What's going on, everybody? Welcome back to Stacking Slabs. This is your hobby content alternative. I'm your host, Brett. We're here to talk about collecting sports cards and what a great time it is to be collecting sports cards.

I can't even begin to describe the amount of energy I have around what is happening in cards right now. There is collectors posting their cards regularly.

There are auctions that are exciting, exchanges, one to one direct deals, new cards popping up, shows, conversations, groups, communities, businesses that are thriving who focus on the collector, businesses who might not be doing well because they aren't focused on the collector.

There's so much in this ecosystem. There's so many topics to explore. There's so much that we have in front of us on a day to day basis.

And all I see is opportunity to talk about something that I deeply care about, that I'm deeply passionate about, that I believe is not only the best damn hobby there is, but it's the best escape.

We're busy. We've got children. We've got jobs. We've got other priorities, and we get this opportunity every day to take a step back and enjoy sports cards.

And I'm really thankful you're all here, and you are taking a minute out of your day to listen to a stacking slabs episode. Collecting rules, collecting sports cards rules, man.

There's so many decisions. There are rules, but are there really rules? Or those just existing narratives that by us being individuals, we can go in and explore and break those rules ourselves?

I think so. I am really fired up about what I'm doing on the content side. Running this brand, there is a lot of fun and exciting updates that are ahead, but maybe I'll leave you with this before we get into the episode.

I really believe in in my heart of hearts that the hobby performs at its highest capabilities and reaches its full potential, Not only when you have great content to support it.

Right? Great content educates and inspires and motivates people.

Not only when there's great content, but when there is great focus collector content. The hobby is a vast sea. There's a lot of different categories. There's a lot of different interests. There's a lot of different ways we collect.

I believe when you start moving down a few layers and focusing in on specific sports, products, eras, styles of collecting, and you deliver content to those individuals that associate or identify through their collection with those areas, game over, man.

Game over. And this is something that I've observed being a student of the hobby and being a student of content in the hobby.

I'm really excited to begin to deliver more focused, more personalized content from this brand, and it'll be happening soon. There'll be more. There will be more voices. There'll be more personalization.

We're just getting started, baby. I want to shout out everybody all the brands all the sponsors make sure you're checking out passionate profession man. I talked with Sharon blackjaded wolf this past week.

She's someone I've observed through social media through her content and just got a chance to talk with her for the first time really enjoyed that conversation shout out my good friends at eBay for sponsoring that series and believing in what we're doing over here at stacking slabs.

But I wanna jump right into it.

Okay? Have you ever looked back at your collecting journey and realized how much has changed? Maybe you entered and you started flipping cards, you built a PC, you chased a set, or you're you found yourself in a totally new lane.

The truth is the way we process, the way we participate, the way we collect, it all changes and it evolves. And I think that's a really good thing.

And so in this episode, this flagship episode on the other side of 600 episodes, I want to talk about how the hobby has many different types of collectors, and each of those collectors have a unique approach.

Wanna make sure that I'm stating upfront. There is no one way or a right way to collect sports cards.

The key is identifying and exploring or exploring and identifying which way to collect fulfills you, which way to collect when you have that moment of time and you're on your escape makes you feel something inside.

The personal growth as a collector is normal and should be embraced, not resisted. Really, I have gone through so many different iterations.

I'm gonna talk about some of those, but the more that I take a step back and make sure that I'm focusing in on my collecting in the way I approach cards in a way that makes me really excited, the the better experience I have.

And I think the reflection and not just going, not just buying, not just doing, asking the questions to yourself is a positive.

So let's start here. There are many, and I'm not gonna be there's zero chance I'm going to be able to call them all out, but I wanna give a few here because I think they're good examples of just to set the stage on types of collectors.

I think the maybe the easiest maybe I'm gonna share my experience, but maybe the easiest place to start just out of the gates is to start with, and you might not call them a collector.

Right? But I would probably argue that the investor is a part of each and every one of us focusing on value. I think we buy cards. We invest in cards and quotes, and we want those cards to go up. We never don't want them to go up.

But I think the part that doesn't get talked about with the investor label is although I buy a lot of cards and I would classify myself as a collector, I also, like, buy in a way that I it has to align with my interests.

But, also, like, what makes it extra fun and extra special is when there's a belief based on my knowledge and going through everything that I go through on a regular basis, creating content, exploring the hobby that there's room for potential.

That's always important. So there's a side of me that, hell, I'm spending thousands of dollars on sports cards. Like, yeah.

I'm trying to build a kick out kick ass collection, but I'm also trying to make sure that I'm not losing on this. I think the the separation point is when somebody comes across as an investor, but there's zero emotional connection.

You know, we talk about flipper vortex. We talk about the transactional side, and this exists. And even in that emotionless flipper persona, even in that persona, there I think you can find positives.

And a positive you can find is, well, this person's trying to make money, so they have the bandwidth to probably unearth some cards that we're not gonna find ourselves. But I think the emotion side is really important.

