Fanatics Live - An Observation

[ThoseBackPages]

i think a lot of the addicted are able to hide it from their wives because boxes of cards are not being shipped to the house.

[hermanotarjeta]

Originally Posted by Badgers0821

The easy answer there is just don’t buy boxes for $20K, but if people like Flawless their only option (for most) is breaks. So either the breaks will continue or the product won’t exist. And that’s an extreme case, there are still products that won’t break the bank.

Unfortunately, I don’t anymore. Even paying $700 for a random spot is equivalent to paying $21k for all spots. It doesn’t make any financial sense to me. I can only wait for the day when most people agree and decide not to get involved. Doesn’t mean I can’t root for that to happen. And if people decide not to break flawless at that price, the product will still exist, but just at a lower buy in price for everyone.

Other products like select and prizm don’t have to be $1000 and $2000 either.

[hermanotarjeta]

I also don’t understand personal box breaks.

Why don’t customers simply order a box and enjoy opening the box themselves? Why pay someone else to do this for them on camera?

I’ll refrain from any judgmental comments at this time.

[majestik101]

Originally Posted by thenightman

I dropped over $2,500 on Project 2020 cards and I bought them as "investments"

Also spent $480 on a Tatis paper gold two years ago.

<Insert Lloyd Christmas dry heaving gif>

[Badgers0821]

Originally Posted by hermanotarjeta

I also don’t understand personal box breaks.

Why don’t customers simply order a box and enjoy opening the box themselves? Why pay someone else to do this for them on camera?

I’ll refrain from any judgmental comments at this time.

I can’t speak to this one, it probably has to do with the instant gratification and not having to wait for something to be delivered…personally I wouldn’t do it either.

[anusinha]

Originally Posted by hermanotarjeta

I also don’t understand personal box breaks.

Why don’t customers simply order a box and enjoy opening the box themselves? Why pay someone else to do this for them on camera?

I’ll refrain from any judgmental comments at this time.

Same reason people pay someone else to diddle their wife.

[POKTRITON]

Originally Posted by anusinha

Same reason people pay someone else to diddle their wife.

Definitely a cuckold situation

[cholodolo]

Color me shocked breakers and break participants are in here trying to explain away their toxic behavior.

Anyone who thinks OP is referring to a team or set collector dropping $20-30 to get some base cards is being intentionally obtuse.

Take The Cup hockey at $1,000 a box for 6 cards as an example...only people buying or opening cases of that are breakers. If breakers didn't exist, could manufacturers charge obscene amounts for their product? Doubtful as it would sit and sit.

That's why Fanatics is all in on breaking...guarantees their product will move....for now.

[hammertime]

Originally Posted by anusinha

Same reason people pay someone else to diddle their wife.

[bub838]

…Did someone say hotwife?

[oddstuff]

Time will tell if Fanatics achieves its goal of increasing participants base 10x via the current model of promoting breaking or whether they will break the sports collectibles world. How long will it take...5 years? 10 years? or sooner...or never...

[ThoseBackPages]

#TenX

[imbluestreak23]

Would be sweet to have Fanatics leadership read this.

Rubin is probably passed out somewhere after doing a line

[POKTRITON]

Originally Posted by imbluestreak23

Would be sweet to have Fanatics leadership read this.

Rubin is probably passed out somewhere after doing a line

They know this and don’t care and that’s fine, I don’t have to spend my money with them. Social Media and YouTube are full of fanatics homers.

[fabiani12333]

Originally Posted by oddstuff

Time will tell if Fanatics achieves its goal of increasing participants base 10x via the current model of promoting breaking or whether they will break the sports collectibles world. How long will it take...5 years? 10 years? or sooner...

No, they absolutely will not. The reasons are that group breaking and trading cards are expensive luxuries and the growth phase of group breaking is over -- it occurred during the pandemic bubble.

The group breaking model is the only thing keeping box prices from dropping and reflecting the singles market. As long as consumers continue to behave irrational and waste money on breaks, it will continue to be a viable model. This is why promoting the gambling aspects of trading cards is important to Fanatics.

