welcome back to another episode of hobby jobs here on the stacking slabs network i'm brett mcgrath builder here at stacking slabs fun episode today jam packed episode we have a operator conversation that you will not want to miss before we get into all of it gotta thank my good friends at bcw supplies for sponsoring hobby jobs for over forty five years bcw has helped retailers and wholesale partners stay stocked with the storage and display accessories collectors trust backed by dependable fulfillment and consistency to keep shelves stocked and margin strong you can learn more at bcw supplies dot com backslash wholesale i want you to think about a decision in your business that you have been putting off we all put those decisions off i have a whole laundry list of them maybe you're doing all of your own shipping and you're trying to figure out whether you could afford help maybe someone wants to work with you but you're struggling to put a price on what you're offering or maybe sales have slowed down and you can't tell whether you need to change something or give it more time you thought about it while you're driving you thought about it after everyone in the house has gone to bed and you keep coming back to that same question who could you call to help you work through it that's what i wanna spend time on today this week's hobby jobs newsletter was called the people you can call and i wrote about the operators around me who have helped me build stacking slabs people with their own businesses and responsibilities who have been willing to make time for me one example that i come to is my good friend nick at the war of sports cards i've really valued our relationship over the years we've gotten to bounce ideas around and talk about growth hurdles hiring and what we're seeing in our businesses we do different work inside the same industry and that gives us something useful to talk about beyond the cards themselves today i wanna take that idea further how do you develop those relationships how do you make the conversations useful and how do you become someone another operator would wanna call later you'll hear my conversation with andrew of vortex sports cards he gets into sourcing product building a team and the work behind his breaking business there are some important connections between what he shares and what we're talking about today one thing i've learned building stacking slabs is that you can spend a lot of time working and still be unsure whether you're working on the right thing there's always another episode to produce another conversation to schedule another piece of content to get out and that work matters but being busy can also give you somewhere to hide when there's a decision that you're just not ready to make if you're running a shop maybe you keep handling the same task every week and you think about hiring someone but it would force you to get clear about what the job actually would entail maybe you're selling cards online and you keep listing more because it's easier than figuring out why the cards you've already listed aren't moving someone who has been through that can help you reorganize what's happening let's use the shipping example you've got an owner who says i think i need to hire somebody but i'm overwhelmed another operator could immediately say yeah you need help but someone who has managed that problem might ask how many hours shipping take takes you each week which parts require the owner's judgment whether orders are going out late what the owner would actually do with the time that they got back those questions give you something to work with you might discover that you need a few hours of packing help on busy days you might discover that your inventory is so disorganized that hiring someone would just give a second person the same problem and if you do bring someone in you can define what success would look like before they even start that's where i see the value of having other operators around you they can help you get underneath the first version of the problem for someone aspiring to work in the industry this is also a way to learn what the work actually involves a stream shows you the person opening the packs a conversation with the owner can teach you about the hours before and after the stream when you talk to somebody whose business you admire you can ask about the decisions they're working through give them room to explain the parts that you can't see you'll understand their business better and you might also start to understand where your own skills can help in the newsletter i shared dan mckee's perspective from darby's vintage did an episode with him it's on passion and profession you can check it out dan has spent nearly six decades in the hobby and he still makes a point of learning from knowledgeable friends that should give the rest of us permission to keep asking questions i want experience around me i also want to hear from people whose experience is different than mine a long time shop owner has seen changes in customer behavior that a newer operator hasn't lived through someone building on a new platform might recognize an opportunity that an established business is overlooked and those conversations can help both people if they're willing to listen there's research that adds something useful here a study published in science in twenty twenty two used randomized linkedin connection recommendations involving about twenty million people it found that weaker connections could help people find new jobs measured by shared connections moderately weak ties were especially useful the results also varied across industries the study was about employment on linkedin it wasn't a study of card shops or a guarantee that meeting more people will help you grow your business my take takeaway for us is that to leave room for people outside our usual circle they may bring information we aren't hearing elsewhere if you run a shop you could learn from somebody managing customer service at a grading company if you're building software you could learn from an employee who has to use it while customers are waiting you don't have to turn every introduction into a close friendship sometimes one thoughtful conversation gives you a better question to ask about your own business i'd also pay attention to whose perspectives you're missing if all the conversations are with owners spend time with the people doing the fulfillment work or answering customer questions they may be dealing with problems that never make it into an owner's public update of course reaching out can be uncomfortable i recognize that you see somebody who has built a successful business and you wonder why they wanna spend time helping you maybe you're worried that asking a question will reveal how much you don't know i was doing research on this topic and found a paper by allison wood brooks francesca gino and maurice schweitzer they looked at this concern their experiments found that asking someone for advice could increase that person's perception of your own competence i'm gonna do that again i was doing research on this topic and i found a paper by allison wood brooks francesca gino and maurice schweitzer they looked at this concern their experiments found that asking someone for advice could increase that person's perception of your own competence especially on a difficult task where where they had relevant expertise it depended on whom you asked and what you asked about i take that as a reason to be thoughtful about the question asking an experienced operator for help with a real decision can show that you take your work seriously but you need to do some work before you reach out think about receiving a message that says i'd love to pick your brain about getting into sports cards where do you even start the person receiving the message has to figure out what you want to do how much you already know and what kind of help you're asking for now imagine something more specific something like i've been selling cards on weekends i've been shipping a lot it's taking me about eight hours a week i'm paying someone to help me with packing when you first handle that kind of work what did you wish you documented that's a question an operator can answer from their own experience they can give you something useful in a few months without having to build your business plan for you here's another example for somebody who wants a job in the industry i manage customer support in my current job and i'm interested in doing similar work in collectibles what do people coming from outside the industry tend to misunderstand about your customers you've given that person a place to begin you've also shown them what experience you're bringing with you when you're working through a decision explain what you've tried and what you failed at ask about something that that person has actually done make it easy for them to answer by message if they don't have time for a call and then listen closely enough to ask a follow-up question it's all about the follow-up question i built my career on the back of a follow-up question it unlocks opportunities it unlocks information further discovery always ask the follow-up question if they tell you a hire didn't work out find out why was the role unclear was the training rush did the owner expect the person to make decisions they hadn't been prepared to make that's the detail you can use you also