I think we're talking about investors. It's so nuanced. Right? We we all want value, and I think the investor has gotten a little bit of a bad name. And we can probably have a whole episode about why that label has gotten a bad name.

But I think when we're thinking about categories and we're thinking about labels, it's important to consider the investor. From my viewpoint, leading with the investor side to me is the top of the funnel.

Like, that's the entry point. Right? The the the light that's trying to bring people into the hobby right now is is focused on gambling and focusing on investing.

And we can see that through the way it's presented, the breaking culture, and, the just searching for sports cards, you're gonna get the cards going up type of content fed to you. This is top of the funnel, trying to bring people in.

The the problem with it is it's great that we're introducing people to cards, but the problem is is that without a strategy to educate and inspire, most of those collectors are gonna lose money and have a bad experience and fall out the bottom.

Right? The the collectors or the investors that graduate into the next stage typically do it by through self discovery and independent thinking. And I I think just in general in society, we we lack independent thinkers.

We lack the ability to think about why we're here instead of having someone else tell us why we're here. That's just an observation on, based on kinda socioeconomic, political, all those observations.

And I I, again, I don't wanna get into all this, but I think we've got a lot of people following the herd instead of people paving their own path.

And maybe I spent I I spent probably more time than I thought I was, digging into the investor type, but I think it's an important one.

You've got player collectors. The player collector is loyal to one player and is seeking to build a collection that might be best in the world or might be, a collection that has every cool card of that player.

I would say player collectors is that natural graduation stage from the, entry level investor type. We typically get into a player that we currently like, that we wanna watch, or a player from our path.

Hell, if you listen to Friday's conversation, I talked with Beau Roethlisberger collector seven. He's been collecting Big Ben since o four.

He shared that perspective. And through his collecting Big Ben through o four, he's gone through many different iterations and turns. And I think that if you're thinking about player collecting, Ben or Beau is a good example.

You've got team collectors. Right? We're passionate, or we wanna collect our team. We want its representation. Now it's overwhelming to me to for me to be like, oh, I'm gonna collect Indianapolis Colts.

There's too many cards, too many different errors, too many different types. But for me, I've been very focused in on a specific product with my Colts collection recently being like, you know what?

I wanna build out one of the best Colts Prism collections in the world. There's a lot of team collectors, and team collectors really, really, shift and change the way other personas are able to buy, sell, trade, and acquire cards.

You got set builders, completion driven, obsessed with checklists, finishing runs, vintage, you got binders.

Obviously, the way a set collector has approached sets likely has changed in the current era with the oversupply and abundance of parallels.

But set builders, man, they will disrupt everything because when a a collector needs a card for a set, no comps matter, no player stats matter, nothing none of that matters.

What matters is how much they will pay to make sure that card gets into their collection. You got parallel collectors. People who love specific parallels. They chase colors. They, like certain cards, and they are drawn to those cards.

You've got category explorers. Individual collectors who wanna try something new, hopping between sports and eras. They see something really cool that they wanna dig dip a toe in.

I think exploring new categories that interest you is the perfect way to get energized and rejuvenated around the hobby. Nostalgia collectors, driven by childhood memories, focusing on reliving the past.

Oddball collectors drawn to unique cards, obscure releases, and off the radar sets. All of these different types, and there are I could spend probably the next hour talking about some, but I just wanted to give you some examples.

I think that all of these different styles interact with each other, and we it's really easy to, if we're collecting a certain player, think we know when a card is up for auction who else will be bidding on it based on our knowledge of the the threshold and the price points of our competition.

But we get blindsided sometimes when we think we know more than we know, but it's impossible to know everything because there's so much overlap in intersection between these two groups, and that overlap and intersection between those groups changes everything.

Thinking about the conversation with Beau about Big Ben, yeah, he might know all the other Big Ben collectors, but it's impossible for him to know all of the Steelers collectors, and the Steelers collectors come out in in in waves.

You I'm thinking about auction talk, us talking about Tom Brady and his rookie cards in Michigan.

With Brady, you've got goat collectors. You've got Pat's collectors. You've got Brady collectors, you've got Michigan collectors, you've got hall of fame collector.

I mean, there are so many different types of collected collectors and collector categories who are trying to acquire Brady cards that it makes it challenging.

Thinking about being a a a a gold prism collector. You got people who are after players, people who are after teams, people who are just after gold prism.

Think player doesn't matter when a card is needed for a set like I mentioned before. And I've paid crazy amounts for for money because I'm trying to crazy amounts for cards because I'm trying to complete a specific player run.

I just think understanding the diversity within the styles of collecting and knowing that they overlap and interact with each other, and that impacts our ability to acquire what we want or what we need, and also at the price or price we want those cards, all that stuff, it's it that's what makes up our ecosystem.

Now my collecting evolution, and I've I've shared this in and out through episodes of Stacking Slides, but it's appropriate here. So I'll just hit it really quick.