[fabiani12333]

I can look at this from Fanatics' perspective. If they don't allow and promote gambling on their platform, other platforms like Whatnot will take business away from them. Fanatics Live is just trying to copy other platforms. Eventually they will go public and will face more regulatory and public scrutiny.

[Cardboard Dawg]

Whenever you think about spending $$$ on boxes, throw it in your savings

Winning strategy for me and have saved thousands this year. I’m completely turned off by the prices of boxes and some of the douchebags in this hobby that’ll do what ever it takes for a dollar

[imbluestreak23]

Originally Posted by Cardboard Dawg

Whenever you think about spending $$$ on boxes, throw it in your savings

Winning strategy for me and have saved thousands this year. I’m completely turned off by the prices of boxes and some of the douchebags in this hobby that’ll do what ever it takes for a dollar

I would also say, max out your 401K before you ever think about spending a dime on breaks.

[theshowandme]

Put your money into Wagner, Cobb, and Ruth

[kyle1707]

Odds are so awful. I have no idea how this can keep going …

It’s hard to believe all these spots with all these breakers fill every night

Seen unsustainable and an awful way to try to run a hobby

[MiamiMarlinsFan]

Originally Posted by kyle1707

Odds are so awful. I have no idea how this can keep going …

It’s hard to believe all these spots with all these breakers fill every night

Seems unsustainable and an awful way to try to run a hobby

Honestly? It seems completely sustainable to me. The only thing I could seeing changing is if things took an even bigger nose dive the prices for slots would go down.

Take a product like 2022 Topps Dynasty for example. MSRP was somewhere around $1,100, but it had a checklist 481 spots long. So a breaker only needed to sell each spot for around $2.28 each to break even. Some spots sell for hundreds. A lot sold for around $7-$12. That still easily puts the breaker waaaaaaay ahead. The breakee gets a chance at a certain card even if they can’t afford a whole box, and the breaker makes a big profit by taking on the “risk” of buying all the product on overhead. Everyone, except people who liked ripping their own wax and making their own profit, is happy in the exchange. I don’t see how it’s remotely unsustainable.

In 2022 I spent around $23 on two Jazz Chisholm spots in Dynasty breaks. I hit squat. Much better than spending $1,100 and hitting a Joe Ryan #/10. I could just go buy that Jazz Dynasty card for around $250 now too, if I want.

[imbluestreak23]

Looking at the terapeak numbers

It's not slowing down. Just speeding up

[tyrith]

Fanatics is not why wax costs so much. The absolute most absurd wax prices took place before the takeover was announced and all of this nonsense happen. Breaking degeneracy and stupid wax prices are 100% because of public demand for the products. Until the hobby, as a whole, slows the buying pace down enough that Fanatics (and Upper Deck, and The Pokemon Company, and Ravensburger, and every scalper and LCS and breaker) makes more money by product being cheaper, product won't be cheaper.

But even today, Fanatics isn't sending guys with guns to take people's money and then leaving boxes of cards behind willingly. People are choosing this dumb stuff. Breaking might make it incrementally faster to do, but the internet has done that with pretty much everything bad you can do to yourself that you can't buy at a local convenience store, so going old man yells at cloud at it isn't going to do anything.

We can all choose to participate in breaks, we can all choose to participate in buying wax, or we can spend our money on other stuff. As much as I'd love to be able to rip cases of stuff at 2017 prices, I can't, and I don't think those days are coming back anytime soon.

[StayingWarm]

Originally Posted by imbluestreak23

Would be sweet to have Fanatics leadership read this.

Rubin is probably passed out somewhere after doing a line

I am 100% positive Fangraphs senior leadership reads this thread and others like iit in these forums. Does it change anything? <shrug emoji>. But your voice is heard here, for better or worse.

[Cavaliercards]

Originally Posted by JWBlue

Is this hyperbole? Are there stories people have told?

Year after your join date.

Can I get my student loans forgiven while I spend thousands on breaks weekly

https://www.blowoutforums.com/showth...=Student+loans