Miss me? I've been slacking on the posts this month. Chalk it up to a few things: writer's block/lack of stuff to write about, less free time lately, the usual life stuff.
One of the underlying reasons has been a lack of new cards to show off. Outside of the Time Travel Trading project, I haven't made any trades. I also haven't bought anything yet this year because I'm waiting for the new base set to come out, and my local retail options are usually bare anyways. I may have to make a special trip to Target to get my pack-opening fix.
That may change soon.
Last week, my wife messaged me an article from a local paper: Cards to posters to comic books to video games: Staunton has a new memorabilia store
A place to buy cards? A mere minutes from where I work? A place I can visit on my lunch breaks?
Now, from the article, it seems like expectations could be set low. The guy is basically selling from his personal collection, granted which he's accumulated over 35+ years. But the article ends with him stating that there aren't many sports cards stores locally, and he felt one was needed.
Obviously I had to check the place out. So last Thursday (on my lunch break of course) I ventured out to find the place. It wasn't as easy as I thought. The outside building was pretty nondescript, and the only signage was on the door and not easy to see driving by. I actually drove past it, twice. But found it I did, and walked in to a sizable room filled with various collectables. The layout was pretty basic, but with plenty of room to expand. In the back were shelves full of cards, with a table set up so you can pull a box and look through. As I was doing this, I got to talking with the owner a bit. He just opened the shop a few ago, so the cards weren't organized very well. He told me he's still sorting through everything and deciding if he wants to group cards by players or teams. Most of the cards were football and basketball, but he had a good amount of baseball too. While I was perusing, I overheard him talking to some other customers who were looking for supplies (boxes mainly). The owner is still working on dealing with vendors, and hopefully will be able to start carrying not only supplies but new product too. If I could get my baseball cards from him instead of Wal-Mart, I'll be happy!
The place has good potential, and I hope he does well. Even though I'm a low budget collector, I want to support his shop as much as I can. I found a card that peaked my interest, and asked him what he wanted for it. It was only $3, which I was more than happy to pay. (I'm glad I had some cash on me too - as of now he can only do payments via cash or Paypal.)
So my first official card purchase of 2024 goes to an autographed card of fan-favorite Mike Greenwell. As I entered the card into my collection on the TCDB, I saw these cards had a print run of 3500, and upon further research found that copies on eBay and COMC run from $10 and up. So I got a good deal to boot, and the guy obviously didn't try to squeeze every last penny out the sale either.
Hopefully this will be the first of many visits!
Good news on the LCS for sure.
ReplyDeleteAny shop that has monster boxes to rummage through to find stuff is worth repeat business unless they have ridiculous prices on things & it doesn't cater to just newer products or slabs.
ReplyDeleteI hope the soon to be LCS hands around for awhile.
ReplyDeleteI have a couple shops around where I live, but all of them have very little (if any) boxes out on display to dig through. It's not a whole lot of fun to look at stuff behind glass and/or ask to look at stuff behind the counter. That alone seems to bode well for your shop!
ReplyDeleteSounds great. There's a shop right down the street from where my daughter lives and I keep thinking how great that is. ... when she says she wants to move someday I say, "but the card shop!"
ReplyDeleteI wish I had an LCS closer to my place. The closest one is about 20 to 40 minutes from me (depending on traffic), but I'll stop by once or twice a year to grab supplies. Congratulations on finding that Greenwell auto for $3. He had a solid career... but my favorite memory involves me hoarding his cards in 1987 and 1988.
ReplyDeleteI'm happy for you. Hopefully some other folks in your area will appreciate the shop just as much as you did, thus insuring that it sticks around for many years to come.
ReplyDelete