fewer first line buyers too.

We have been logically heading this way for the last few years. The whole base of the hobby is the card collector and they have taken the smart collector out of box/case buying. What happens now card makers?

mykdude - are you saying that a case also would have been about $2900?

quote:

Originally posted by Bill Mullins:
mykdude - are you saying that a case also would have been about $2900?

First release was around 3k...it has settled closer to 2k since. It was $2400 for dealers. Going for the Eastwood was certainly going to offset the balance.

Watching multiple case breaks on line compared to my want list and none of them were close.

quote:

Originally posted by Raven:
This is the only way a smart autograph card collector can approach the hobby now and congratulations on your acquisitions.

This has pretty much been my model of collecting for years. I don't mind jumping on new product that isn't being run into the ground. The fact that collectors keep gravitating to redundant titles is something that defies my instincts as a collector, I left sports collecting because of it. Everyone wants something rare while collecting the same thing over and over and over again.

quote:

Originally posted by Raven:
You had to put aside $2900 to do this. You didn't buy the case, but you needed the available pile of cash. In the past we didn't have to shell out so much, all at once.

I get what you are saying but my method has allowed for me to purchase over a seven month period. Had I been frugal I could have made it last a year or two. Being forced to buy the case is what would have put me in a "pile of cash" situation. I didn't literally put $3k aside but gave myself that limit to see what I could do with it.

quote:

Originally posted by Raven:
The second thing is, someone busted those boxes and cases giving you the opportunity to cherry pick your autographs cards. There was a first breaker, whether or not they sold directly to you, or to someone else who sold to you second or third hand. On the secondary market, a card can be flipped many times, but only one seller took the risk of opening the box. Did that first breaker make money or lose money? If they made money most of the time the secondary market will be strong. But once the first breaker is more likely to lose money, the secondary market will have fewer new cards and more sealed product that no one will want to risk opening. New product will have fewer first line buyers too.

The question is who is busting cases these days? Would seem that many dealers are the first breakers and willing to turn their at cost price into the hype of a case break. Selling lottery tickets for what may or may not be in the box is a scenario that requires more losers than winners but the house always wins. Not to mention the legit customers of the dealers that want to risk a case at full cost. Pop Century is the perfect gamble product because there is nothing else to collect except for the hit card.

quote:

Originally posted by Raven:
We have been logically heading this way for the last few years. The whole base of the hobby is the card collector and they have taken the smart collector out of box/case buying. What happens now card makers?

Up until now card makers are dictating terms to the collectors and the faithful are buying it. They turn a base card into a colorful variant, chisel 1/1 on it and everyone wets their pants. They fill a product with autographs that allow for maybe 10% to win and another 10% to break even. Maybe the product design isn't for collectors at all and I am collecting the only way a collector can.

Maybe we should stop looking at it logically. The lottery is not logical and yet..........

quote:

Originally posted by mykdude:
Pop Century is the perfect gamble product because there is nothing else to collect except for the hit card.

quote:

Originally posted by Raven:
We have been logically heading this way for the last few years. The whole base of the hobby is the card collector and they have taken the smart collector out of box/case buying. What happens now card makers?

Up until now card makers are dictating terms to the collectors and the faithful are buying it. They turn a base card into a colorful variant, chisel 1/1 on it and everyone wets their pants. They fill a product with autographs that allow for maybe 10% to win and another 10% to break even. Maybe the product design isn't for collectors at all and I am collecting the only way a collector can.

Maybe we should stop looking at it logically. The lottery is not logical and yet..........

I do try to accept this hobby with all its nonsense, but since I do collect to hold rather than to sell, I have to be somewhat logical. No one ever called lottery tickets collectibles. No one stores losing lottery tickets and used scratch-offs in 5000 count boxes. Gambling is gambling. Card collecting and/or autograph card collecting is a hobby. I agree that they are both pastimes and to some extent obsessions.

I still believe that cards or autographs do ultimately wind up in the hands of someone who wants to keep them. I have never pulled a valuable card from a box and immediately, or even slowly, went out and sold it. Why hope for good luck, only to hand it over to someone else when it finally arrives? And if you are only looking to make money, there are better ways of getting it than busting Pop Century cases.

The odds that you state of "10% to win and another 10% to break even", if fairly accurate, is terrible. Who continues on for long when 80% lose and most of those are not pure gamblers? Logically card collectors and autograph card collectors will turn to cherry picking at the cheapest prices they can find or find another interest that is more fun. After all, we are literally trading in a house of cards and once you erode the foundation, those top rows aren't going to hang up there all by themselves.