We are back with another episode of Passion and Profession. It's fun. This kinda last lap of this series this year, we're reconnecting with some old friends, and we're doing that in today's episode.

And I I wanted to reach back out to some of the sellers that we had on previous episode, especially because, like, the market is crazy right now, and so I wanted to get some perspective.

So we're gonna be talking about kinda, like, what it's been like, scaling, working in a business while the market's crazy.

And today, I'm joined by Josh from PC Sports Cards. Excited for this chat. Josh, how you been, man? It's been great.

And we've had a the last fifteen minutes have been great just shooting the shit with you off the air. That's we hey. We're we're letting people behind the scenes. We're talking about, collectibles, memorabilia, college football.

Maybe Pat Tillman. Because I always ask, Ryan Hoesch when he's on here about his, Pat Tillman jersey, maybe share with the audience who are primarily listening, what you got in the background.

Oh, so I saw Ryan's episode. Ryan and I are actually really good friends. And, I saw his episode with his jersey, so I had to bring in my Pat Tillman signed helmet.

It's, it's a Pat it's becoming a Pat Tim Tillman memorabilia, podcast. Well, let's let's start with, like, the topic at hand, and that is just the market demand.

Every conversation I'm in, it's like staffing people are needing to hire. There's people are trying to slow down the speed of everything happening because it's just, like, craziness all the way around.

I'm curious just on your end what what it feels like running PC sports cards when demand prices are kind of at an all time high right now.

So it's funny you you ended that question with all time high because my reference is gonna be to 2020 and 02/2021. Right? Like, it feels like the days where we're just pushing, pushing, pushing. We scaled up our office.

We hired, like, 25% new employees. Focusing on with with our focus on live and our focus on core, it's just we're growing in multiple ways right now where we actually just opened up full consignment on eBay live.

We used to just take graded cards. Now anybody that wants to send something for eBay live, we're figuring out how to do that.

We're scaling up that process, hiring internally, partnering for some different grading stuff that we can get into a little bit later if you want to.

Just we have we have a lot of stuff going, and it feels like 2020, 2021 where wake up, get my kid off to school, come to work, get him home from school, and then two days a week, come back into the office.

It's just it's literally nonstop, and it's extremely fun again. How are you finding the right people to get on the bus?

Obviously, when you have a you need a hire that usually there's growth happening. Like, how are you finding, you know, the right employees who love cards or are good fits for the roles?

Like, what's your strategy been? It's funny. We used to actually look for people that would fit into that mold, and it gets very hard to find those people in the New York area. Like, just like it's so specific to where we are.

So we're hiring people that may not be into cards, but are looking to be in a fun, fast paced environment with a bunch of like minded people, sometimes card people actually end up not being the right employee because they get so infatuated with every card that they become less efficient and less efficient for everybody else.

So it's a it's an interesting balance looking for some personalities for live, looking for some of those people that are just really detail oriented, to focus and follow all the all the different, systems that we put in place here to protect our customers and their and their cards.

I think when when I had a run-in with you at the national, you were kinda in the middle or just getting done with a live session.

And I think since, we spoke last time to now, it feels like the PC sports card brand is really getting connected to the live experience.

Obviously, it feels like you're putting some time, energy, and investment into it. What has it been about kinda live selling that you're you're enjoying or has been good for your business?

I think it's just the future of the hobby. I think it's the few like, we have shorter attention spans. Right? And, I mean, content is a perfect example to to use also for comparison.

You have people that wanna take in long form content, and you have people that wanna take in sort of that four to eight minute content, and you have people that wanna just take in that thirty second reel and flip to the next one.

So having core, we have that long form content. Right? Like, we have seven to ten day auctions, could be five days if people really want it, where people can let it let it sit and grow and and watch their items for that entire time.

And then we have the short term content. Right? We're doing, I think, 10 shows a week right now. We're in negotiations for another office across the hall from us to grow into so we could be doing more shows.

So we really wanna we wanna be able to provide that full service for not only our sellers, but also all the buyers that are out there in the hobby.

I think it's just such a fascinating topic, and almost every conversation I get in to with different leaders in this space, live selling comes up.

So it's I feel like it's a trend, and it's going to be something that sticks based on just the interest.

Do you feel like it caters towards a specific, demographic of buyers? Or through your experience, has it been kinda just, like, breaking, like, any different type of participant in the hobby, jumps in and does it?

