GoodSellas: Recent Episodes
Stack
Good Sellas is a podcast for individuals who want to learn how to sell their cards more efficiently — at a faster pace and for more money. In each episode, Justin Brown uncovers how true hobbyists get their cards sold. Each conversation explores stories of how specific actions & techniques can help you get more from your sports cards. Ultimately, Good Sellas helps sports card collectors sell the cards they don’t want so they can get their hands on the cards they must have.
We usually associate card collecting with sports. But you can also develop this hobby around various social and cultural phenomena such as Pokemon.
According to Wikipedia, Pokemon is the second highest-grossing media franchise — behind Winnie the Pooh — which puts it ahead of Mickey Mouse, Star Wars, Harry Potter, and the MCU.
A Pokemon card collector himself, our host Justin Brown invited two fellow collectors, FTC and Trading Card Joe, to join him on this episode of GoodSellas. In the hour-long conversation, the three discuss the Pokemon card market's early days, its current state, and the growth potential from buyers' and sellers' perspectives.
Communication between card collectors is the main reason they are active on platforms like Twitter and Instagram. It allows them to acquire information, meet people with the same passion, get the best offer, and make money or enrich their private card collection. But collectors also build micro-communities on digital platforms or create a Discord server.
In this episode of GoodSellas, we are joined by a Discord server creator, Zach Meadows. Zach is the founder of Card Brokers, where every card collector can find their preferences.
First, we asked Zach to explain what Discord is and who it is for. Then we get into what made him launch a company. Zach also discusses why people join Card Brokers, the server's most appealing features, and its most attractive perks. He also goes into the company's early days and how it has changed over time.
Card collectors are like poker players. They see their passion as more than a hobby. It is a way for them to connect with people with the same interests, exchange cards, and enrich their collections. But card collecting can also become a revenue stream. Therefore, we decided to call Nick Martin — @Nmartin55 on Twitter — to join us on this episode of GoodSellas. If you are interested in entering this space, you could learn plenty from Nick.
Nick discusses his beginnings and how he switched from basketball cards to football, specifically cards of defensive players in the NFL. He also shares when he started earning from his hobby and the things he pays attention to when considering which card or niche to invest in. Finally, Nick shares how a passionate football card collector like him became interested in Fortnite cards even though he doesn't play the game.
Most passionate card collectors are familiar with their options and know what to focus on when searching for their favorite pieces. But the collector base snowballs, and it's challenging, especially for newbies, to keep track of everything, including terminology.
Therefore, our host Justin Brown dedicates this episode of GoodSellas to discussing all things breaking. He explains what breaking is, the different types of breaks, and what he expects from a particular break.
This episode is part of a series. In the next episode, Justin and our guest Brooks Hester will discuss their successes and failures from breaking the 2022 Bowman Chrome.
eBay is a dominant platform among sports card collectors, buyers, and sellers. But not everyone finds this channel the most effective. Therefore, we decided to dedicate this episode to stack sales on Twitter.
In addition to running stack sales on Twitter, Justin Brown is also the CEO of the Stack app, a tool that enables you to run stack sales directly from your phone. The app's launch is planned for Q2 of 2023.
In this episode of GoodSellas, Justin shares how he started selling cards on Twitter and breaks the entire process into five critical segments. Then, he mentions two additional steps that can greatly help every seller, especially a newbie, organize giveaways prior to and during the sale and create a virtual CRM of people who buy from you.
Finally, Justin, whom you can find as @Oldtowncards on Twitter, is more than willing to share the template of the spreadsheet he uses.
The number of counterfeit trading cards in the market is increasing, and that's one of the reasons you should get your cards graded by a professional grading service provider.
But what are the other benefits of card grading? In this episode of the GoodSellas podcast, our host Justin Brown welcomes Jason Dardick, the COO of DCI Grading. They chat about the importance of card grading, the differences between rock-hard review and card grading, and why counterfeiting is detrimental to the industry.
In this episode of GoodSellas, Dary Rezvani (@daryrezvani on Twitter) joins our host Justin Brown to talk about how he turned his passion for sports and card collecting into a side gig.
Dary is a verified seller on a platform called Whatnot and holds small auctions on weekends. Today, he shares how he organizes them and also introduces the platform.
Although Whatnot is not as popular as other platforms like eBay, our guest explains why it is worth your time if you are looking for a digital space to sell or buy cards.
In addition, what differentiates Whatnot from other platforms is that it is seller-friendly and allows users to create niches within the community.
So, if you are interested to hear more about the app, tune in to this episode of GoodSellas as Dary and Justin discuss the following:
- Who can join Whatnot and become a verified seller.
- How card auctions function and why they are better than other platforms like Twitter for the same purpose.
- How much time it takes between the buyer paying and receiving the cards.
- The price range and shipping costs.
- The importance of building a community.
