Potential Worth of Soccer Cards as Market Grows

[KhalDrogo]

The cards being produced today are just bad. That’s the case for all sports. Too expensive, bad quality, and unimaginative. Fanatics is lost, and will run the space back into the 2000s if they don’t correct course.

[YayNJ]

What was the last really nice set that actually looked and felt quality?

2018 Eminence?

I can only keep thinking of the likes of Nobility, Noir, Black&Gold, 2018-19 Topps Chrome.. and they were all from around 2018... that's pretty shocking.

Merlin 2021/22 on the budget side, the card stock was sublime - but even that suffered from scratch issues and also just happened to be the year when Panini and Topps both decided to keep the printing presses running until they ran out of ink

[mfw13]

Originally Posted by YayNJ

What was the last really nice set that actually looked and felt quality?

From a purely design perspective, 2017 Nobility is/was terrific.

I've also liked the design of the Deco sets.

But just about everything is overpriced.....

[Gin&Juice]

I always like the look of Impeccable for singles. And, Stadium Club is my favorite set every year. But, I have not opened a product at release in several years. Makes no sense.

[YayNJ]

I love the idea of (modern) stadium club, it's just the parallels kill it for me - I just can't get into those lighting bolt things at all, no matter how hard I try

I'll take the solid red and oranges all day long though

[chiefs]

In the US I think one big contributing factor not previously mentioned in decline of card sales is the student loan repayments. These were paused since Covid but have resumed this fall. Thats a few extra dollars a month not available to spend on cards for many would be collectors/flippers.

If anyone wants to do something fun go take a look at Shaquile Oneal Rookie Cards on COMC. He's arguably the best player of his generation and one of the 20 greatest basketball players of all-time.It's just that his rookie season was during one of the peak years of card production. You can find so many of his Rookies for $1-$5 dollars. It's not that hard to imagine finding some of the last few years of great young soccer players in the same situation in 30 years.

[Gin&Juice]

Originally Posted by YayNJ

I love the idea of (modern) stadium club, it's just the parallels kill it for me - I just can't get into those lighting bolt things at all, no matter how hard I try

I'll take the solid red and oranges all day long though

Agree on the lightning bolts. I am usually partial to the solid blue and gold (which are also cheaper than red and orange).

[netmasters]

People blaming the US macro economy are thinking way too big. Real wages have been higher than inflation for months. If you are still in cards you are probably doing just fine. If cards were still going up people would have the money.

I think it's more way too much money going to the card companies and graders hoping for the quick flip. The hobby got overwhelmed with gamblers not collectors post covid. When things are going up people will buy singles in hopes of the quick flip. In a down market everyone is too scared to buy a card for more than the last comp. If you still want to be in cards you would rather buy wax/breaks and hope to get the quick win or grade and hope for the win that way. The person that said the money that goes to those companies is gone forever is spot on. All of that plus highly increased production has stymied singles prices. I would like to know the total amount spent on cards and compare that over the last few years instead of looking at single prices. It's possible the total soccer card economy has grown but singles prices are still way down.

[bobbycass]

A lot of people joined the hobby for the wrong reason and they are still leaving it, slowly.

And was spending an absolute fortune on rookies ever a thing before? That #@#@#@#@ has to stop too as prices can only ever go down if youre spending thousands on a player who has to have a better career than Tom Brady if youre planning to make money off the card.

[YayNJ]

The amount of money I see people spending on 'hot' rookies makes me feel queasy. A while ago someone on a group pulled a fairly decent Mudryk RC and my advice was to sell it now as his prices will never go above what they are now. (This was at the start of the season)

I got dogs abuse for it. I was 'clueless'.

Incredible amounts on every player. They only have to be wearing shirts of certain teams and they go for ridiculous sums bought by people I honestly think have no clue about football or who the player even is. I enjoy prospecting, and I enjoy picking up cards of undervalued players. I don't think I'll ever do as well as I did with Foden while everyone was frothing at the mouth over Sancho, Havertz and Timo Werner.

..but that was back in the day when you could get Foden Rated rookie reds and greens for $2 a go and there was still a genuine feeling of excitement and buzz. People still enjoyed opening boxes on YouTube for fun and sharing, rather than trying to push cases they are sponsored by, or anything else aimed at making money.

[Ianhatcher]

Originally Posted by netmasters

The person that said the money that goes to those companies is gone forever is spot on.

That was me and I will give you all an example of what I am talking about.

When 2023 Sapphire UCL came out I decided I wanted to chase the Cristiano Ronaldo Sapphire SP until I hit a color parallel. Rough luck $4500 and 30 cases later I hit an Orange and a Yellow in the same case.

So my final tally was 32 Cristiano Ronaldo SPs and 2 parallels.

I got all the cards in the mail and about 10 of the 32 base were gradable or so I thought. I sent those 10 along with the yellow parallel to PSA. Total cost to grade them $19x 12 + $40 shipping = $248 and for all you math experts in the room my total cost was $4748.

PSA Graded 9s on 7 of the base and 10s on 3 of them and the Yellow got a 10.

I sold the other 22 base for $31-35 each so let's call it $726
I sold the orange as it was off center top to bottom for $350
I sold the PSA 9s for around $50 each so $350
I sold 2 of the PSA 10s for $199 each so $400

All sold was a total of $1826 less Ebay fees so I made about $1600 back.

So I paid $4748, made back $1600 and still have a PSA 10 base and Yellow Sapphire.

The high cost of joining breaks plus the cost of grading and the fact I didn't gem a lot of the cards cost me around $3000 for a PSA 10 Yellow and a PSA 10 Base.

That is $3000 of dead money that went to the breaker. That is $3000 not going back into the singles market because that is pretty much what I do with everything from my card sales and then I have a monthly budget of $3000 from my job to spend. I'll claim all that on my taxes as well as an expense so that helps some too but you can see what I mean.

That is an example of why I think the singles market has crashed and why I pulled back A LOT with opening soccer cards and joining breaks and just started buying PC cards and moved most of my side business to TCGs. The cards are cheaper, the grading is cheaper and better and I make more money to put into other cards for my collection.

Of course this is anecdotal but I found that this was happening more and more the past few years. I decided I was tired of giving them my money. Hopefully others see it too.

[mfw13]

Originally Posted by bobbycass

A lot of people joined the hobby for the wrong reason and they are still leaving it, slowly.

And was spending an absolute fortune on rookies ever a thing before? That #@#@#@#@ has to stop too as prices can only ever go down if youre spending thousands on a player who has to have a better career than Tom Brady if youre planning to make money off the card.

Spending $$$$ on rookies has been a "thing" since Mattingly and Gooden exploded the hobby in the mid 80's. I remember guys selling 100-card 1987 Topps lots of the hot rookies like Canseco, Joyner, Bonds, Will Clark, etc. and rack/cello searching was rampant due to the fact that people could figure out the patterns, and know which cards were in which cellos/racks.

The problem nowadays is that players don't have a single "rookie" card due to the fact that there are so many products being released in any given year. So there is no consensus on which cards are the "true" RC's.

Anyway, soccer is a different beast, since it didn't really take off until 2016/17/18, and many soccer card collectors are foreigners who never really got into the whole "RC" craze in the first place.

[collectornotes]

Originally Posted by YayNJ

The amount of money I see people spending on 'hot' rookies makes me feel queasy.

eBay was selling Benja Cremaschi Topps Now for 150$ and $200 in the height of Inter-Miami MLS Season 2023 (June-July) now the card is worth like 10 bucks. Some smarties made good profit.

[panenkacards]

Originally Posted by collectornotes

eBay was selling Benja Cremaschi Topps Now for 150$ and $200 in the height of Inter-Miami MLS Season 2023 (June-July) now the card is worth like 10 bucks. Some smarties made good profit.

Not that those prices made sense, but his first card was relatively SP. Then he had multiple TNs come out with pretty big print runs.

Should have been clear to people that he will be in every MLS product this year though, I'm not sure what they were thinking.

[CiaranGQ]

Originally Posted by mfw13

Anyway, soccer is a different beast, since it didn't really take off until 2016/17/18, and many soccer card collectors are foreigners who never really got into the whole "RC" craze in the first place.

Agree that soccer is a different beast for multiple reasons - largely that neither cards nor stickers are the focus unlike US sports. Appreciate recent trajectory may indicate otherwise but it just doesn’t work like that.

To be clear, children collect the Panini World Cup stickers and Match Attack cards etc. However, it feels short term and any long term demand for stickers (Pele 1970 Panini, Beckham 1996 cards) appears fuelled by outside speculation rather than bone fide collectors. Hence, someone is always going to be left holding the bag.

Soccer collecting has a long longer history than 2016//17/18 … that’s just the modern cards (“junk”). I was attending Northern Ireland Football Programme Collector Fairs from 1985 and similar fairs were commonplace across British Isles. At time, these would have given big US baseball card fairs run for money in terms of attendances etc.

[imbluestreak23]

Originally Posted by Ianhatcher

That was me and I will give you all an example of what I am talking about.

When 2023 Sapphire UCL came out I decided I wanted to chase the Cristiano Ronaldo Sapphire SP until I hit a color parallel. Rough luck $4500 and 30 cases later I hit an Orange and a Yellow in the same case.

So my final tally was 32 Cristiano Ronaldo SPs and 2 parallels.

I got all the cards in the mail and about 10 of the 32 base were gradable or so I thought. I sent those 10 along with the yellow parallel to PSA. Total cost to grade them $19x 12 + $40 shipping = $248 and for all you math experts in the room my total cost was $4748.

PSA Graded 9s on 7 of the base and 10s on 3 of them and the Yellow got a 10.

I sold the other 22 base for $31-35 each so let's call it $726
I sold the orange as it was off center top to bottom for $350
I sold the PSA 9s for around $50 each so $350
I sold 2 of the PSA 10s for $199 each so $400

All sold was a total of $1826 less Ebay fees so I made about $1600 back.

So I paid $4748, made back $1600 and still have a PSA 10 base and Yellow Sapphire.

The high cost of joining breaks plus the cost of grading and the fact I didn't gem a lot of the cards cost me around $3000 for a PSA 10 Yellow and a PSA 10 Base.

That is $3000 of dead money that went to the breaker. That is $3000 not going back into the singles market because that is pretty much what I do with everything from my card sales and then I have a monthly budget of $3000 from my job to spend. I'll claim all that on my taxes as well as an expense so that helps some too but you can see what I mean.

That is an example of why I think the singles market has crashed and why I pulled back A LOT with opening soccer cards and joining breaks and just started buying PC cards and moved most of my side business to TCGs. The cards are cheaper, the grading is cheaper and better and I make more money to put into other cards for my collection.

Of course this is anecdotal but I found that this was happening more and more the past few years. I decided I was tired of giving them my money. Hopefully others see it too.

It sucks that this happens but until people stop putting their W2 income into the breaks and high grading fees, Nat et company are going to keep getting fat and happy while the white out parties hosted by Rubin are just going to get crazier.

The math on none of this stuff is working out. Sent in 2 orders for the first time to PSA since before Independence Day, the longest drought I've had in sending in cards. So much so I let my membership lapse for a few months. I have a love hate relationship with the hobby. Love the pre Covid, post Covid it is an absolutely digusting place. Just hope things get better somehow.

[fadster]

Panini Group (the global parent to Panini America) has extended its deal with FIFA to go to the 2026 and 2030 World Cup https://blog.paniniamerica.net/fifa-...s-generations/

I thought Fanatics would make a big play for these rights to kill off Panini but also would be a "last stand" type thing for Panini given its history with the tournament. On a global scale there is probably enough for Panini Global to tick along, but I wonder if this is enough to keep a scaled-back Panini America going...

[YayNJ]

I know this goes on everywhere, but why is selling cards you don't own such a thing with Japanese sellers?

There's one card specifically I want, and I've found three completely different people selling it so far.

[yiguiri2002]

Originally Posted by fadster

Panini Group (the global parent to Panini America) has extended its deal with FIFA to go to the 2026 and 2030 World Cup https://blog.paniniamerica.net/fifa-...s-generations/

I thought Fanatics would make a big play for these rights to kill off Panini but also would be a "last stand" type thing for Panini given its history with the tournament. On a global scale there is probably enough for Panini Global to tick along, but I wonder if this is enough to keep a scaled-back Panini America going...

I think Fanatics is playing it smart and going after the stuff they have experience on.

My hope with this is that, once Panini is done with their license for NBA/NFL, they can focus on soccer. There's no reason why, with a little planning, they release a massive low end set for 2026. And that should allow them to focus on releasing decent product with quality for mid-end and high-end collectors.

Of course, it's just wishful thinking, but one can dream.

[wilsonsingles]

Originally Posted by CiaranGQ

Agree that soccer is a different beast for multiple reasons - largely that neither cards nor stickers are the focus unlike US sports. Appreciate recent trajectory may indicate otherwise but it just doesn’t work like that.

To be clear, children collect the Panini World Cup stickers and Match Attack cards etc. However, it feels short term and any long term demand for stickers (Pele 1970 Panini, Beckham 1996 cards) appears fuelled by outside speculation rather than bone fide collectors. Hence, someone is always going to be left holding the bag.

Soccer collecting has a long longer history than 2016//17/18 … that’s just the modern cards (“junk”). I was attending Northern Ireland Football Programme Collector Fairs from 1985 and similar fairs were commonplace across British Isles. At time, these would have given big US baseball card fairs run for money in terms of attendances etc.

This and also, the number of soccer/football fans outside the US is massive, but the number of those that are willing to pay for cards over $200 is miniscule. I've got a lot of cards in the $500-$1,000 on eBay and I get dozens of offers from European and Asian buyers for pennies on the dollar. They just don't have the buying mindset for rarer cards that Baseball, Football and Basketball collectors have.
This is coming from a guy born and raised in the UK, so no slight meant.

[YayNJ]

Originally Posted by wilsonsingles

This and also, the number of soccer/football fans outside the US is massive, but the number of those that are willing to pay for cards over $200 is miniscule. I've got a lot of cards in the $500-$1,000 on eBay and I get dozens of offers from European and Asian buyers for pennies on the dollar. They just don't have the buying mindset for rarer cards that Baseball, Football and Basketball collectors have.
This is coming from a guy born and raised in the UK, so no slight meant.

the vast, vast majority of soccer cards I see for sale are massively overpriced.

[703dispensary]

Originally Posted by YayNJ

the vast, vast majority of soccer cards I see for sale are massively overpriced.

Exactly. Way too many opportunists out there thinking they have an inventory full of paydays in individual cards.

[mikee1186]

It’s a weird time for new releases currently. We are now about halfway through the season and while some folks await Deco and Gold to eventually ship, there are still no other European soccer products even on the release calendar right now (Futura and unlicensed aside). I’m not sure why this is except for the continued printer backup caused by overdoing all product lines. Just venting as it would be nice to get a product in before the very end of the season.

[YayNJ]

Originally Posted by 703dispensary

Exactly. Way too many opportunists out there thinking they have an inventory full of paydays in individual cards.

Exactly. It's not that people don't have a 'buying mindset' it's more that they have a 'you're not ripping me off' mindset. There's a lot of people still trying to peddle soccer as if it were peak 2020.

[cardshopmd]

Originally Posted by YayNJ

I know this goes on everywhere, but why is selling cards you don't own such a thing with Japanese sellers?

There's one card specifically I want, and I've found three completely different people selling it so far.

If you are looking on ebay its because most sellers go by the highest one sold. Not by recent sales. If you want to make money in the soccer card market do in it volume not in a single card. You make more money selling$1-$5 cards they you will selling the high end cards that just don't seem to sell anyway unless you auction them off and sell them for less.