have to be okay with somebody being busy a delayed reply doesn't tell you much about what they think of you give people room to have their own responsibilities i can hear someone listening saying brett that sounds good but i'm just getting started what am i supposed to offer someone who has been doing this work for twenty years you can start by paying attention maybe you notice that the shop's hours are different on its website and its social profiles you you can let the owner know privately maybe you're good at editing video and they're struggling to turn longer conversations into something people will watch or maybe they tell you that they're looking for somebody with a specific skill and you know a person who might fit ask both people before making the introduction and explain why you thought of them the contribution should fit what they need and what you can actually do you don't have to make it a grand gesture following through on something small gives somebody a reason to trust you with something else there's another con contribution people underestimate when somebody gives you advice let them know what happened i love it when individuals ask me for something and then follow-up it happened this week i got a text message from somebody i work with and they let me know how things were going based on what we are working on together it was awesome it gave me insight it gave me focus and it allows me to do more of what they said was working you can suppose an owner suggests documenting your packing process before bringing in help you try it a few weeks later you send a short update explaining what you changed and what you learned now the person knows you took the conversation seriously and your experience might teach them something too you don't have to follow-up every piece of advice to close the loop you can say i realized i wasn't ready to hire yet so organizing the shipping area first is what i did and here's what i changed that gives a relationship somewhere to go beyond another request if you're the more experienced person be clear about what you can offer a specific answer or useful introduction can do a lot you don't have to take responsibility from somebody else's entire business to help them make progress i also wanna talk about what happens when you get advice that doesn't fit because if you ask enough people you're gonna hear a lot of different answers one owner tells you to hire quickly another tells you to keep your cost down both may be speaking honestly from something that worked for them you need to understand the conditions around the advice this is why you ask questions how big was their business when they made the decision what work did they hand off what did it cost them what happened afterward if their business has steady demand and documented processes their experience may be different from yours if their bad hire happened because they didn't have a defined job that doesn't necessarily mean hiring was the wrong decision you can respect someone's experience and still need more information about applying it and i want people around me who will challenge my thinking but i also have to be willing to explain what i'm trying to build and what constraints i'm working within otherwise i'm asking someone to advise a business that they don't that they don't understand and eventually i have to make the call more conversations can become another way to delay a decision and at some point you need to choose a manageable next step and learn what happens for our shipping example that we continue to talk about that could mean trying a few scheduled hours of help track the time you get back the accuracy of the work and whether you put those hours to good use you can have a much better conversation afterward because you have something concrete to discuss and trust matters here too if someone shares a difficult experience with you privately handle it with care you can apply what you've learned without turning their business into a story you tell everyone else people need to know they can be honest with you so how do you make any of this happen when you're already busy it's a question that we all ask ourselves and i ask myself this every week i'd keep it small enough that you'll do it again next week in the newsletter i suggested thinking about a circle of trusted operators to put that into practice start with one decision you're facing and one person whose experience can help you understand it reach out to that individual with a specific question if you already know them ask how their business is doing before you get into yours and i mean it there may be something they're working through where you can help and after the conversation document and write down what you learned and what you're going to try put a reminder on your calendar to send an update once you've had a chance to act and that's enough to start if you're going to a card show think about one operator you'd like to learn from ask when they might have a few minutes a person trying to serve a customer in a busy booth may be happy to talk another time and if you wanna bring a few people together give the conversation a per purpose you could each bring one operating problem you're willing to discove to discuss keep the group small enough that everyone has time to explain their situation and after a month look at whether anything changed did you make a decision you'd been avoiding did you create a better process did help did you help someone solve a problem those are useful signs that the time is helping this week's job highlight connects directly to what we've been talking about stockx has a category manager for trading cards role listed in the united states it was one of the opportunities in this week's newsletter the position involves growing the category recruiting sellers and breakers and working with product and engineering on what what would make it worth their time to help shape that product you need to understand what would make it worth their time to help shape that product you need to hear where their current process is difficult that's my read on why the relationship piece matters so much in a role like this listening should lead to something the business can act on and if you're interested think about examples you can bring to that interview maybe you helped a seller improve their process organized a partnership or use customer feedback to change something that worked if you are early in your career use the posting to understand what you could work towards look for chances to take responsibility for a small project and learn from people affected by it i'll include the if you want to check out this role make sure you subscribe to the hobby jobs loose newsletter it is free and a link is in the show notes this brings us to the conversation i had with andrew of vortex sports cards andrew started with a few boxes and videos he was making at home in our conversation he walks through how that became a business with a shipping team and a much larger set of decisions to manage listen to how he talks about sourcing product he's built relationships over the years and he's also clear that he has to make the economics work for himself we also get into the software he's been building to manage the business and the experience he wants customers to have when they come back to a stream as you listen think about one part of the work you'd want to understand better that's a good place for an operator conversation to begin here's my conversation with andrew of vortex sports cards

going on everybody excited to bring another operator conversation back to the hobbyjobs platform this conversation is brought to you by my good friends at bcw supplies i'm excited to be talking with andrew at vortex sports cards he has built a very established business in the space he is growing i've been following him and excited to chat with him for the first time so without further ado andrew welcome how are you thank you doing good excited this should be fun i'm excited too i've been looking forward to this all day i wanna start with maybe the origin story of vortex what got you going what motivated you to take this path to your career in sports cards as opposed to kind of a traditional corporate path that many of us take right out of school yeah so it goes i mean long story short i was the my high school senior year was the covid year so i got like half my senior year cut short but i never really wanted to go to college or get a job i knew i always wanted to kinda start my own business do my own thing i've done mowed lawns i had a like t shirt screen press business at the time i've i've tried a bunch of things and it kinda just randomly happened i mean i was i was pressing t shirts in my parents' basement and my younger brother was so this was like i think september october it's i think it's really six years this month was looking at like talking about sports cards and we used to like obviously collect cards at the time and i was oh well you know let's let let me go get us a box and i mean i maybe had three four hundred bucks like that's to my to my name so we'd go and we'd get like the score or the don ross hobby or like blaster boxes at the at the card shop and open them and it was fun and i was trying to the way it worked is like i was just getting the cards thought it was cool and i was trying to sell my cards that i was hitting from these boxes on ebay they're like dollar cards right so no one was buying them and my i just my thought was like hey maybe i should just make i'll make some videos of me like opening up the cards in the packs and then maybe those people wanna buy these cards from me that was kind of the the idea and i ended up i was going all the stores i was just trying to find us boxes i ended up getting a couple like don ross blaster boxes from i think it was bj's at the time and then someone messaged me through the videos i was doing that for a couple weeks like hey can i buy a box can you open it live i was like yeah sure i can get to open it sure and that was the first stream and it ended up being like seven hours long in my basement and i sold everything i had and literally from that day on i was like alright i just gotta keep going because it was it was the biggest like in terms of i don't know any momentum or just excitement that i've had because nothing to that point ever worked like i never like sold that many of anything so pretty much from that day forward i was like alright i'm a just keep go just keep going you know get into it i think i like to talk about this space being very entrepreneurial yeah whatever you're doing building your own business dealer at a show on streams you just reference the fact that like you wanted to work for yourself t t shirt pressing business you know mowing lawns doing whatever what what do you think this industry wakes up inside you as an entrepreneur like what is it about this space that excites you most about building your business i think i mean in terms of when i started that wasn't like the goal this wasn't the goal and i think that's in terms of like any business or success like there's something to be said about everything i tried before this was very much spending a lot of time planning making business cards like making a website right like you try to do everything and you're like thinking about it and planning it versus just doing and not really expecting much i don't really know how like and how you can explain it but there's just something to that and that's how i got started so if you asked me that before i wouldn't have had i would i would've just been like i i don't know i just was interested in it and i've always been like when i get into something i'm very much into it and that's just how i've always been like i get i'm very obsessive with things and this just like you know caught the bug and i collect like everything and i always have i used to collect the like you know the dumb dumb lollipops oh yeah with the little flavors i would collect the wrappers i want one of every wrapper i collected bottle caps like i've just been like that for something in my brain it's like oh i wanna compile this group of things that has something similar to it literally it's always it's always how i've been so that it was kinda like the perfect mix and now today it's the same that kinda same concept where that's like i do that on my own anyway i would probably do that if it wasn't business but this just allows me to kind of do more of that and that was i think that was probably the initial more my initial like how i thought about it was well if i'm able to sell the boxes you know like buy stuff that i can then sell then i'm just able to open more boxes which i think was fun and i'm able to like see more cards and hold more cards even if they're not mine and that was kind of the premise of it in the beginning but now it's from then to now i mean that was six years ago like this is collectibles in general are it now right everyone across the whole world with for a lot of different reasons but i've always just liked it myself so it's cool to see that now this stuff that i'm sure you and everyone that's a lot of us watching is like you've been into for a while is now like more of a big deal you see a lot more big you know companies lot money coming in and it's like taking it more seriously so i think that just gives you a little bit more of a assurance you know that like alright i've been doing this for this long seems like the right path so you mentioned that you started kinda in your basement with one stream and obviously have scaled it pretty significantly sizable audience you know regular breaks going on how during that scale from just like initials initial stream based on customer demand to where you're at now like how has your role with inside the business evolved it's interesting it's been kind of in and out pretty similar i guess in the beginning right i would do everything of course i would i would wake up i would because i wake up super late because i was up streaming late the night before wake up go downstairs and package everything get everything out for the day and then i would have to drive to the car shop pick up stuff for the stream that i was gonna try and run tonight whatever i could afford like what can i just buy today i and i and we're talking especially those first few months to even like year couple hobby boxes at a time like two three four hop like all i could literally afford in my card and then come back make some videos make sure everything's going good and then stream do do the stream so now obviously we have a whole shipping team but in terms of i guess today still a lot of like buying the product like what are we like sourcing stuff that's a huge thing making some of the videos just all the kinda as you grow headaches that you know i'm sure never that never stop when you run a business emails and things that go wrong things you gotta do dealing with that all day and then some of the content and still doing some of the streams so different but kinda similar yeah how did you get to the point where you realized you were at capacity with what you were currently taking on and you needed to make the decision to bring people on to help support your business scale and growth i think you know people are expensive it is money that you were probably in the early days taking away from product to invest in people like how did you as kind of a bit a business builder come to that realization that that was best for the business even though it probably cost you a lot of money in the short term yeah i guess i'd say that in term i mean there there's a couple different variances of that the in terms of like people that can help with sleeving top loading sorting the actual cars making sure it's all good during the stream and then shipping and handling that that was like i mean pretty much a no brainer from literally day one i had one of my best friends from high school who's still with me now like he started coming over and helping me like from day one that was pretty obvious i mean it's like you can't that that sort of stuff is someone it's gotta get done but my time was better like doing the stream and the other stuff i was doing so that was pretty like obvious literally day one i had my little brother who was like i mean he was probably ten ten at the time like he's i'm like this is these are these are the divisions sort the cards like he he was helping me for a little bit but then when he had to go to bed it was his bedtime i still needed help so that's when i had to go elsewhere and then since then we got to the point where it's pretty much like we could stream longer we're just you know there's only x amount of hours you can sit there so that's when i kinda had more of my friends come on and we would do more streams do longer streams make sure we're live all the time those are probably the two biggest like that's the most obvious like your time is worth more kind of if you can set those things in place that makes sense yeah i wanna talk i'll it does make sense i wanna talk about just like your thoughts around customer acquisition and content and you you know you are someone who is is is very comfortable in front of the camera someone who can hop on a stream and run a show for a while i guess like in the early days what did you learn about getting someone to stop scrolling and jump in your room and see what you're all about i mean there there are a lot of options back then when you started there's probably twenty times the amount of options today like what did you learn in those early days to kinda serve as the pattern interrupt and get someone to come check out what you're up to yeah when i first started i mean today you have because we stream on tiktok still to this day you have the tiktok shop and there's a ton of breakers on there and there's like different communities right there's like there's there's a whole the whole whatnot and then there's a whole tiktok and there's other apps and they're all kinda different but i was on tiktok from pretty much day one i think i was at least like one of if not the first person to really do cards in there when i went to my first card show i went to the dallas card show it was i don't know how long but within like the year that i started i would tell people like oh yeah you know i streamed your breaks like oh like what's your whatnot i'm like no i'm on tiktok and they're like isn't that where like like girls dance like is there not a good dancing like that's how it was back then like it was not even a thought that this was something for cards so i feel like i had the good i had a good like start there where i was really the only one doing it and i made a bunch of videos before i ever tried to even do breaks or sell breaks i see a lot of people today they're