Finally, Dary describes himself as a typical buyer/seller, so he will not try to impersonate a showman during an auction. Of course, he likes to tell jokes and create a pleasant environment, but he doesn’t want to waste anyone’s time, as he knows why they came to his auction: to buy cards. After all, those are the types of auctions he likes to join as a buyer.
It doesn’t matter whether it is Whatnot or some other platform as long as the person behind the offer is professional and trustworthy. Thus, building a good reputation is of the utmost importance.
”People want to buy from the person. I don’t care what app it’s on.”
In this episode of GoodSellas, we’re joined by Don Shaw (better known as @geowiz34 over at Twitter and as nova_cards on eBay) to talk about how he uses Check Out My Cards (COMC) to build his collection and reputation as a collector. Don’s used COMC to move thousands of new-age cards to make cumulative eye-opening profit margins—which is why he’s as reputable as he is today.
Although he describes himself as a “disabled army veteran who cannot stop laughing at this world”, the one thing that can’t be laughed at is his card collecting game.
If you wanted to know the print run of any card, he’d be more than ready to tell you about it in-depth based on things like pack odds and market sentiment on Blowout Cards forums. This sheer dedication is precisely why he’s a key figure in the sports card collecting space—and how he uses COMC to grow his collection plays a key role in this, too.
With Check Out My Cards, Don’s been able to grow his collection and up his profits by successfully selling his modern cards to get coveted vintage releases. And he believes that it’s a tried-and-true strategy that any collector can do as long as they keep the right things in mind.
We had an amazing time listening to Don Shaw go over his experience with COMC and how he used it to build his dream collection. Throughout the discussion, he went into detail over a few key points that can help card collectors everywhere—such as:
- The advantages of using Check Out My Cards as a selling platform
- What types of cards are good candidates to send over to COMC for the best returns
- The easiest—yet most profitable—process to follow when selling cards on consignment platforms
- The cards collectors should avoid buying if they want to sell their way to bigger, better collections
- How to best navigate the selling process on COMC during massive releases so you can walk away with profit
Whether you’re a hobbyist or a serial collector, Don’s wisdom and experience with maximizing COMC is something that you can learn a whole lot from. His story also proves that there’s always an opportunity to make money regardless of what you get in any pack of cards.
In this episode of GoodSellas, we sat down with Brooks Hester to talk about his experience with consigning baseball cards.
One look at his resume is more than enough to see just how on it Brooks is: he’s a self-proclaimed data nerd who's deep into tech, IoT, and engineering. And, with all that Brooks has achieved in his career, it's no surprise that he’s also an award-winning professional at the top of his game.
But that's not the only game he's known for.
You probably know him better as bHestCards over at Twitter and eBay where he's been selling sports cards since 2009. You’ve probably even come across his listings yourself (such as this PSA 10 2022 Bowman Chrome George Valera).
Like most card collectors, Brooks has a full-time job amongst other things that take up most of his day. But it’s his passion for collecting cards that’s allowed him to hit new milestones—like racking up serious profit from sports cards with the help of consignment.
Brooks talks to us about how he got started in card collecting and making the switch from selling to consignment. We cover a lot of great stuff in this episode including:
- Why any card collector should look into consigning cards
- The best kinds of cards for first-time collectors looking to make big returns
- What to look out for when choosing cards to buy and sell
- The impact of sports card grading in today’s market, and
- Creating Brooks’ very own Bowman Prospect Value Finder
We had a great time having Brooks over to talk cards, consignment, and catching Ws along the way —and a lot of the snippets from this episode show you exactly why that’s the case. If you’re looking to make profit-generating sports card buys or want to learn more about consignment, make sure to tune into this episode!
In this episode of GoodSellas, we’re joined by Dan Noethe, better known on Twitter as DMN Takeover and founder of YouTube channel TakeoverTV to talk business, community building, and why he won’t be on eBay anytime soon. Dan initially started collecting cards as a hobby, eventually growing his sideline into a full-time stack selling business.
Dan started selling cards in 2013 when everyone thought the sports card industry was dead. After re-entering the scene and connecting with other collectors, he was surprised to see the card collecting community was alive and well. Now with almost a decade’s worth of experience in stack selling, Dan’s approach has evolved into one of the most unique and successful business models in the space.
It was great hearing Dan talk about how his stack selling business transformed over the years. His journey highlights some helpful tips for other card sellers, such as:
- How feedback can help streamline your business process
- Why selling on Twitter is better than selling on eBay
- Incentivizing a sale to move inventory
- Building a community to drive traffic on stack sales
- The power of consistency in the stack selling business
There’s so much to learn from Dan’s wealth of experience in the space. Starting from a five-dollar sale on Twitter to closing out deals with CEOs, Dan’s really come a long way in what most people could easily write off as an unprofitable hobby.
It was an absolute pleasure having Dan take over our first episode of GoodSellas. Here’s a couple more interesting things we covered in this episode: