[charbs1111]

Do you report individual card sale prices to Beckett from your shops?

[branesergen]

From my understanding a few years ago it is like Neilsens TV ratings - Select shops report to Beckett sale prices much like select families have the box in their house that monitors what they watch. They also have reps that visit other "retail" outlets as well as shows. The difference in Low BV and High BV is quite simple. Low is the lowest retail price they have seen it sell for and high is the highest. Shop A sells it for $50, B for $60, C for $70 and D for $80 gives its the BV of $50 low to $80 high. Ebay is not factored in due to the fact that it is a wholesale outlet.

[chads-cards]

Nope...you mean I sell a brady bowman rookie in my shop for $50. Then tell beckett I sold it for $50?

[charbs1111]

From my understanding a few years ago it is like Neilsens TV ratings - Select shops report to Beckett sale prices much like select families have the box in their house that monitors what they watch. They also have reps that visit other "retail" outlets as well as shows. The difference in Low BV and High BV is quite simple. Low is the lowest retail price they have seen it sell for and high is the highest. Shop A sells it for $50, B for $60, C for $70 and D for $80 gives its the BV of $50 low to $80 high. Ebay is not factored in due to the fact that it is a wholesale outlet.

http://www.beckett.com/estore/helpsys/vi...icleId=319

This article says they do use online auctions....i dont believe any of it. I know of a card that has only sold for $150-$190 on ebay, but high value is $300. There are only 10 of em, so there cant be many of them that have sold off of ebay since several have on ebay. I think its based off of the product, and then every player has their slot by product. AP and Brady, etc at the top for vets, then work the way down...and do the same for the rookies.

[branesergen]

In addition, we take into account the value of previously issued material, the cost of the product from the manufacturer, the popularity of the featured player or team etc - Would include Bradford

Finally, we try and balance the factor of availability into the question. For those consumers that jump to the conclusion that "eBay is the market", they might be frustrated when trying to track down a specific card that might show up on eBay only once a year if they're lucky. - If you've seen one sell and have another (I've seen 2 sell) then it is infact a scarcer card now. Factored with the fact its Bradford would justify a $300 BV and what you're neglecting to look at is the Low BV of $150 for that card which would acurately reflect the $150-$190 that you've seen it sell for.

It's not uncommon for us to track multiple copies of a new card on eBay selling, for example, at $1-$5, and then get reports of the same card selling at shops, shows and fixed price point websites at $15-$20. Even employing the range of LO-HI values that we use in our monthly and Plus price guides, it's a difficult task to convey a "book value" that perfectly fits everyone's experience of the secondary market. In the above cited example, we'd likely run a range of value around $6-$15, excluding the cheapest 10% of sales and most expensive 10% of sales.

With all of this stated, we realize the matter of trying to price sports cards whereby everyone is in agreement with the listed value is an impossible task.

---

P.S - I do agree with your product and slot placement theory as I have always thought pricing came out too quick to be accurate as well as older cards takes forever to change when they are selling for alot more or alot less than BV suggests.

[charbs1111]

In addition, we take into account the value of previously issued material, the cost of the product from the manufacturer, the popularity of the featured player or team etc - Would include Bradford

Finally, we try and balance the factor of availability into the question. For those consumers that jump to the conclusion that "eBay is the market", they might be frustrated when trying to track down a specific card that might show up on eBay only once a year if they're lucky. - If you've seen one sell and have another (I've seen 2 sell) then it is infact a scarcer card now. Factored with the fact its Bradford would justify a $300 BV and what you're neglecting to look at is the Low BV of $150 for that card which would acurately reflect the $150-$190 that you've seen it sell for.

It's not uncommon for us to track multiple copies of a new card on eBay selling, for example, at $1-$5, and then get reports of the same card selling at shops, shows and fixed price point websites at $15-$20. Even employing the range of LO-HI values that we use in our monthly and Plus price guides, it's a difficult task to convey a "book value" that perfectly fits everyone's experience of the secondary market. In the above cited example, we'd likely run a range of value around $6-$15, excluding the cheapest 10% of sales and most expensive 10% of sales.

With all of this stated, we realize the matter of trying to price sports cards whereby everyone is in agreement with the listed value is an impossible task.

I get all that. I just dont believe its being done. Many of the early nfl products prices have changed, but many (say Limited) which just came out wont move UNLESS the entire player's cards for this year move. Limited pricing will be out shortly with barely any sales to compare...so if cards dont move for a year (or ever), that means they got it right? Dont think so...Beckett makes prices, and moves them from there based on the players overall performance, popularity, demand...an individual card's sales does not effect that IMO, or you wouldnt see stagnant prices like you do.

As for "In addition, we take into account the value of previously issued material, the cost of the product from the manufacturer, the popularity of the featured player or team etc - Would include Bradford" - That thinking is backwards. The value of the previously issued material, cost of product, popularity will ALL be in the cost of the sales data they are supposedly looking at. Thats why youll see Exquisite and Triple Threads selling for more than Topps Chrome. So if the price data for a Topps Chrome card is based just off the sales data, why would something that cost more to get in a pack box etc which people would already therefore pay more for because of that also get a premium above that...makes no sense. I think its based solely off the product itself, and prices are set based on who the player is...prices will go up and down as demand for that player as a whole...not sure i havent seen an example where this wasnt true.

[shezdoni]

I get all that. I just dont believe its being done. Many of the early nfl products prices have changed, but many (say Limited) which just came out wont move UNLESS the entire player's cards for this year move. Limited pricing will be out shortly with barely any sales to compare...so if cards dont move for a year (or ever), that means they got it right? Dont think so...Beckett makes prices, and moves them from there based on the players overall performance, popularity, demand...an individual card's sales does not effect that IMO, or you wouldnt see stagnant prices like you do.

As for "In addition, we take into account the value of previously issued material, the cost of the product from the manufacturer, the popularity of the featured player or team etc - Would include Bradford" - That thinking is backwards. The value of the previously issued material, cost of product, popularity will ALL be in the cost of the sales data they are supposedly looking at. Thats why youll see Exquisite and Triple Threads selling for more than Topps Chrome. So if the price data for a Topps Chrome card is based just off the sales data, why would something that cost more to get in a pack box etc which people would already therefore pay more for because of that also get a premium above that...makes no sense. I think its based solely off the product itself, and prices are set based on who the player is...prices will go up and down as demand for that player as a whole...not sure i havent seen an example where this wasnt true.

You have to remember, the price guide is exactly that, a guide, it is not a figure written in stone as to what something is worth, and there are a lot of factors that come into play when selling cards.

In my opinion, they use the "law of averages" to determine Bv's,

For example a 2000 Fleer Brady Rc sells for $50 on an ebay auction, a shop in New England submits a sale price of $80, Another sells on COMC for $35

They then add those 3 numbers together and get $195, then divide that by 3 and you get $65. so LBV = $65 and HBV = $80

There is no other way that they could do it, as it is virtually impossible,time consuming, and expensive for them to track and trend the Millions of cards that they "price"

[dmasci]

All very interesting and ties in with my question about whether ebay prices are considered when BV is published. If in fact it is, then it's kind of amazing how most people (myself included) just expect to get items off of ebay for a fraction of BV. It's great for buying off ebay, not so much if you are selling....

[charbs1111]

You have to remember, the price guide is exactly that, a guide, it is not a figure written in stone as to what something is worth, and there are a lot of factors that come into play when selling cards.

In my opinion, they use the "law of averages" to determine Bv's,

For example a 2000 Fleer Brady Rc sells for $50 on an ebay auction, a shop in New England submits a sale price of $80, Another sells on COMC for $35

They then add those 3 numbers together and get $195, then divide that by 3 and you get $65. so LBV = $65 and HBV = $80

There is no other way that they could do it, as it is virtually impossible,time consuming, and expensive for them to track and trend the Millions of cards that they "price"

Your last paragraph is pretty much my point. Its fun to have book values, and I find it very handy for trading. But for use when truly determining the value of a card is not doable with all the different places in the market cards are sold.

[y2hood]

Seriously. I got excited one day, a little to geek excited, to find a card of a certain retired player I really like. The set in question is known for a few famous players to have high BV cards and since in my bubble, this guy is popular, I figured $15.00 was a STEAL!

So I purchased it and got home, and according to the Beckett price guide, it's only worth $2.50.

Riiiiight....he's only popular in my neck of the woods. Everyone else done forgot about him. Whoops.

But hey it'd be reported as a $15.00 sale and I guess on COMC it'd go for 1.00 and on ebay it'd go for .75...

Someone is selling it for a nickle somewhere.