trying to you know they wanna start breaking and do those things and they'll kinda make the account and just go live or just start right away and i think i had it a lot easier because i spent a lot of time i think i already had like maybe ten thousand followers at the time on tiktok when before i did my first break because i wasn't really thinking about it in that way like like i was just trying to sell my cards on sell my single card but i think doing it that way making a bunch of the videos people saw the videos then they would go in the live that was kinda my thought in instead of like just whatever the alternative was if i could just make a bunch of videos and people like them they'll join the live that was kind of my thought initially from day one and since there wasn't anyone else doing it it worked pretty well have you as someone who produced content before you started breaks and continues to produce content as you you know do breaks have you learned like how do you think about the difference between like content that just gets views and content that actually brings people into your universe of what you're doing on the breaking side like when you're thinking about those things is there any differences you consider or you just kind of i'm andrew this is the type of content i create and this is what has gotten me to the point that i've been to so far like how do you think about your content design yeah i have to i would say and i may same like with everything we kinda do and from the beginning a lot of it is just stuff that i like that i'm into for the time so i'd say most of my videos that i'd make and i really gotta be more consistent it is hard but it's more so like a video that i think would be cool or fun or like and i just post that and if people like that then i assume that they'll come to the stream it'll make stuff where it's like hey this is what we're doing we're breaking this but that stuff will never go as well because it's just you know hey come join the live like hey come join the live video someone might see it but like i never really focused on that i my whole thing was like i'm just gonna kinda make the videos i think are cool and fun and that maybe i'd wanna watch or that i think would do well and if you get a bunch of views from that obviously most of them are not gonna come watch you but since it's more broad but i feel like that that's always been my kind of thought where if if i just make good videos people like and if a lot of people see them percentage of them are gonna come over and you know join the stream and it's just kind of building the brand and building awareness and it's like gives you that more you know like this is a legit company because a lot of this is just they're just accounts right so when you're not going to a store buying something you're just an account on any platform so i feel like it just that would build the kind of i don't know what the word would be but build that brand where people would come through throughout and then you mix in some of the hey we're doing this this and then but my focus has always been like what's gonna get music what's gonna be good videos a lot of those are more broad they'll get more views and then the people that are interested will come in like top of funnel thing no doubt i'm i'm curious how you think about product allocation like what comes in what you're focused on like if it's specific sports specific categories i'd imagine like your your process right now isn't going over to walmart and buying a bunch of blaster boxes for your streams maybe that's a part of it but like how do you think about making sure that you have the right product constantly with with within your four walls that you can go live and that you know your audience wants and demands yeah that is the biggest like issue like that's that's the whole business that's your job is is is that right there and i did the i think it was after that first stream i i told you about where it went well i was like oh my god this is crazy i was like i gotta find more stuff i did one time i woke up at six am went to walmart saw a guy standing there stood in line weird people that were waiting some of them were very interesting and i did that and it's like peep it's like people fighting over these boxes so i literally after that i said i'm never doing this never doing this again so that was like a one and done but today it really is and i'm not i don't get anything from never did from panini never got anything from any of the distributors or companies directly so it's always just been trying to find and source product that i think is good i've opened enough stuff i've seen enough where i kinda have a feel i know what's a good product what isn't what would go well in stream what's undervalued what isn't and it's really a lot of time just spending looking at that stuff trying to find stuff that i think would be good because especially today and i it's it's so different today than it was and it's only changing with tops and fanatics and how that's gonna go it's really just a lot of time spending like what's gonna be a good product like what's gonna be something when you open it up not even that i mean price has a lot to do with it right like there's a lot of products that people call it's a bad product but at the end of the day any product is good at a certain price you know if you think of the worst hobby box ever if it was a dollar would it which would it be that'd be it'd be great right it's so that's how i kinda kinda think about it like what's the product and then at what price is it like oh this is good value that we can kinda offer and i think is cool and people will like and you're kinda i mean at least i take it as trying to like you know curate like curate a product selection that i think people will like stuff that i like that i'm like passionate and want to open and have fun in opening versus just oh it's an extra release just throw it on the table we gotta open this up next you know what i mean versus that that i think you can you see a lot the one of the things that i find fascinating about people who do similar adjacent things as you breaking building audience is this idea of like when you have your product right you're trying to make sure that you are organizing it and promoting it in a way for your audience to buy into specific spots that are attractive to them but then on the other side makes sense from a business perspective for you and there are right there are a million different ways to cut it like you can do team breaks player breaks i've seen it done in so many different ways like how do you like what is your process when you get a new product to make sure that not only are you setting your audience and customers up for success but then on the other side of it you're not spending you know ten hours on a stream where you look at the end results and you're losing money like how have you gotten good at that yeah that's that's changed a lot over the years and that's one of the things that one of the things that is consistent like with this in the industry is like you always have to keep evolving and changing and trying things out because nothing you know sticks or stays forever i've i've i've gone through we've gone through so many like iterations where you know we'll be trying something that's going really well and then you see other people trying it or it gets a little stale and then you just have to kinda re evolve so we've we've gone through so many different types of products so many different formats of breaks so many so many of of of what you're talking about and it really is just i just kind of when i see something when i see a certain product now my brain is attuned like alright what's the best way to break this whether that's you know pick your player pick your team pick your spot pick your card randoms or what what what whatever you wanna call it my brain is kind of adjusted to like alright how what's the best way to try this and then with kinda new products and new and as you just try stuff out i just get a ton of ideas okay let's try this way let's try this way this we did this didn't go well or this went really well and then one of those ideas is really all it takes we'll end up being the thing we do for the next three to six months to a year until we kinda have to you know move to the next thing or whatever that might be that how in yeah how how important have you mentioned like no directs with manufacturers like how important has building the network of relationships been for you that so that when you need new product because you just sold something and it went really well and you want more like you have an individual that you can turn to to get more like how have you prioritized spending time just building relationships with other people who have product that you can get it from when you need it yeah it's super important i've spent a lot of time a lot of money with a lot of different people over the years and you definitely like learn you have to you know it's hard to it's hard to get into position because no one's going to no matter like who they are maybe if they're if they're your best friend but nobody is gonna like sell you something you know crazy under what it's going for because why would they right like that's just how it is like if they're getting it for x amount and it's going for y why they're not gonna give you a fifty percent off so you can make whatever so it's almost like there's you know obviously you have to know who to talk to and kind of the deals you can make but i think the most important what i've what i've gone for is more so and because you can't really rely on that i i feel it's like i have a lot of people but you know people go off what the market is like no one's going to oh here's here's just a free like fifty percent for you like that's just not how it go at least not for me if there's anyone out there that wants to see that please let me know but i've i've found what i've been trying to do and like kind of hone in on is just based on what i know because i feel like in this industry i'm sure you you know this it's like you can't really like learn a lot of this stuff just the way everything works you like there's no you can't go read about it google won't answer it for you and no one can even fully explain it to you i i think because it is a lot of just like you have to go through it and experience it and then you just pick up these little things and the patterns and it's so it's like it's like this thing's passed down but you only know it if you know it if that makes sense and that's kinda goes for it's very broad but i just have i guess i kind of have a good feel now based on patterns of things that have gone well and haven't it's like i was saying like what is good value so that's kind of what i do is kind of hunt for that like what do i think is good value and that's not even it doesn't mean that it's not even in in exactly something that oh well this person's gonna get it from get it from me better it's like what do i think is just underpriced that people aren't looking at that's kind of how i've been trying to go about it and that's sometimes it can go well sometimes it doesn't but because then if you get something at a certain price a lot of times for release days and it can go one way or the other i i think this is gonna i think this is gonna be good i think this it's a good price the market's at now you buy a lot of it and then it doesn't go well and you're like oh man i haven't or it went down or people don't like it as much or you're like hey we'll try this out it goes great and you got one case we sold out now it's two times the price type of thing so managing that is very hard there's no like exact way it's kinda just i you know i feel like i have a decent feel for it now but it's always a struggle in a way you have to try and like manage that day to day i wanna hear a couple examples based on that like a i love that like i'm buying for value i i love that mindset his give me an example of a product that you bought for value and you're really excited about that didn't go well and then on the flip side obviously buy what is a product that you bought for value that like blew you away that it went so well yeah oh my goodness let me think there's so many right it's there's been so many products over the last how many years because we've gone through all the football because mostly we do we've always done football that's like mostly been the the sport as of the last like it's like year to two years we've kind of tried to expand a little bit more but all those releases with panini just trying to see like what's gonna be good like i remember this is like so random but this just comes to my mind it was twenty twenty one i think like the trevor lawrence year it was xr football and i don't remember what the price was but i remember seeing it and i was like i did this this seems like too good to be true like there's there's certain prep products and price i'm like this this is too good and i got a lot of i got a i got a hand a good amount of it i think i was like this this should be good and it went really well it was like just such good value and then then it goes up in price so those have opportunities once i like see them they never last and then something about a lot of that kinda just sat i'm trying to i mean there's been so many there there's been so many i one that i specifically a lot of this is like when you're breaking everyone's ripping the same stuff for the most part right when the stuff comes out there was one i i think it was the latest what was it i think it was either flawless or national treasures whatever the last like big football release was where none of the guys signed i think it was twenty twenty four i'm trying to remember whatever the biggest release was i didn't i didn't even get it and it's like everyone's oh do you have this do you have this like that's an that's also a part of what i've been doing which i i don't think many other people do but and i get like heat for it i won't buy some something like i won't get some of the new some new thing in that everyone might want because i just know that it's not gonna go well like i i i know what this product is bro there's no most of these guys don't have autographs the patches aren't getting used it's five ten thousand dollars a box you're not gonna i'm gonna i'm gonna run this break i'm gonna take all day to fill this fill and run this break no one's gonna hit anything you're all gonna be mad at me and it's like and i'm gonna have to give you something for free it's like i'm i'm not even doing it it's not worth it so i'll just like save you if you wanna go buy it somewhere else go for it but i just won't if i look at something like i'm not even getting that because i know it's not gonna be good even if you know customers may want it it's like it's not worth it i don't think how do you how do you like what is your mindset and how do you think about what you're doing from like the long game knowing that everything you open isn't going to be a home run and there are going to be those moments where you you break a product that sucks and people don't like it and you're stuck with a bunch but then you know two months later there's a product that just goes lights out like how do you how do you get in the right mental state to like understand that the business you're building is like for the long game and how do you not like get down and out when something doesn't go right or you lose money on something like how how have you grown to kinda be comfortable in that world that you're working in it's a great question yeah i don't feel like no one really talks about that but it's definitely true there's a lot of times where and then there's times where a lot of stuff's coming out and it's like man i gotta figure out how do i even get the money to get up because we have a we have a you know two weeks where there's like full releases and then you have a month where there's nothing and that's when it kinda goes through and it's hard it's like oh my god i gotta figure this out and it's just more of the alright i gotta like get to work and like look around like what can i find that i think can go well in this kind of you know medium time because that's especially with breaking you have like alright the new thing when that comes out that's obviously always everyone wants the newest thing that's gonna we know that's gonna be like a bigger stream it's gonna be important and then you have the time when there's nothing really new out so it's like alright first let me go back to what was the last few releases because that's the stuff that's still out there it shouldn't have moved too much or a lot of times goes down a lot of new products will go down after release especially recently because everyone's trying to buy it to break it or everyone's trying to buy it immediately whereas before it would be and i remember this that's what i was saying back to like twenty one twenty two i would get stuff i would preorder a lot of stuff and it would go up after release like the like the value would go up so i would have to get a lot early now it's like i don't wanna touch it until the till like the day before and then after that it's gonna go down so that's like it's a lot of those things trying to figure out what is this product but then back to your question when i know there's gonna be those times like we're we're about to be i'm about to be in one right now like for the next month it's like alright i know there's not anything crazy that's gonna that it's gonna be too crazy so it's just some of there's always there's always something coming out maybe trying something that or trying like you know a little bit of that seeing how that goes trying a new something new that we haven't tried before a new product and then but then just going back to like what do i know that's people like that's good that's cool that i like and think is good value and what can we you know what can we get to kinda fill the time that's pretty much what it is that that people are still gonna want because at the end of the day like you're selling you know you have to like sell stuff that people want you're kind of the the we're kinda like the access point i feel like kind of like in a way like a curator right like all these people that buy like they're collectors of something right so hey i'm gonna kinda pull together these different products of different forms of collectibles and this is what i think is cool and then they rock with it or they don't it's it's you know it is what it is but that's kinda how i feel it's always just like what can we what can i find that's that's gonna be good for this period and then trying to figure out alright i know i have maybe a week i know i have maybe this weekend we don't have anything i gotta figure something out or hey this next month we gotta plan out because there's nothing really new coming i gotta make sure we have stuff for you know x amount of time i wanna kinda go back to the entrepreneur operator side of you and just get your perspective here like you're let's say you're in a a lull period a short lull period and you know you're thinking about like decisions and thinking about like man i wish i wouldn't have bought this or i wish i would have bought more of this and going back and forth in your head like do you ever find solace just thinking like taking a few steps back and just being like yeah like this like this this short period sucks right now but like i get i'm working for myself and i'm i'm working in sports cards and like at least i'm not like going in and working some desk job that i don't like and working for someone that i don't like like do you ever find like are you ever able to kinda like pull yourself back and look at the big picture of kind of what you're building and kind of the environment you're creating for yourself yeah and i have to kind of accept that i feel like anyone that's ran a business before will i mean like sometimes i will envy just the person that might work at chick fil a or something because it's like you just you like any any job that where you get to go to your job and then when it's over you get to go home you know to think about it like anyone that's like really done it i feel like and that's what i've really learned i've always heard that but i never knew i never understood it any business it's like it's hard like twenty four seven it's you're thinking about it like there's always something like at two am i get you know there's a call about something that's wrong it's it's it's twenty four seven and i'll be like man like it'd be so it's gonna be so much easier if i could just do something else but i literally can't like i just i i i wouldn't be able to i would get fired the first day of any other job so i i have no other option so that that just that's just because of who i am i have to like you know because even if whatever i do if it doesn't work out and a lot of things have i lose money a ton of times i have it's like i just gotta be able to i gotta make the call it has to be like if i have an idea i wanna be able to just go do it if i you know wanna make this decision i get to make it like that's just who i am i've always been like that i don't like anyone else telling what to do so i just have to you know take a deep breath and accept that's the path that i've chosen or it's chosen me i don't know but yeah these these conversations are therapeutic in a way for me because i i i love hearing stuff that i feel the same way about i very much don't like being told what to do and it used we find ourselves in these spaces trying to build our own thing i wanna get some perspective from you like business builder you know selling product live you're kind of a seven days a week three sixty five type of guy like how are you able to kind of get the take those like mental breaks like are you able to take those mental breaks like how have you gotten good at like kind of taking a pause before jumping back in or are you still trying to figure that out i don't think you ever really figure it out that's what i've heard i've i've i listened to ton of people i've read so many like a lot of business books i've heard so many podcasts with successful people and the consensus i've got is like you don't really figure it out because you can't like right it always needs to but there's times like this past weekend it was my mom's birthday we went to the mountains for the weekend so i was able to take like two days and like not do anything and then i get back and it's like alright i have all this stuff that piled up we gotta i gotta i gotta get back to it and then then you know i'll go for periods where it's not it's like does i don't even know what day it is most of the time it doesn't really matter what day it is it's just going until you know yeah and then i'll have a break where of a day or two and i just won't look at my i won't even answer anyone i won't do anything and that's nice and then it's like alright then i gotta get back into it and do it all again so i wouldn't say that's there's not a ton of balance but i don't think there in certain periods there there can't be i would assume there's some sleep in in your daily diet how when you when you wake up in the morning or at night or whenever the hell you wake up like what what motivates you like what are you like really excited for like is there something right now that like when you get out of bed gets you really excited and going about the work that you're doing i am not a morning person that's i've never have been so i i'd sleep a decent amount i get a good amount of sleep but i just go to bed so late because that it it kinda ruins the schedule for so and then there's periods where like last i think it was september i don't think i went to bed before five am the whole month and then it's like the other day i've been on a bit little bit better schedule one of my buddies called me and he was like we were just talking and he does cards too and he was like dude like i i i woke up at like eleven today i slept in so late i wanted to be up early i was like i got up at eleven too and that is like a great day for me do you understand that eleven am is great because if you wake up i gotta do all the stuff and then you do the stream sometimes we end at four or five am it just depends how it's going and then you kinda get in that schedule and i like the night i'm just i like staying up so that's just me but in terms of sleep yeah it's it's just inconsistent but i get sleep but in terms of waking up there's just always i'm always working on something i feel like i always have like something i'm doing which excites me so i i kinda will go if i have an idea i'll kinda just go all in on that the last like oh my god almost two years now i've been building a software which is basically four breakers to manage all of the day to day because when it just in product when it comes to the inventory of buying stuff getting it in making sure it's there how much did i pay up in the inventory managing the streams like alright you have to track each stream individually it's just this business is so unique it's not like anything else out there so i've been building and then using myself for like the last year a software that basically saves me so much time and like gives you gives me that data that you actually need to run your business which is a huge thing that i don't feel like most people at least in this industry even understand or they probably know but it's just they don't have it because it's so hard there's so it's it's all physical it's all single skews right there's like most of the time it's not like you're just selling hairbrushes that have four different sizes it's it's different stuff coming in all the time so if you wanna have actual like data you gotta spend a lot of time in spreadsheets doing it and i hated that i never liked doing that so over the last like year that's helped me a lot where i'm a lot more clear on where we're at and what we need to do versus just you're in the fog because you don't even know like if you don't have the numbers if they're not correct if you don't know where you're at or what some some things you're doing you don't even know so data like tells you kinda what to do in a way which i finally learned which has been great so i've been building that and then using that and i'm gonna try and launch that soon for other breakers i think it's a huge help that's been super like helpful to me and just be just using it every day where i wake up and it's like more clear of what i need to do and where we're at that is huge versus you wake up and it's like i don't even know what i'm doing sometimes you know is your is your vision with that to be able to productize it and sell it to other people doing similar stuff to as you yeah it's super niche but for breakers i think because i've used i've been like i've been using it every day almost for for the past year i think and it is like it kind of upsets me that you have a lot of in in just all businesses like small businesses i used to like the the reason the way i got into business was like shark tank when i was literally twelve years old i started watching shark tank and from that from that moment that's when i knew like that's what i wanted to do i just thought it was always so cool and something they would always say like i remember thinking of this when i was young it's just like they're always know know your numbers right know your numbers but when you're running the business like you're a small business owner or whether you have a couple people it's like every day and you're doing a lot of stuff and there's a lot going on and a lot of days it's just i gotta get through today because i need i have all these things i need to get done today right so going through and getting all this like all these numbers and data and spreadsheets that doesn't need to get done today but it should but also no one wants to do it i hate spreadsheets and that kind of like upset me that that's and i went through i think i went through three or four like bookkeepers that i paid and they just they just couldn't do it and they couldn't get it ready even after i get it because it's not especially for this industry it's not like normal right it's like oh well yeah i bought these brakes i bought these products and i combined like four different ones and i put this into a break during the stream and then i had this card that i bought a couple months ago for this much and this got graded so now it's worth more and i sold it for this like they don't know right and then oh yeah this is what my inventory is worth but it's probably going up or down this much all that kind of stuff and that just like really upset me and very much because i would just spend so much time doing it every day and i wanna know that stuff and have that clear and i feel like it's it's it's kind of like frustrating where you have these big companies they have a cfo that hands you a report here's the number for today it's like every like individual person that's just that's you know struggling or is working to try and run a business should have that that's what that's what i think so that's kind of given me a lot of clarity or motivation like i think this is like some people should have just just what a young entrepreneur who's ambitious just what they need another thing to build and think about while you're building your business yeah it's i think that yeah i think it i think it's awesome though because you're you you understand you you know the problems yourself because you're doing it so that's why i'm so confident because there are so there are so many problems or friction points or whatever in this industry and you see a lot of people coming in a lot of like big money people and a lot of like just more focus and attention on this and a lot of more businesses being built and a lot of things but like we talked about earlier if you don't really know if you haven't been doing this for x amount of years you really don't know and this is like one of those industries where i i see some tools and i i've i've tried everything and it's like i can tell that you've never even ran a stream you never ran a break you never sold a card by the way that this is by by you know the way this is so i feel like i've been doing this long enough i know the problems i deal with it myself so i'm like kinda building it for myself which is why i'm so confident that there's and that's what i wanna continue to do it's like there's so many problems there's so many opportunities right when you say problem it's really just opportunity to fix something and i feel like i'm at the point now where after six years i have a good enough feel of like how it should be and the best way to do it where that brings me a lot of excitement because it's like kind of like the stars are aligning in in all these things everything i've been doing has kinda led to some of these moments so that that excites me i wanna spend a second talking about customers and how you think about your customers they're well you've already referenced this like when a new product comes out everyone's breaking it like you can open up any app and there are hundreds of breakers breaking the same stuff like outside of just like the cards and the hits and what people are getting and the clips and all that going out like what it what is the type of experience that you are trying to create for the people who are not only spending time but spending their money with you like how do you think about vortex and how do you think about that differentiation so that when a person drops by buys into a break it's not just like a one time thing but like they had a good enough experience to to come back and and keep breaking with you yeah i have we've gone through so many again different iterations of what we're doing where we would do some sort of break some types of products where you have i mean we'd have you you have like hundreds to a thousand people customers in a night right but they're all buying we're you know we're we're doing it where they're all spending like a little bit or like x amount or whatever versus more and it's not really about you know just the amount of money but i feel like we've gotten to a point and i personally enjoy where we have a solid like group of customers where you kinda go in and you know who they are right oh johnny just came in what's up man how are you doing oh cool i just got this and i talk to a lot of these people i would say a lot of like customers have become friends in a way and it's hard to have that when you have so many customers and you're running certain types of things but in terms of like the experience i think when you have that sort of concept and then new people will come in and then you have kinda your people who are always there customers who are always in and out like a core group of people i feel like we got and then someone comes in they're talking to chat and then kinda they're added to that and then you come back and they're like oh what's up man what's up man it's kinda like a like a community in a way i don't love that word but what it is i just feel like it's overused and a little cringe but that's kinda what it is so i feel like that's the best way to do it and it's it's and again people say that and it's like what does that mean it's hard to really like it's kinda like a buzzword but really where you have people that are coming in and it's like you've talked to them i'll talk to them off the stream hey shoot me a message and you're kinda just talking in the chat about collectibles cards other stuff not just hey buy this alright cool we're done type of thing and then you can kinda interact with them hey what what do you think we should run let's do this let's do this where it's more of like a hey we're all hanging out and then like the cards and breaking is the medium or whatever we're open i love that is there i have to ask like for you and six years of breaking cards and you know tens of thousands of packs ripped what what is the most memorable pull that you you have like when i ask that question like the first card that comes to your mind it has to be the justin herbert black finite one zero one we pulled that was year years now at this point a couple years ago but it's it's gotta be that that was the biggest card that ended up selling for like a million dollars i think probably worth a little bit less now but at the time it was that that was huge and i don't think there's ever gonna be something as big as that again now with a lot of these tops products you're seeing some of them but i mean after that i remember there there was a couple cards like that like there's there's not many especially football like the different the basketball you know how like the that a lot high end basketball is a whole other thing like there's not even many football cards that are like sell for a million dollars or be worth that lot so that was just a crazy thing and it was just like the it that's like the card his you know rookie card at the time a lot more hyped up than he probably is now but that was just insane that was that was a wild that was a wild pull i don't think i'll ever beat that no i mean at the time of that you know outside of him or burrow that was like the product hit what oh yeah what was what was going on like what was going on in your head when you realized what the card was like like was it it had to have been a little bit different because of the gravity of the card like different than other big pulls you've had in the past like what was going on kinda in your head when you saw that that was the card that was in your hand yeah so it was it was from prism and if anyone that's from prism you kinda know there's so many rookies right there's a and there's a bunch of rookies for a team some of them aren't even in their uniform so you always kinda we always like kinda looked at like move it to the side look for the rookie symbol and then we would kinda move the card up and look at the team it's like rookie chargers and then it's always like for twenty twenty so joshua kelly or like one of the random people like that's what it would always be and i remember doing that it was like rookie chargers can we see it's black finder like woah black find it and i was like no way it's herbert like that just doesn't happen of course like it's gonna be like quentin johnson whoever was like the guy where you pull it it's not herbert and we pulled that and there's a video on my thing it's i'm literally just like i didn't even say anything speechless i was like i just knew like this is a big card like this is a forget the money like there's certain cards and things and where you just know like this is a important card like this is a this you know this is a very meaningful card his prism which is probably arguably the best like true black friday rookie like that's like that's a big deal no matter the price like that's just that's a very important card that's insane yeah that was for the longest time there was very few one million dollar football card sales and every time i filtered up in card ladder i was looking at it like that card was standing kinda at the top with some brady's and some mahomes stuff so that's crazy that you pulled it are you are you having fun andrew are you having fun doing what you're doing building what you're building oh my gosh yeah it's fun it's but it's it's stressful but it is fun because it's like every day is something new and that's what i need like i i just i don't like you know routine where it's same thing every day so every day whether whether it's like a new problem or it's a new idea or something it's just doing that is what's like fun to me like alright i have this thing let's try it out or hey this went great like we need we need to fix this or try this or just different things and then just going through the motion i love i love like what's super fun to me is now at the point like i said we're trying to find products like making bets in terms of okay i see this as potential value for x y and z and no one else does so i'm gonna make my call and then seeing how that ends up working out or not that's super fun to me because now i know like just the entire industry itself and that's aside from breaking but just kinda how it works and i feel like that kind of full that's super fun it's like research i'll find like something super niche and i'll spend like three hours just looking into it like alright i think this is i think this is a a good play and i think like stuff that i think is cool as well like i'm able to just kinda what do i think is cool and fun that i would wanna do aside from this and when i kinda lean into that that's where i found the most success when it's just like authentic versus just trying to you know buy or sell some random thing to make money you know i think no doubt i think one of the most interesting things about connecting with operators and builders across this industry and whatever the individual's doing is that there is something on the front end that everyone sees whether it's a a new break whether it's a podcast episode whether it's a product release new piece of software but like the stuff that the customers don't see is like all of the stuff that happens in the background that leads up into that point which we've covered a lot of that from your perspective just in you know the software piece for you and the spreadsheets and all that like what what do you think individuals that are like you know collectors or customers like what do you think people underestimate the most about like the work that you're doing behind the scenes it's a good question i wouldn't say it's just me specifically but in this like this type of business model i guess you could say is that it is it is a lot more than just like opening cards right like that's what you see like you said but there is the basically from day one like just the marketing and everything it takes to get to the point where you have a channel you can go live having everything ready to go and then going live if you're gonna sell a box it's not just shipping in like sell a box on ebay ship it selling it filling it breaking it sleeving top loading sorting and then packaging and then shipping individually to everyone it's not like one box and then you got thirty two people to ship to in terms of that and then making sure those are all all those you know orders are good if there's anything any issue that comes up like dealing with that and then finding something new that you have to do every day essentially like that's probably i'd say the hardest thing and now at this point i mean there's a lot of breakers there's a lot of people that are breaking cards and there a lot of people selling the same thing pretty much so you gotta be able to like differentiate in some way or it's like what's what's the point right they're they're selling the same thing as you so when people are selling stuff for the price that i have to buy it at to get it for some of this new stuff it's like alright well what can i do that's gonna be you know to stand out in some way so it's a lot more than just getting product and you know opening boxes i'd say but it's not not gonna act like it's the hardest thing in the world but there's definitely a lot more to it alright as we are closing this out there's a lot of individuals aspiring to be builders in this space tune into this hearing advice from people like you what is one piece of advice that you would share with anyone out there who is thinking about taking a similar path as you or in a job they don't like right now and wanna work full time in sports cards what's a piece of advice you can share as we close this out that's good i like to get i i have a lot of people ask me especially with the breaking how do you do this or that i like to get like specific as i can for people because everything is nuanced right nothing's really like black or white and it's all about the specific situation but i would say at least like depending on whatever you're doing if you're trying to get into it what i just did was like i said in the beginning less just like planning and like writing down you know this thing and that thing i made making i made business cards i made a website i made all these graphics for things i've tried before and that never worked this was literally just it's you you gotta get into this sort of you know flow where you're just doing and then eventually as it kinda works you follow that and i mean obviously depending on your situation like i would really recommend not spending any too much money at all if you're just starting because there's so much that there's a lot all those things i've talked to you about where i feel like i kinda have a good grasp i i recognize some things came from losing a lot of money and spending a lot of time and like just a lot of you know paying to learn that so i would say don't just go and buy a car like really make sure you kinda know what you're doing or looking for or talking about first and that can come from just like researching and looking up different sales of cards and why is this this and there's a lot of you know podcasts like this you you can look at or message me but there's a lot of you know variables but obviously obviously just try and learn as much as you can before you spend any money like see what like what do you actually wanna do because we say like this industry there's probably what like a hundred different models that you could go about in this industry that some of them i would hate to i would hate to do like i wouldn't wanna do that but then some of them someone else might so it's so it's so specific but kinda like just explore find what you are interested in and try and learn about it more but then just start if you're going to like just start it start small just list the card on ebay or just do this try not to like spend all this time planning i still do this myself i gotta take my own advice sometimes but that sort of like momentum you get from just starting and doing something and building upon that is i think a lot more powerful than just sitting there kinda contemplating and that's how you learn it is this was andrew vortex sports cards loved learning about the business that you're building everybody go check out his breaks andrew looking forward to doing this again sometime down the road yeah this was cool awesome i appreciate it

a big thanks to andrew for spending time with me you see somebody opening boxes andrew is thinking about what they buy how to structure a break whether people will enjoy the product and whether the work make sense for his business it also puts a useful limit on today's conversation a strong network can help you learn and give you people to work with you still have to understand what you're buying and what your customers want as andrew explained a relationship doesn't mean somebody is going to sell you product far below the market i appreciated his openness with his numbers too he described how difficult it had been to get a clear view of his business and that's why he started building software around the work that he was doing every day my takeaway is to get specific when you're looking for help if you're talking to a bookkeeper or a software provider can you walk them through how money and inventory move through your business can you explain how they'll handle the process those questions can help you understand whether there's a fit there andrew also talked about recognizing the people who return to his streams and getting to know them beyond the purchase that's something you can examine in your own business this week what have you learned from the people who keep coming back what are they telling you about the experience that you're creating and when you hear andrew describe the demands of running the business pay attention to the work too if things depend heavily on you ask another owner how they made a particular responsibility easier to hand off you might come away with a practical practical change that helps take a break and that's where i wanna leave us today choose one question you've been carrying around find someone with experience that could help you think through it do enough preparation to make the conversation useful and give them an update after you've acted if somebody reaches out to you consider whether there's a small way that you can help them move forward hobby jobs exist to support the people building in the sports car industry i want these conversations to make more of that experience available so people can use it if you're building if you have an operator question feel free to email me stacking slabs at g mail dot com i'd love to hear from you make sure you subscribe to the hobby jobs newsletter link is in the show notes and thanks again to bcw supplies for supporting this work and thanks to you for spending part of your week with me happy building we'll talk to you soon