You know, when I came in, I was much like, you know, wet behind the ears, reengaging with a childhood hobby. And, like, the the content front and center was all around, you know, investor and making it big.

Okay? So so naturally, because that's the content in front of me, that's how I think everything operates. You're just buying stuff with the hope that it increases.

There's no connection. You're maybe you're trying to manufacture a connection. We've all been there. Like, how many times in the early stages of being in cards where you bought a card where you were, like, trying to care?

Like, oh, I've got these cards of this, you know, prospect, and I'm gonna watch their game because I've got their cards. Like but it you you really don't care. That's, like, so many people once they get back in the hobby.

And then it's the reality of chasing money versus chasing passion. Been doing this for a a little bit, and being on the side of chasing passion is way more interesting and way more fun than money.

You find your find my player PC. Right? It's easy. We've got players. You graduate, and it's like discovering the joy of building a collection through Peyton Manning and the hunt for meaningful cards or just learning what cards matter.

Running with themes, sets, runs, parallels, the shift from scattered buying to focus collecting goals, and how it's deep in appreciation for specific cards.

It's like, you know, it's crazy when you kinda take a step back and you're like, man, how much money am I spending on this stuff?

But I really love it. And then when you realize, like, that you're not being as maybe intentional as you probably could.

It's like I had that moment when I was buying cards, and I was had all these player PCs, and I was buying all these different types of cards.

I was like, I just don't care about all this stuff. I like these players, but these cards don't make me feel something.

And if I'm spending hundreds and thousands of doll hundreds or thousands, not hundreds of thousands of dollars, I just it's gotta be like it's gotta make me feel something inside.

And so when I started to shift my focus around my Prism Colds collection, I just like, the card matters to me so much.

The the the design, the whole thinking about a whole product, a chasing cards, like, peril, like, all that really matters, and then, like, the player side kinda comes after that.

You know, I'm I I don't know. I'm just, like, not that like, it doesn't it it doesn't really excite me to think about a specific running into a player I really like at an airport.

Like, I like, that that type of thing. I just just a normal person. Right? Like, so I don't get, like, overjoyed and, like, daydream about specific players. I I just that's not in me. Like, I I'm more of a a the the the team.

I'm more of a product guy, and then the players fall after that. But also, like, now I'm in this mode, which I think is a really important mode that I alluded to before, but the exploration of new categories.

And I think it's really important to branch out in having these moments. And I think change is good and necessary for long term enjoyment.

But I just think about, like, my WNBA collecting, and it like, when I take a step back and think about the excitement I have around that league, when I think about where that category is in the bigger picture of the hobby, and I think about the limitation of sets, I think about how focused you could be.

A lot of that excites me. And so that I know that, like, exploring new categories and finding footing in those categories is really essential to my overall happiness in the hobby.

Some lessons that maybe we can close this out with that I've learned through my journey. I think recognizing different collecting styles, just being, like, recognizing exist helps you avoid frustration.

I think many collectors struggle because they think they should collect like others. The biggest wake up call you can have is, like, what you think or why certain cards did or didn't sell for the what you thought, it doesn't matter.

Like, the way you think about what you do, likely few others think that way. And we get spun up in these conversations of, like, oh my god.

I can't believe they paid this price for this car. It's like, doesn't matter. Just because you think that way doesn't mean others think that way. And you might think that someone overpaid for a car.

Like, we need to quit worrying about what other people do because the fact of matter is the best part about this hobby is the fact that it's unique in the way everyone approaches it is different.

Think evolution is inevitable. It's another lesson, and that's okay. What excites you today, that mail that you get today might not excite you tomorrow. It changes. There are shifts.

This isn't a stagnant hobby, and that to me is exciting. I think it's being open to change keeps collecting fresh. Another lesson, experiencing new ways to collect. Trying different approaches will help you find what truly excites you.

Maybe it's the marketer in me who loves to experiment, to try new things, that to know that most of the things that I try aren't gonna work, but the one thing that does work, I can go all in.

That fires me up. I think it's okay to dabble in a category without committing to it long term either.

Another lesson, following the herd rarely leads to fulfillment. Turn left when everyone else is going right, baby. Buying because everyone else will lead to burnout. True joy comes from leaning into what actually matters to you.

Last one, the best collectors are the ones who stick to what they love. The happiest collectors I know had hundreds and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of conversations over the last five years.

The happiest collectors are those that embrace their style. Your collecting journey is yours alone. We don't need to feel boxed in by what others are doing.

Stay open and try new things. Most importantly, collect what makes you happy. What type of collector are you? How has collecting for you changed over time? What is the moment in your journey that defined your collecting style?

If you are feeling lost, know that every collector has been there. Keep exploring, keep collecting, and most importantly, enjoy the damn ride. Really appreciate you tuning in. Four stacking slabs.

If you enjoy what I'm doing over here, check out that Patreon group. Link is in the show notes. Lots happening on the stacking slabs front. Appreciate you supporting the brand. Tell a damn friend, and I'll talk to you soon.