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Lets face it, the Coe Jollectors love to jump on products when they are hot. THEY LIVE FOR IT. What they dont get is that after the first weeks, you can pretty much cut the price by 20-50% for the remainder of the time. No matter what happens, TWGM jumps in volume sold and price when things are first listed.
The reason I am bringing this up is because Topps Football was just released and not only are people falling all over themselves to buy in at the 85+ dollar price for a box (HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!), but they are also killing any surviving brain cells by paying "REDICOLUS" prices for the rookie premiere autos.
This has led more sellers to post enormous BIN/BOs on their auctions, while others dont even bother with the BO, and just expect people to buy their third string WR red ink auto at $250. Lets go over something:
1. All Day (ROY, all time yds leader single game, beastly runner with tons of hype) - $300 Bucks
2. Matt Ryan (Plays for a shitty team and wont be good for three years) - $199
3. Darren McFadden (shitty team, wont do half of what peterson did) - $310, sad
4. John David Booty: Red Ink /10 (5th rd pick, 3rd stringer) - $149?
Am I missing something here? I dont know many JCs that would even buy in at these prices. Hell, even I wont buy in on Peterson because I know those prices are going to drop like a rock, not to mention the fact that he has played a year. Yet, people are buying Rashard Fucking "NO SIG" Mendenhall at 230 plus? Fuck!
Someone really needs to have a mass murdering rampage across TWGM, I am super cereal about that.
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Contrary to Common Belief, High Price 1st Week DOES NOT Equal High Price After That
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I haven't been able to exactly come up with the words to fully say what I want to, but something is amiss in your critique.
ReplyDeleteThe point of ebay is to connect seller with buyer. So someone is willing to pay X amount of dollars for the card. Who cares what they pay? They wanted the card and were willing to pay that much.
It seems to me that you rail on the "JC" for buying at ridiculous prices, and yet in this post I get a sense of you looking at collecting as a "profit" type endeavor. I am not saying that this is what you are about, but the flow of the argument lends itself to this interpretation.
If we are going to cast off Beckett and irrelevant values, then I believe you also have to embrace the market fully. Whether the value is more or less tomorrow then what someone paid today is irrelevant, What matters is what people are willing to pay at that moment.
Obviously, you have an idea of what value you would put on the cards, but truly you are just one "buyer" in a great big market and your opinions do not set the prices.
If I go on ebay, I have an idea of what I want to pay for an item and I won't go higher than that unless I really want it (as a collector). The issue I am coming into is both on posts like this and responses from people on ebay. They make it into some type of "moral" "value" based issue, like I am "wrong" to only offer that much or an "idiot" for paying X amount for said card. It is what it is and people will pay what they want or not.
Yeah, prices people are willing to pay may go down as more product is introduced to the market and people if they were smart probably would wait, but that also doesn't account for anther factor. The buyer who was willing to pay that price in the 1st week is no longer in the market for that card (unless he/she is a super collector of ridiculous high end cards).
It was a bit of a ramble and for that I apologize. I think you are right that people pay to much for the 1st cards, but really that is coming out of your own perspective of trying to get cards as cheap as you can (for the most part).
P.S. You are banking on AP's value going down but there is also no guarantee on that. (The odds are in your favor, but if he has another stellar year more than likely more people will become fans looking for said cards and create a new market that could keep prices up or go higher)...like I said odds are in your favor.
I guess you are right that it is wrong of me to lambast people for paying exhorbitant prices as this is the flow of the moment. Market value is market value, so I guess it was wrong in that respect. I was trying to offer my opinion on the matter, and that may have been lost.
ReplyDeleteNo Gellman I got the point, and I think you are right that people pay too much because it is "new" etc. But that is also part of the equation, you will always have people who want to have the first or be the first (I mean c'mon you had to see the news articles of people who have always lined up for the next best thing...XBOX 360, PS3, IPHONE, BATMAN: DARK KNIGHT. It's a principle of human behavior and marketing.
ReplyDeleteJust wanted you to know that I didn't miss the point and I think most people will get the point. I just wanted to touch on some of the inconsistency, etc. And it isn't all directed at you it is at everyone. People relate on ebay like it has some type of moral bearing on reality, like someone is "wrong" to offer such a low price. Sellers need to realize that buyers want to get the best deal and so they are going to try to get the best deal, if you don't like it then reject it but dont make it into some type of "moral issue" like most sellers/buyers do.
Whether or not you "really want the card" is not at issue. The point of this post is to point out the morons who have to have the first of everything. Even if it was your favorite player in the history of sports, wouldn't you feel like a prize idiot if you paid $300 for a card, and the following week it was $100??
ReplyDeleteI've never understood this facet of our culture.
If an entire group of people who have waited out in the rain and sleet for 3 days to be the among the first to over-pay for an Iphone or sit on someone's lap to watch Dark Knight, got run over by a out of control bus, I would have no sympathy.
I have never, and will never understand these people, and I think Gellman's post drives that point home with a sledgehammer.
Everyone so wants to find that next Adrian Peterson and make sure they have all the rookie cards of running backs. I just think that the AP thing was just a perfect storm. The Vikes had the O-Line, just not the dominant RB needed to take advantage. I dont't think any of the RBs taken in this draft are going to come close to what AP did last year. To spend crazy money to get these rookie cards is ridiculous.
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