So I think I think young folks, obviously, that have grown up with more of the TikTok, Instagram experience, and the real experience sort of feel that could get a better feel for it and get into it more.

But I also think that a lot of savvy and educated buyers are looking for it.

Like, we we see some stuff that just sells some stuff goes over comp. There's no question about it. There's some stuff that goes way too high. But in general, there's really good value for buyers out there.

We've been buying we we've been buying a lot of collections of, like, 1 to $10 cards, grading them and then selling them because we're making enough money that it makes it worthwhile, and we're giving our customers good product for the value that they're getting, and we're still making enough money where it makes it when we sell our own stuff.

It's really to me, it's really a way to get out of cards faster. Like, you wanna move a card, you can sell it online. It's done. It's it's gone in a day. And the the savvy buyers are really going to the streams and picking stuff up.

I've been buying stuff for 75, 80% on some other streams and then selling it for full price on eBay. You know? I do it every once in a while. I know a lot of people that jump in that way.

I always like to ask the question about just, like, your observations on, like, performance of specific categories, sports, players, markets. Like, it's I it we tend to just be like, the market is going up.

Everything is ripping. And there might be some truth and validity to that, but maybe on your end, what is catching your attention? Like, what is surprising you the most in terms of, like, growth during this period?

I don't I don't think it's surprising it. I have I'm skewed more towards lower end graded cards that are that that's sort of the the stuff that I deal with day to day.

Right? Like, I don't deal with a lot of our customer stuff day to day. I deal with, like, what I'm looking at it live. So it's really the growth I see and the safest stuff I see is the it's the obvious.

Right? The judges, the Ohtanis, the Mahomes, those cards that are graded are always gonna sell well, and they're there's always gonna be velocity of their sales.

They're always they're not gonna sit. They're gonna move. Right? And soccer's obviously exploding. We don't need to even talk about that. I I'm sure you've talked about that ad nauseam.

Right? But the real stuff that moves is the stuff that somebody wants to put in their collection and look at. Right? So you're seeing we're seeing Aaron Judge cards go for $45 that I would think would be $30.

We're seeing Ohtani cards go for $45 that I would think would be $20. Right? Like, it it's just this the right names, The most collectible names are the ones that are getting bought up.

I I appreciate following you and your content because you talk about something I don't necessarily see a lot of other people talk about.

I think we get infatuated by, like, these bigger sales and we we go up a tier, another level, and then all of a sudden, it's like we forget about, like, what's maybe possible and levels below.

And you're constantly, like, talking about, like, grading and grading, like, even base cards of of these stars and just, like, what is possible and what can happen if you're, like, really putting a strategy together.

And I think about players like Judge, and I think about Ohtani where they've got all of these cards in, like, our mindsets as collectors go towards, well, let's get the biggest and the best and the rarest and the scarcest.

But I feel like you're doing a pretty decent job of educating and reminding us that it we don't necessarily always have to play in that territory.

Is that just like how you've always operated in the hobby with that mindset where you see kind of the best opportunity? So our business was built on grading low end cards and selling them for profit.

Right? That's literally the start of PC sports cards. Yeah. The answer is yes because most of the hobby can't afford, like, the Mahomes n t r p a that I have back there. Most of the hobby can't just lay out money and have that.

Right? But anybody out there could buy a $10 Aaron Judge 2,018 Pink Refractor, look it over, send it into PSA, sell it for a $100. Right? Anybody could anybody in this hobby could find that card.

I think it's like a 75% gem rate. So anybody could do that. Right? One cool thing that we do at PC that nobody else does is we can do that whole process for you where you don't have to take money out of your pocket for the grading.

They will sell it for you and you'll get paid on that. Right? No nobody else does that. You can send us 20 cards and sell seven of them if you want to. You don't have to sell everything.

We have the most flexible system for that out there. And I think that that's the entry level to the hobby, and you need to service the entry level more than you need to service the super high end. Right?

Our focus is on getting those customers in because that guy that sells the $50 card, if he's doing it right, in three months is selling a $200 card, in six months, he's selling a thousand dollar card, and all of a sudden, he took that $200 that he started with, and now it's $2,000.

You don't need to start with a huge number, and then you could start buying those bigger cards that you really want. But it could all start from 5 to $10 cards.

The so this has been the foundation for your business and that mindset and mentality. There's a lot of growth happening. You're talking about hiring. What we've talked about live selling already too. A whole, list of topics already.

But has anything dramatically outside of you doing live selling now for the first time, has anything dramatically changed for your business over the past twelve months in just the terms of how you operate and think about, you know, servicing the end customer?

So we've really focused on two things. One, getting customers cards up quicker than anybody else. We've done surveys.

We've talked to our customers. And what we're told, which we don't really always agree with, is that getting the card listed and sold faster is more valuable than trying to time the market or trying to get it listed on the right day.

Like, get it in, get it up, get me paid.

That that's the feedback that we get, and we've turned our focus to that rather than trying to we'll still curate a Thursday high end auction. But now instead of us just doing that, we're emailing our customers and saying, hey.

Do you want us to do that? Like, we pick these cards out for that auction. We can either listen tomorrow, or we can list them in three days on the Thursday for the longer auction that's higher end. Most people are like, it's $50.

50 right now. Right? Some people, like, get it up right away. Some people, like, launch it. So we're sort of we're tapping into what our customers are telling us even if it goes against what our original thoughts were.

The other thing is the safety for our customers, and we're trying to build a system that is the most secure for our customers so they have the peace of mind that their cards are taken care of from the minute they get here to the minute they leave here.

So and it starts with us recording every single package that gets opened, which I don't think any other consignment company does.

You so you you're very mindful of kinda customer relationship. I think inevitably in business well, obviously, trust is always important. It's it's especially important in the hobby and hobby businesses.

I think one of the things when businesses are scaling and growing, it's unless you're, like, super mindful of it, it's really challenging to continue to maintain the same level of relationship with your customer and making sure that trust is, always there.

How do you think about maintaining trust with your customers and potential new customers as you continue to try new things like live selling and expand your business?

I mean, we have we have a good customer service team that talks to everybody, takes care of everybody.

The other thing we're doing is actually probably in about two to three weeks, we're gonna be launching a new website that's gonna give an even more detailed look into what's going on into your account.

So there's even more transparency with everything. We we were the first company to create a website in this space for the consignment and grading.

We were the first company to actually create a second website because our first website went out of style, and now we're creating a third website.

So we're just we're continuing to invest in our company to give our customers the best service and best experience possible.

There's been a lot of conversations around, like, I've I just had a conversation with Ryan Hogue about just the demand and the increased demand PSA is getting and turnaround times and managing that.

It's I think it's, like, just a challenge in the hobby business when supply is coming in and you gotta figure out staff resources, operations around those things.

We talked a little bit about hiring, but how do you account for, like, a new head count at PC Sports Cards win?

Like, what is the moment when you're like, oh, shit. We need to bring some someone new on to help manage this or something is going to break.

Like, how do you think about that? So that's a great question. And we've sort of changed how we thought about that. We used to be the kind of company that would be, like, more of a just in time hiring where that mattered.

Right? Like, oh, we're growing. We see growth. Let's hire. Right? About six months ago, we we we switched that around and said, we are always hiring.

So we're gonna overhire. We're gonna have two or three people here that we don't need, and we're gonna pay them extra money to be here to learn because inevitably, somebody's gonna quit.

Inevitably, somebody's gonna get into a car accident and can't come in for a week. Inevitably, we're gonna grow. We're gonna go to a new space. We're gonna need somebody's going on vacation for a week.

So we're gonna over hire, be overstaffed, and be over repaired so our customers are always taken care of and the cards are always taken care of. And that that that's one of those mindset shifts that we had probably six months ago.

What was the moment for you where you had to change that? Because I know it's it's tough just as a business owner to be like, I need to pay someone more to maybe not do anything right now, but we need to be prepared.

Like, what what happened to make you have that mindset shift? I don't think it was one specific thing. It was just, like, three people were like, I I can I go on vacation this week?

Right? Or two people were on vacation, and then two people called out sick, and then we're in there for extra four, six hours a day. And it's and I'm away on vacation, and I can't do anything about it.

And it's, it's just in a growth industry and a growth part of the market, in order to in order to show everybody that we're the right place for them to use, they have to have the best experience.

They have to be able to say, hey. I use PC sports cards, and I love that. I everything is perfect. I've never had a problem.

Actually, I had this one problem, but they solved it right away. Right? Mhmm. Like, that's the perfect referral to me. Right? And that happens. Mistakes happen. And hiring usually leads to mistakes because that person is new.

And then how you handle that mistake is how your business really succeeds. I wanna get your perspective on the kinda changing of the landscape, especially specifically on eBay. Right?

We've I have the fortunate thing for me is I get to meet a lot of you business owners doing this show and learning about your business, and we have seen definitely, there's been news just about, like, probes probe steam doing his own thing, leaving eBay.

And when you I I'm just curious.

Like, when you see something like that and you see a long term, seller, like, going off and doing building their own platform, I would imagine to you that seems like, oh, there's there's this seems like a opportunity for me as a business to, you know, step in and maybe cater to some of his previous clients.

I'm curious. Just like everyone knows each other. Like, I'm everyone meets each other at shows.

I'm just curious, like, what when you heard the news and how that all shook out, like, does that make you do anything different about how you're running your business? I don't think it does anything different to our business.

It it definitely gives us a kick in the ass to make sure that we're ahead on hiring because we know we're gonna take some of that market share, and we're gonna push for that market share, it just excites me.

Right? It's just like this is somebody that's been selling tens of thousands of items a week for over a decade.

And his stuff's not up, so he's not gonna be able to do everything yet. So those customers are out there, and they're out there for the taking.

And we're working on specific marketing plans to introduce those customers to our services and how we're different than everybody else that they could choose to use.

I will say one other thing that we started doing is we started sponsoring some shows in the local areas. We started going to shows and partnering with eBay.

Like, we went to the Philly show, and we took consignment at the eBay booth at the Philly show. There's a reason that eBay chose us to represent them at the Philly show taking consignment.

Right? So we believe in those types of partnerships, and we want to be the go to consignor for all those people that are leaving Rick. Right? Anybody that wants to keep on selling on eBay, we we're ready to take your business.

We have the capacity. We're always growing. We're always hiring. Give us a shot. How important do you think it is to get out in front and meet your customers face to face or meet future customers face to face?

So much of what we do is digital online, interacting with people that we've maybe never even seen their face before, but, like, how important is that for you?

Are are you finding it more important now than ever before? We've always known that it was important.

We sort of I could say we had a complacent mindset for a while and that we realized how much more important it is to our business to grow, to be out there meeting with people and getting to the shows.

And even if it's not me and Zach, it's the guys that work for us.

Right? They just wanna see a face. They don't care if it's the owner. They just want somebody to talk to. And the guys that we send to the shows, they'll come back and be, oh, I met this person.

He gave us this. And then they'll be telling me about their text conversations with the people that they had that they had met. So they're developing the relationships, which is great.

It it adds longevity to business and means that I could trust them to go to those shows and to send them all over the country to collect Is there and I I I ask this question all the time when I'm talking to owners of, consignment operations like PC Sports Cards, but I'm just curious.

But it's I know it's can be a blur because you're getting all of these cards and all the cards get listed and the cards get sold and then on a whole new batch.

But is there, like, a card or any specific cards just over the last you know, maybe since the national to today that stand out to you that are, like, memorable cards that, like, we can maybe get a little nerdy about that have sold through PC sports cards that, you recall?

I'm trying I'm trying to think of the cards that, like, I've actually done some, content with.

So, like Yep. One that just came in that I think is really cool, my one of my buddies actually, we have a a real going up out of today. One of my buddies joined the break.

He just got it he just got into the hobby. Right? He's a private chef in my area. He's cooked at my house four or five times. Amazing. I'm actually gonna see him on Sunday who's cooking for, my family.

And he just text, text, text, text, text, text, pull, pull, pull, pull, pull. Is this good? Is this good? Is this good? Sends me a picture. He had a Curry horizontal kaboom. $16 in a in a break. We sent it in for grading.

It got a 10. It got a huge upcharge, and now we're selling that. Now he's gonna turn that $16 plus $600 for grading into $10,000. And, like, to me, that's cool. Right? So, like, that kind of stuff I can nerd out about.

One of my buddies hit a one of one of my other friends hit a messy, immaculate RPA that we just sold for him for, like, $12 that he hit a break where it was the the the top of the break was $5, and he got that and we sold it for $12.

Like, there's just a lot of there's stuff like that that I find interesting.

If you ask me from the national on, the problem is that after the national, I got COVID. And then after COVID, I went on a cruise and got engaged, and then I came back.

Congrats. Thank you. And so, like, that month is gone. Right? And then now I've been back, and it's been, like, three weeks. So I and I've just been focused on, like, creating content. So, like, take away August.

So September was pretty cool for us also. Well, I I I you're doing something right because you've got a friend that's a chef who's cooking for you and your family. So, I mean, come on, man. You you I don't pay it.

My family pays it. How like, what sort of advice maybe, like, advice strategies for sellers, during this period? I think I you hear so much information, but I always like to hear it from someone who's, like, in the thick of it.

Like, it's a hot market. Things are scorching. I'm like, it's stuff it probably won't be like this forever, but, like, what sort of advice do you have for sellers trying to kinda scale, during a a hot market like we're in?

So it depends what kind of seller it is. The sellers that I deal with, mostly are the great and the consignment kind of seller. Right? So, like, let your cards fund your purchases and let and I call it a snowball effect.

I don't know what anybody else calls it. I'm sure other people say that. Right? Get the ball rolling down the hill. Buy the card, grade the card, sell the card. Buy the card, grade the card, sell the card.

Unless you absolutely fall in love with something, If you're doing it to make money, do it that way. If you're doing it to collect, great. Buy other cards to grade, to sell, to grow your collection. Right?

You're gonna make more money reusing that dollar over and over again when you know what you're doing rather than trying to watch something and try to catch lightning in a bottle with some crazy jump in value at this point in the market.

It's not twenty twenty twenty twenty one that way.

It's more of a steady growth. Soccer is different right now, but it's more of a steady growth, and we're building a better base for the hobby to carry the pyramid rather than just looking at what's the top.

And that's what we focus on. You said it earlier. Right, Brett? Like, we focus on the low end because that's the base that supports the hobby, and that's who we wanna deal with the most.

So maybe getting, like, super tactical because I think to to have like, the audience having someone who's built a business based on this, like, is if if this were you today and it I don't wanna, like, get your secret sauce, and this is, like, maybe how you operate.

But, like, what is, like, what is a card or a profile of a card that you would that you could go out and buy and that would need a grade that you would look at? Like, how many copies would you potentially go after?

And, like, what would you expect from a return at PSA? And then, like, how quickly would you then list those cards? Like, in your mind, like, what what is that what does that play for you right now?

Right. I'm such a nerd also, by the way. So I have a spreadsheet from when I started doing this again back how three months ago of, like, by player, by grade, what my grade rate is.

I use an AI called CheckAI that we can actually do for people now. And, like, how does my grade compare to the CheckAI grade? Like, the cards and this is what I see. You'll see this on everything that I've ever done on YouTube.

The cards that you can use to grade to make money are something that somebody else is willing to pay a premium for graded. Forget about what you think. You don't need a low numbered card of some schlub.

Right? Give me any shiny Patrick Mahomes card, any refractor Aaron Judge or Shohei Ohtani card. I don't care what it is. Right? Or give me those bomb squad cards. Those are sneaky good value because they're cool cards.

People like them. Right? So give me those. Check the PSA pop report. If it grades for over seven 65, 70% PSA 10 and you have a decent eye, if you're getting 65 to 75%, you're making money.

Right? That that's really what you need where you need to be for a PSA 10. And I I it's not a secret sauce. This I share this with everybody. I did a I did something couple years ago. I I never really finished it.

I did a thousand dollar challenge on on YouTube where I started with a thousand bucks. I bought cards on eBay from other sellers. I looked them over, showed myself looking them over, sent them in for grading, and then sold them.

I took no discounts. I didn't take whatever discount I get from PSA, I didn't take. Whatever discount I get from eBay, I didn't take. I set it as if I was a customer, and I turned a thousand dollars into, I think, $4,500 in two months.

Right? Maybe it takes a little bit longer because you have longer times at PSA right now, but another like, this is why I wanna make sure people understand what grading the consignment is.

Right? Say you get 10 cards or $10 each, you spend a $100. You wanna get them graded. You're looking at now it's called $25 with rounding.

Right? It's $22, but call 25 with rounding. You're looking at another $250 out of pocket. So you're looking at you need $350 to get started. The way that we do it, you need a $100 to get started.

We get those cards back. We sell them for you, and that covers that $2. 50 plus you get money back. So now you could take that $3. 50 and you could buy 35 cards instead of just 10 cards.

So you can grow it a lot faster. As long as you know what you're looking for or you have a way to evaluate the cards, that that's just it lets you get that economy of scale way faster.

I love this. And, like, so we started with an example of, like, selling and then you you shared some there, but maybe, like, moving over to consignment, for collectors consigning cards.

And maybe it is the grade to consign, but so much of what we do in sending our cards to consignors is trying to, like, maximize value.

Like, right now, what sort of advice do you have for collectors who are selling via consignment? Like, is there is it just kinda business as usual, or is there anything tactically that you can recommend in this market?

To me, it's business as usual. Right? If you have something that you don't wanna keep long term for your collection and you're looking to grow it and looking to make more money on it, sell it now and move on to the next.

Find somebody that's gonna sell it for you and pay you right away. I would say look for the company that's selling cards in your price range or of your players.

We have a lot of people that take advantage of our combined shipping. Right? We sell our average sale price on eBay right now is about a $100 an item.

Right? We sell a lot of stuff that's lower and then we sell a lot of stuff that's higher than that. We're now that Rick is gone, we probably have more $1,000 plus sales per week than any other consignor on eBay.

Right? And there are people that sell a lot more cards than us, but they don't get as many cards a thousand dollars and up still. Right? That being said, I wanna focus on the guys that are selling the 50 to $75 cards.

Like, to me, 50 to $2. 50 is the key range. Right? So I want all of those cards because I think that's where the market lives. That's where the the heart of the market is is in that range.

What what are some of the biggest mistakes that you see, sellers make, during, like, these peak moments? The biggest mistake is putting something on fixed price at a crazy number and then getting a reasonable offer and saying, no.

I can get more. The Talk about it more. Talk about it more. That that I I, you know, I have it listed for 2,000. Last sale was 1,200. 1,500 is not enough.

I'm gonna get my 2,000. Three weeks late no. You should take it. No. You should take it. No. You should take it. No. No. No. I'm gonna wait. I'm gonna wait. Three weeks later, I need money. Send it to auction. $1,200.

Does does does the do you do you find and this is getting, like, kinda super in the weeds, but do you find that a card that's been listed at a buy it now price where you've got the seller on the other side rejecting reasonable offers because they're holding out who then eventually caves and puts the card at auction?

Do you think that that card inevitably because everyone's already seen it for a price and it's been sitting there.

Do you think that hurts its potential in an auction format? No. I act I act the way that I try to sell not not the stuff that's, like, like, not the Jaden Daniels rookie or the Judge low end card. Like, the better stuff.

When you're what my strategy with a lot of the higher end stuff is listed for fixed price because I think you if you list something for fixed price, there is a big delta between what an auction ends at and what a fixed price sale will sell for.

Right? Now there's a time frame that's different. Right? You're not getting it done in five days, seven days, or ten days.

It might be three months. It might be two months. It might be two weeks. You don't know. But I'd I always say to list those cards for about two to four weeks, especially depending on the season.

And if it doesn't sell, then send it to auction. You're gonna get roughly what you would have gotten unless something bad happened.

But you're taking you're you have the opportunity to get that one buyer because I know a lot of people will say an auction is what one person is willing to pay for it, but that is mathematically just incorrect.

Right? An auction is an auction ends at one bid above the second highest bidder.

Mhmm. Right? If it if I bid 1,200 and somebody else bid 600, I'm getting that card for $6. 10. Right? I'm not getting it for 1,200. I'm getting it for $6. 10 even though I was willing to pay that much for it.

Right? So a fixed price is a more accurate portrayal of what a card is worth to that one person. An auction is what it's worth to the second person at that random time, during that random auction, in that in that five to ten day window.

Do you do you find like, as a buyer, Josh the buyer, when you're when you understand what a card sells for, do you like, when you're negotiating and you're trying to land on a a price that makes you feel good, do you do you factor that in, like, buying format, buy it now versus auction?

Is that part of the conversation as you're trying to acquire a card? If I can use it to my advantage?

Sure. I love the honesty. I mean, it's the truth. Right? I I'll I'll always be honest. In general, I'm not buying a ton of stuff to flip. Like, I'll make post places and say I'm paying 85 to 75 to 85, maybe 90% depending on what it is.

And I'll pay it fair enough. Whatever card letter says, I'll pay that. Right? As long as it's the right names. Right? I'm not gonna buy it if some somebody I don't know.

When I'm buying stuff for myself, I'm willing to pay full price for it because I want it for me. Mhmm. So it doesn't usually, the people that are selling to me are coming to me for money.

Right? So it's not as it's not as hard of a negotiation. It's more like, this is what's reasonable. This is what I'm willing to pay. If you wanna do it, cool. Here's the money.

If not, I totally get it. Like, go get more somewhere else if you can, if you can't come back. What, what excites you the most right now, maybe in the next, like, six to twelve months with PC sports cards and what you're working on?

Growth. Growth excites me most. Right? I it it's like I said, it's 2020 to 2021 all over again. There's just we're growing live. We're growing core.

We're growing grading. Even with PSA getting all these cards, our grading is growing for them. The the content that we're putting out is growing. Like, it it's just it's the ability the the AI pre grading that we're doing is growing.

Like, it's just the ability to take steps forward. Like, we joke like, me and my ASU friends joke around. ASU for the eleventh straight year, 11, has been named the number one school in innovation in The United States.

And it it ahead of MIT, ahead of Stanford, ahead of every other school, we're number one in innovation, and we find a way to innovate in this space. Right? We saw live as a chance.

We did it. We did great into consignment. We're doing the instead of looking over cards or somebody giving me an idea, we're using the AI pre grading to do it for somebody. So, like, we like to we were the first ones to have a website.

You know, we we like to be that step ahead and let everybody else end up copying what we're doing. We need to do a better job as a company of having that message get out there to potential customers. Right?

Like, if you if you're sending your cards on consignment to somebody and you know they're videotaping every single card that comes in, wouldn't you wanna do that instead of just somebody that's putting it in a pile and you have no idea where it is?

Like, to me, that that is innovation in our space, and other people don't do it.

So there I love kinda your mindset on building your business and all that you're doing, use of technology. Do you I don't wanna say fear because I feel like fear is a very aggressive word.

Maybe it's like be how do you prepare yourself for maybe this market cooling off at some point and maybe not being as ripping or as strong as it is right now? Like, is that is that even a thought that enters your brain? Of course.

It enters my brain. Right? I'm human. I think that's the benefit of having, two owners of a business that have different focuses. Right? Like, Zach focuses on the high end stuff, which is great, especially in a market like this.

And I really focus a lot more on the low end stuff. And that low end stuff and that base is what keeps a business afloat when that high end stuff doesn't sell as well.

Right? Like, in 02/2021, our our ASP, our average sale price was, like, 150, a $140 dollars a card. Last year, it was down to 75.

Now we're back at a 100. Right? That's just the stats. Those are just the numbers based on what cards you're selling for. So the market is up just based on that. But we did well when the market came down because we had built that base.

And then we'll do even better because we have the top of the market also. So continuing to grow that base and add one, two, three, four high end sellers. That and that's one of the reasons that we're doing the shows.

Right? We noticed the value of being at the national, and we noticed the value of going to these shows. So it's really going down different avenues to take market that we never really went after before and focus on growing that base.

Before I let you get out of here, maybe any opportunities that you think sellers or collectors might be overlooking in 2025 from your viewpoint?

I think that again, this is me. Right? I think that they're like and you said it earlier. Right? There's such a focus on high end sales that the opportunity lower end is growing.

And to me, PSA raising prices makes that opportunity even more, because even less people will have the skill of looking over the cards and the knowledge of what cards to buy to be able to make money on.

I saw somebody yesterday put out a video that grading and flipping is not the way to make money in this hobby anymore.

And I didn't watch the whole video, but if that's if that's what somebody's telling you, I I don't know what to like, there there's no other market in the world where you can have a third party evaluator tell you that a card is in a perfect in a better condition and make a third party I an item.

Right? Any item. Right? And all of a sudden, it's worth more money.

And all you need to the only skill you need is the ability to look it over or the wherewithal to train yourself on how to look it over whether you're using some kind of other tool or whatever it is.

So I think the ten to thirty dollar raw card that can turn into a 60 to $200 PSA 10 is gonna get even more overlooked.

And when you're looking at the right players, like, you're looking at, again, those Ohtanis, Judges, Mahomes, you go 65 to 75%, you will be making an absolute killing.

And that that market is gonna become, I think, underserved even more with PSA continuing to raise prices.

Always, fun to talk with you, Josh, and all the insights information that you're sharing from your experience in building PC sports cards.

Looking forward to doing this again down the road. Hell, yeah. Always good coming on, Brett, and go devils.