welcome back to another episode of passion to profession brought to you by my good friends at ebay we have talked a lot about life selling businesses recently and really excited for the opportunity to get into it with a business owner who is not only running and managing a brick and mortar retail location but also selling on ebay live and wanna get into the live selling business wanna get into the process strategy everything in between i am joined by josh o'daniel from odz sports cards josh welcome man how are you thank you i am wonderful appreciate you having me excited to talk about it and kinda get in the weeds should be fun yes we we will get in the weeds and i'm excited to get in the weeds with you because it is becoming a fascination for me to explore the individuals building a business on live selling and i think i always learn something new from each individual i'm talking to but before we get into the business side josh let's learn a little bit about kind of your background in collecting have you always been a collector what have you collected let's start there so yes and no off and on i think like most people when i was a kid i collected a ton i had pokemon sports and i and it's kinda sad to say i had so many michael jordan cards that i no longer have or own because i believe they were thrown away so was kinda sad about that but but yeah i i collected as a kid i collected actually for several birthdays in a row i went to the flea market of all places and bought pokemon holographic cards real or fake i'm not sure but we we we bought those when i was a kid it was a lot of fun and then you know i guess in my you know high school years and stuff i didn't really collect at all until you know in basically when covid started i saw someone streaming pokemon again i was like man i used to love pokemon and then i started getting back into it you know then but yeah i i collect nowadays i pc michael vick donovan mitchell lamar jackson and pretty much anybody in the louisville jersey and then also collect the nineteen ninety six japanese pokemon holographic i've i've almost had the full set i'm missing like one or two so quite the diverse collection which i love is there a specific card that you have in your collection when you think about josh's pc this is the card that you would show someone who was interested in learning about your collection first the i mean my favorite one is the ninety six japanese charizard i have i think it's a cgc seven five and my goal is to take that whole set and upgrade it you know trade essentially upgrade it in grade if i if it's possible to do that but that or i have a a really some some really cool donovan mitchell in the louisville jersey just some like prism one o ones like nebula and the black one zero one that i really i like those a lot that's personally what i like so yeah that's awesome so much like many of us getting back into cards because we heard saw something a friend told us that cards were cool again how how long from that process of you getting back into kind of the the top of the funnel with sports cards and experiencing all the new things to you starting your own business like what was the time in between those two moments it really wasn't too long to be honest like you know when covid covid happened i saw it i don't know if you guys watch twitch at all but a streamer called his name is doug israel he still streams today he would play call of duty and then open pokemon after his streams and i would see him doing that and i was like man i i i need to find some cards i wanna rip some cards and i eventually was able to find some i luckily fortunate enough i didn't have to go into work during covid i was at home working basically so i would take lunch breaks out to try to find cards and was able to and you know it wasn't too long i i i streamed like back then i was i streamed like video games just very i don't know just very small scale like two people watching you know nothing too crazy and but i would open pokemon after my streams just for fun for me you know and then my friend started being like hey like i wanna buy a pack i was like you wanna you want to buy these i know like i want these i don't wanna sell these what do you mean well eventually they talked me into selling them packs because they couldn't get out they couldn't find anything so they they talked me into to selling them packs just you know on the side and for some reason i don't know what clicked in me but when when i did that my mind went to create a website so they could buy it on i don't know why it wouldn't just be like hey send me paypal or something i don't know but my mind went to create the website to purchase the packs on and that's kinda how it started so you've i love this getting some friends who are getting the bug with pokemon they you are the source they wanna go direct to you you start a website you mentioned you know you streamed on twitch video game stuff where you're opening up pokemon packs when did you decide to kinda go live and bring kind of what was happening with cards and maybe the commerce side of cards to that live experience was that something that happened kind of organically or were you just like alright we're gonna try this here's what we're gonna try and see if it there's any success with it talk to us about that yeah it started like like i said i mean it started with pokemon and i didn't really like i i've always loved sports my you know i actually went to school and had a like a sports major degree etcetera but i've always loved sports it's always been a passion of mine but at the time you know it was really just pokemon and then in the process of you know going to the store and you know looking for cards and buying pokemon and trading the sports boxes that they would give you for the pokemon boxes and then i was like well maybe i should open some of the sport like the sports kind of interest me from that point of like maybe i should check this out like i didn't really think about it but maybe we should open some of this and like just kinda see how it goes just for myself and i didn't really like think of the you know the business side of it really at all like i was just i just wanted to open boxes you know for myself and it's hard to say like when that actually like clicked i guess we you know the first streams we did we we sold like some team breaks through ebay and this was way before ebay live and and all essentially on on an ebay page that we created to sell you know i sold pokemon code cards you know for low amounts to get get reviews and get get my ebay page built up a little bit and we we basically just did team like auctions to start but that was probably at least you know six eight nine ten months after like i kinda started the the had the little website and had the things you know that we were doing on twitch so so there i would imagine through maybe just reps and sets of continuing to iterate on selling team spots it evolved into maybe something bigger than you anticipated what was that growth like was it intentional did you did you get through this like midstream and realize you know what like maybe i can quit what i'm doing professionally and and do this full time what was that growth like i don't yeah the growth i mean really we took it pretty slow because you know i had a good i had a nice i worked for ups i i worked actually there for eighteen years so like i had you know i even stayed there years after the business was was booming and doing well and i had just left actually april of twenty twenty five so year and a half ago so not too long ago but you know i i never really intended for for for this to be a a a stand alone thing that we did or or a bit really a business at all it it evolved to that but you know in the in the beginning it was you know it was just a bunch of you know trying to just having fun for the most part trying to kinda figure it out i think at some point i realized i actually enjoyed the sports side of it more than the pokemon side of it i don't know if it was something about the same old sets of pokemon or the same characters something with it i i i remembered vividly like i'm like i'm kinda getting bored with the pokemon i was like let's let's get more sports let's get some hobby boxes and let's see if if we could actually open one hobby box and then we kind of progressed along the way there but i just remember like pokemon becoming a little bit stale which is kinda weird to think now that that that was the case but i remember thinking that i'm like i'm just kinda bored with i i don't know if it was they they had a delay in releases i don't really remember but i just know i got kinda bored with it back then so you did you spent eighteen years at ups you were running the sports card and pokemon streaming side it was just for fun as you mentioned you started to see some success was there a moment when you realized that the business needed your full attention and and and what was kind of that moment of you saying goodbye to an eighteen year career at ups to go full time on something that you were building and working on i think i i started to think about it probably in twenty twenty three a little bit where you know you start to think like where should i have spent what what should i put my time in like where should i spend my day and and my thoughts and everything else and it got to where the more as time went in twenty three and twenty four it was like i'm starting to think and do and work and message about car like our trading card business more than i'm thinking and doing and working for the ups side of things you know and it was it was still doable to overlap the two but it really got to where it just really wasn't healthy for me it wasn't really possible to to keep doing both you know there were nights we we streamed until three or four in the morning and had to go to work the next morning it's seven eight am you know like it just was not sustainable is the main thing and i had to kinda take a step back and just really really evaluate that and it was just very clear and obvious that i should pursue this i you know i'm passionate about it i love it i enjoy it and i need to pursue it and and see where it goes you know were were you scared when you made the leap from that regular paycheck to do working on something and kinda earning for yourself i would say no only because like we went so slow like we were in business for five years before i did that right it wasn't like you know if looking back if if i wasn't married and and if i was making all my own choices i probably would have left sooner you know but that safety of the the the state the you know the the paycheck you know having the guaranteed paycheck and living off of that but looking back i mean we should have made the leap you know two at least two years prior probably to progress things faster but also i i you know i don't regret it or anything like that like i'm happy with the pace we took or the pace we're still on really you know we're we go at a good pace we we don't really jump into something until it's we're really totally ready if that makes sense yes i think something that is unique what i love about your story is you've said it a couple times is taking time moving slow which is very opposite of what i hear from a lot of people who are building in this space where it's like we see the growth let's run let's invest all of this resource but what you have done kind of is the opposite it's been maybe slow plotting and methodical was was that is that just like how you operate how you typically roll is it something different obviously it sounds like it it that that that mindset has kinda led to what you have today which is probably a good thing than going full gangbusters out of the gate yeah but maybe like what is it about moving slow that has helped you get to where you are today i think i think it's you know i have to give a lot of credit to to my wife lizzie she is for one in the beginning like she was the sorting and shipping team of course she and she helped me really continue to grow the grow our business and you know in our old house it grew so much where like we we had to move because the business was to had too many things too much cardboard too many shipments and all that we we did not have room to operate like we wanted to but she's really the reason that we were able to to even grow a little bit in the beginning because of her her help her assistance her you know bouncing ideas all parts of it she was she was very pivotal in our success in early stages but she also i think helped helped me like stay grounded and helped me like you know think through things that because like i said if if it was totally up to me i probably would have jumped in eyes closed and and just went for it and it might have still worked out fine but she has really allowed us to set the pace and be comfortable and make sure we're making the right decision if that makes sense it's always good to have a good supporting team that's for sure the what's the business look like today in terms of like makeup where you're spending your time employees what what does it look like today so today i think we have close to like twenty two ish employees or so it's it's it's wild to think and a lot of that is the growth of it is really take you know in the last i don't know i i don't think we even really hired our first employee until i don't know probably in the in maybe it was twenty twenty four i think if i'm thinking right maybe even twenty twenty five because i know you know we we had a daughter she's like nineteen months now so when that when when that happened i was like okay lizzie physically can't you know continue the task and it's time to get help and it's time to have you know assistance there but but it it's you know i i mentioned going slow i think we went very slow in the early years in the last two years it's we've really expanded and and really ramped it up a lot how how do you decide in terms of when you need help and support how do you decide whether like when to obviously you mentioned with your wife and having a a child and that made it really easy to be like alright we need someone to backfill but as you scale how do you think about kind of adding the right people to the team to help you kinda take that next step because people are expensive it costs money to bring people in like how have you gotten good at the at at hiring kind of for growth as a business owner we've actually gotten very very fortunate that we found really good people and i and a lot of it is family friends or or you know someone that's that's been able to help and and almost everyone that we've brought in is still around like no one's really had to leave or take take a new opportunities or or whatever we've been able to continue to grow with the same group if that makes sense and really one big thing was you know the first time someone else was on the stream and it wasn't me like that was that was a big step you know that was a monumental thing where and we actually hired chris and chris runs our odc baseball channel and chris of all things he's actually remote he's not here in kentucky he's in florida so he has you know he was doing his own streams under us and he was essentially fanatics live exclusive at the time and that was the first like i i guess big change where someone else was on the camera and it wasn't me that was the first time ever really which now i think about it it just sounds silly but but back then i was the only one like lizzie my wife did not want she didn't wanna stream she had no interest in doing that even though we tried tried to get her to do it a few times the the the pronunciations were amazing but but really the first big step was was hiring chris and chris is still with us today and he was he was he was the you know the guinea pig that that had to try it out essentially for us and with us and has grown along the way with us so and now today chris chris has you know two two employees under him that stream and then also you know two three four ish other employees that sort ship and do other stuff for us too so so you've built this business as kind of the the individual that was public facing on the streams when people think about the brand they think about you and then you in order to scale you have to bring in other individuals to to help do the work were you obviously it's it's worked itself out you just kinda shared kind of the hiring and you know some expansion there but were you did you feel like you were giving up control of like what you have built in the brand by allowing someone else to do what you're doing like how did you manage through that out of the gates yeah mentally i i don't know if i'd say i felt like control it was more of like i had to get comfortable with letting someone else express themselves use be them be themselves be their own person you know but also at the same time they have to fit in line with how we are how we operate how we act you know they don't have to be a clone and people actually joked at the time they're like is chris your brother because he also had glasses he also wore a backwards hat on the street it was just kinda funny but no not brothers but but he you know it was very much watching his streams way more than i watched the guys today of like how's this gonna go how's he gonna act how's he gonna interact and then really at the time we had built a really strong community so how does he fit in that community and will they be receptive that was a huge question we just didn't know and luckily of course everything worked out really well but that was a big thing of would they would everyone receive him well or not you know because it wasn't me for the first time so and it all worked out great so so you had experience in the past through you know video games and twitch and opening up packs and like you know being the individual and responding back to chats but i think you know it is for anyone who hasn't done it before it can be uncomfortable finding the groove around kinda live selling what things you you're supposed to be doing things that your community wants you to do like talk to us about like the evolution of josh as the on air talent as the streamer like what are some of the things that you have picked up along the way that you have learned that is the types of things that your audience wants or expects when you're starting a new show yeah i think you know in the very beginning the number one thing is consistency you like to me we had to set a schedule we had to be on at certain whatever days of the week it was and you know the consistency of it being there showing up every day that goes a really long way to help start to build something from there but also like it's a lot of the conversations on the stream whether it's while we're ripping packs while we're not ripping packs while we're trying to fill something there's a lot there can be dead air at times like how do you fill that dead air and i feel like i don't know if it's just it's just me because sometimes you feel like you're talking to yourself you know there's times that happens you know but i think i think a lot of the the original the original group of people really enjoyed just the conversation and like and maybe it was you know during covid and there weren't a lot of you know human interactions going on so it really felt authentic and and was you know we talked about everything you know more than just cards and and things just there would be conversations about lord knows what on on a a twitch chat you know so i think that was the the biggest thing that that stood out to me was like how while i'm live i'm able to conversate interact and it's not and i guess like it takes time to get comfortable but when you're looking at cards i'm looking down and looking at cards how do you also conversate with everyone and and maybe not be entertaining words you're just acting you know crazy on the stream you don't have to do that but also like how do you carry that conversation and and engage everyone you know and also another thing that i really wanted to do was every time we went live i wanted to open something so there was a lot of times where i would go live and open things for myself and that's kinda how it started where it's just something fun to watch and something to do while maybe we're working on selling a spot or whatnot so what has your i guess what what kind of process do you have today that gives you the confidence before you go live in front of your audience that what you're about to deliver is going to be something that the audience wants it's gonna be on brand you've built this operation where it's not just you it's other people i'm just curious like to make a successful live show work like what are some of the kind of founding principles that you try to strive for each time you go live i would say you know there's a lot of pre stream that takes place and it's not even like i don't know if i'd say principles but more or less like business process of like we you know the break has to be i like to post the breaks during the day i like to send an email send a text out communicate the break to the discord and and really if we don't do those things that could lead to a poor stream or a stream that doesn't have the spots go as maybe they could if we communicated things better that's really the main thing is like the pre stream of the communication and really it's less now but it used to be a ton of discord engagement from me in the community and like talking to everybody posting things during the day you know if i'm at work i would be posting in discord you know just talking chatting about whatever if i had a little break or had a chance to do that you know that was really pivotal in the beginning i think was the off stream community aspect of it if that if that follows the that was that was key for us was having our discord in our community and still is today we still we still i i believe have a really the best community in the world a lot of people say that but i really do think that that our community is really awesome and it's it's in the discord to where that's manifested and built itself because we you know we do more than just livestream in there we you know we communicate the breaks but we also run like a fantasy football league you know ncaa football dynasty do things outside of cards and trading cards that engage everybody as well and that it's not like forced it's what i enjoy i enjoy doing it we enjoy doing it together you know how how important is like that nurturing element in the community building and giving your customers or future customers a space to hang out and chill and feel like they're not being sold to twenty four seven like i i that's by by giving use by giving them something else besides break spots where they have to spend their money like what has that done for you in the business i i think you know it was i think it was everything really because like when we very first started with team breaks the the first people that joined in were random people from ebay well so many of those same people are in our community today from those first streams that have you know found a place that they like a style they like and a community they like other people you know you say like minded but you know other people in you know for the most part everyone gets along really well and it was cool too just to touch on it we had a a our store grand opening was four weeks ago and we had a a a bunch of guys come in from out of town that i'd never met that had been in the stream for years and years and came to the store to see the first like grand opening and it was just so cool and and we had just the best time and it was it was just really cool to see like the community in real life come together like that it it was it was awesome but i think the the engagement there in the in the discord and in the in the community is pivotal i mean that is the most important thing to me is you know doing that and then also as we grow like chris and our other other team members also would need to engage and communicate in there as well to continue to to build that community up and you know have the same level of engagement as we you know grow and expand and become busier i will say it's been really hard on me to continue to do the same things with a lot more you know a lot different things on my plate but that's i think it's it's pivotal to to our success i'm not sure there's a better way to measure your brand than people on the internet who are attending your stream showing up in real life to support you that's pretty cool how how do you how how do you how does the retail location fit into kind of the streaming world and are they independent is do they co how do they coexist so i actually i'm in one of our stream rooms currently really the you know the idea of the physical store it was obviously something i think we all think about right that we all would consider like hey i wanna open my own store i in a lot of ways you know some people would say well why would you wanna open your own store you sell online you don't need the overhead the cost and i'm like yeah yeah but i kinda want one you know i kinda want to do that i kinda wanna go down that path and really for us the big thing was we you know when we started to hire more people everyone is streaming from our house in in my studio at home and it's like that doesn't always work with the baby and everything so it just became really obvious even if we didn't have a store we needed a space and office you know to stream from and it turned out that this space was able to kinda provide both you know we have three different studios here that we stream out of and have the store here so it's been really really cool in that aspect that they kind of complement each other in that way and we actually can't see it but we have big windows in the store that you can see the live stream that if people are people are ripping something it's just a cool experience to see it in here on the tv outside and also kinda have it all right here in the you know in the middle of the store basically we do have it enclosed you know that was a big question do we enclose it do we leave it open you know all we decided all of that stuff but but yeah they they coexist i think well but we're still we're still brand new we've been open four weeks officially oh wow so we've had we've had the space since february so it took a lot of time to plan and build out the studio aspect of it but once all that took place you know we opened the store a few months after that was done so is it is it nice you know stepping out of the studio and having a conversation with customers in real life versus the virtual component built your business on yeah it is and it's it's so different too because we've had a few people come by that are in the streams like on ebay and they're like hey i live twenty minutes away i'll come pick up my cards and that's just like it's just a new thing for us to get used to and and like it's really cool that they can come and see it and we don't have to ship it it it saves them you know the worry of the mail and all that stuff so it it's really cool that there's a spot and if people ever come visit too like there's it's kinda like a home base you know it's kind of a place you could come and hang out and you know enjoy whether it's streams cards conversations food whatever it is you know we could we have a good spot for that so it's really it's really cool so hitting on ebay live you made mention that some of the individuals who showed up at your grand opening were people that started as just ebay users who found kinda your breaks and kinda met you there maybe talk about the experience of just selling on ebay live and just in terms of like the biggest benefits that you've experienced you know obviously there's a ton of people who are on ebay regularly but i'm curious like there's a lot of places to stream and there's a lot of different strengths of each of these places i'm just kinda curious on the ebay live front what you like about it yeah i i mean i think majority of our business and sales is on ebay live now and really over the last i would it's really been two years i guess but really last year they've really put a big emphasis on it and knowing that like is the platform perfect it's not perfect but knowing that you have support you have a team that's working on it they're they're you know you know ebay is so big and also has been around for so long a lot of the processes and things are made for things that don't include live selling and live streaming so they're really recreating the wheel a lot but i i really find that ebay is i think the ebay live like the community the chat is is really positive for the most part it's really i guess sort of easygoing there's not a lot of like negativity which is which is great you know to see you see that a lot sometimes i really think that the chats and the community on ebay live specifically is is really awesome that's why i like to sell there for the most part but also they're building more and more tools it is a work in progress it's not perfect but also i i like the the idea that it's or not the idea but the the fact that it's it's they have to approve sellers like not anyone can do it now you could anyone can apply and they do you know they are bringing in more people which is awesome the more the more on the platform the better but there is like a a process and a standard for streams and breaks and it it allows to me the buyer to feel safe and comfortable and that's the most important thing love that maybe getting in the weeds a little bit about your breaks and just like processes like what is what all goes into kind of each show that you're running in just the nuts and bolts of kind of the workflow and making sure that the promises that you say on the front end of you know your cards are gonna get delivered and here's when to expect them and this is what we do like how do you ensure that kind of you have a process in place that makes makes it i won't say foolproof because stuff happens but gives you all and your customers the best chance of kind of keeping the relationship going for the foreseeable future yeah i think you know for us you know we our process we we do a bunch of different styles of breaks right so the first style is the standard pick your team break which we actually do less on ebay than i thought we would that's for a few reasons mostly because the team like workflow creating the break isn't the best at the moment it's getting better but we do a lot of like pick your player breaks on ebay so we'll sell the player on core ebay core and we run the stream on ebay live and twitch we dual stream it together so we do a a group of that and then we also do live auctions which on any other platform i've ever been on live auctions never do that well and so for them to actually perform and it's not like it's really never like way over and above but to actually perform close to what the market price of a box is you know it actually is pretty pretty good on ebay live we actually hit in general where the box what the box should cost roughly so that's that's really encouraging and so we do you know we have team breaks and we actually do it a little differently we don't do random which is odd for some people some people don't you know it's different we actually go down the list and auction each team off individually so you know the first one say it's football it's arizona cardinals you know they go first and we go cheapest team to best team essentially is how we do it so you know as a customer you know what you're bidding on you know what team you're gonna get and you know kind of what that team should cost roughly and as a seller you know we don't have the negative effect of you know the good teams going first or on the flip side as the buyer you don't have the good teams at the very end where everyone's bidding like crazy to get it it's very i i guess relaxed in in that form it's not as there's not as much you know i i i don't know if you call it a a fight or like you know there's not as much animosity between buyer and seller it's way more of a relaxed environment which i that's what i love about it but we do we do a a mix of those things live auctions pick your team and then also player breaks on ebay and really like you know getting into the weeds a little bit building a player break you know you're building a you know with for prism soccer seven hundred and ninety spots there's a ton of players that are in the set so you have you know we have to you know we use excel and we use the tools from ebay to upload our our spots so without those tools you can't you can't list seven hundred ninety players individually on your phone by yourself it just doesn't work right so luckily ebay is has those tools to to use and we can bulk list and bulk upload and all that fun stuff so it allows us to run our streams you know flawlessly but also like you know there are there are struggles you know that that you can only have seven hundred fifty listings on one ebay livestream so if there's seven hundred ninety players well guess what there's forty that aren't listed in there and that's a whole another thing but overall i think that's that's what's really cool about ebay is the that we're able to to bulk sell and bulk list even on like a you know if we're doing a live auction stream there's you know thirty two nfl teams and let's say we're gonna run twelve breaks you know you that's a lot of spots that you have to list you know thirty two and then twelve different times and you list them all out you know which it it doesn't sound like it would be that cumbersome but we put the individual break number on every single break that's how we stay organized and it's just our process you know so but it is decently easy to do on ebay with the upload yeah i don't think a lot of people who spend money in breaks understand how insanely challenging it can be for someone like you to come up with the process and actually do the work how much how much work versus like how how much work behind the scenes like competes for your time versus how much work you know in front of the camera competes for your time like if you had to like weigh them are they about even one more than the other it used to be the camera was majority but it is is certainly not anymore with all of our different things so so we do we do consignments on ebay we do we do have grading services which are a little slower now with all the issues with the backlog stuff we have the physical store we have live streams on ebay live fanatics live our website and twitch and then we also have remote guys kiwi runs our odiz hits channel and then chris does odiz baseball chris ben and graham all do that for us so now i spend probably eighty percent on back end and twenty percent on the camera but that being on the camera is important to me like i don't ever envision a time where i won't be on the camera whatsoever and and it's it's not just important i just enjoy it it's fun like i i need that fun i need that that open impacts and having a good time to you know to feel fulfilled i guess you know so i do we we are doing a ton of back end things you know on top of scheduling streams and all this but you're buying product you're buying supplies you're shipping this shipping that and you know and and you mentioned earlier too about fulfillment you know typically our ebay breaks we fulfill them we ship them the next day so we rip it on wednesday we ship it on thursday that is a massive turnaround to send you know ten cases of breaks out the next day that is a huge lift on our team here and you know i'm really proud of that like how we're i feel like our service on ebay is the best there is our service on ebay with the shipping the the timing the communication we actually have two two employees that their sole responsibility is ebay messaging essentially twenty four seven they watch it eight hours and eight hours and i watch it the other eight so we have twenty four seven coverage on our messaging to to allow that communication and it's so it's so important to our to our business to communicate because you asked earlier you know how how someone feels comfortable to come back you know and that that really makes to me it makes a difference it doesn't mean they're gonna respond but but we're gonna communicate it we're gonna we're gonna do our part to the best of our ability so has there been i guess you've been doing this for quite a while there's been a lot of different breaks over the years maybe what are what are some of the most memorable moments on camera like cards that you pulled things that stand out where it was like you couldn't believe you hit a card for a customer that sort of thing i think the the one that i don't know why it it just stands out the most above anything else we hit a gold kaboom jamar chase and now you know big card but not like not cooper flagg eight million dollar debut patch card but you know that for some that stands out to me so much because that was early days of our streams our community it was very much we're we were at that point doing not doing any ebay breaks because ebay had shut down all the breaks no one was allowed to do breaks on ebay and we were strictly selling our website only that's it so we were you know trying to to fill things and trying to sell things in in some ways it was nice because we had options we could do what we wanted there were no like rules and quotes you know like we could do certain things to have fun on the stream and not you know affect any other policies or whatever but that that particular card there was a you we essentially were trying to fill a spot and i can't i think we were doing a one box break and we were breaking the boxes down if i remember right it was like the the absolute had like three mini boxes right and we broke it all the way down and we were doing like some sort of filler for the spot and the spot was like eighty bucks and the filler was like eight bucks and the guy paid eight dollars and hit a gold kaboom jamar chase and the and it sold for like eighteen thousand dollars seventeen eighteen thousand dollars back then and it was just an insane moment of very early days and like it was just it was just unreal that someone in our community like like we helped them you know i guess make that make that sale we helped we helped all assets or all facets of that to to help see that through for them it was just really cool that that that happened that's really the one that always stands out to me is that that gold jamar chase it's like my favorite it's one of my favorites yeah not bad there's a a a lot of bengals fans i'm sure in your neck of the woods yes yeah and and this was it was someone in california actually that that pulled it but but yeah it was just it was really cool it was just one of those that i never forget how much how important is like the hitting of the card in the clip and then the people seeing it on the socials how how important is that for a brand who's you know breaking and live selling like does it obviously you know when that stuff gets pulled people love that content they wanna see it they'll like it they'll share it but how much of of that kind of leads to maybe people coming and checking out your breaks in the future you know i don't know actually i i kinda think it doesn't impact it a ton now i will say there's times where you know if i post a group of photos from cards that we hit and that you know there might be a comment like man you guys have so many awesome hits i need to join next time you know that does happen some i i kinda think it doesn't really impact it that much mhmm i do think there's probably a a certain percentage that like i bought in four or five times got nothing and maybe they don't return that's that is that's what eats at me is like it's not i can't control what's in the box but i wanna i hope that they return for for our service for our you know the stream the quality all the other things that go into it but the big hit the big moment i think it matters but also i don't know if it moves the needle on the grand scheme of things you just opened a store your team is growing a lot going on with odz sports cards what's next like what where is your head at going into twenty twenty seven in terms of things that you wanna accomplish so we are going to start streaming on tiktok that is gonna be kind of our next endeavor to see kinda how that goes i think tiktok's really grown a lot in the in the space as far as collectibles and things go we're gonna try try our hand there but other than that like and that's pretty short term we're building out a office space in florida at our in our cape coral florida location and so essentially those were trying to and they do baseball only so we're trying to kinda ramp that up a little bit in the short term so we'll and you know we essentially wanna have them to have a staff you know right now there's there is a staff but it's a lot of you know family members helping and being nice and wanting you know wanting to help out but i want to essentially build a similar staff that we have here down there as well and that that it just gives us more options and then you know in the long long term maybe if we did have a second store location that's probably where it would be don't know for sure that we're doing that yet you know we're still kind of trying to figure out if we if we make money here or not but but but you know it's it's on my mind at least that's kind of on our i guess on a road map for the future but really the biggest thing is getting them getting them the help with with sorting and shipping and letting them live stream and and do their thing on the live stream and then having having a team to help us you know complete the task there it's been awesome to learn about your business josh before i let you go a lot of people listening there are a lot of people breaking into cards starting businesses a lot of individuals starting life selling businesses you've been doing this for quite a while you shared a lot of insight and info based on kinda your build for anyone out there who might be starting kind of a or thinking about starting a live selling business like what is one piece of advice that you'd share with them that has been instrumental to your growth yeah i mean i mentioned a little bit earlier i just think consistency is most important you know especially if you know live selling as a whole if you look at other industries whether it's tools or golf clubs or watches or clothes fashion all kinds of like live selling is is here to stay in my opinion so whether it's cards or not i i think consistency in your streams trying not to worry so much about the dollar and trying to like let that take care of itself but trying to engage with the community and just just be there like show up be be i would say be on time i'm notorious for being slightly late but you know just just have a schedule and be there for for them essentially you know and it it's not gonna go perfect there's gonna be problems issues and you don't have to have the best tech in the world it doesn't you don't need the best microphone or camera or lighting i mean lighting makes a world of difference if you just go with some a couple of lights but you know you can you can start anywhere to be honest and and it doesn't have to be perfect and it definitely won't be but consistency and and and showing up for the for your community i think is most important josh it was a pleasure everyone can go check out his breaks over on ebay live looking forward to doing this again down the road absolutely appreciate you having me thank you guys