2013 Industry Summit: Panini America’s corporate address
By Susan Lulgjuraj | Beckett Sports Card Monthly Editor
LAS VEGAS – The crowd at The Industry Summit shuffled into a showroom at The Orleans in Las Vegas on Tuesday. The room is usually reserved for concerts or big shows at the casino, but instead Panini America spoke to a room full of dealers.
It did not feel like a typical corporate address at The Industry Summit. The stage had three chairs in the center, banners of Panini’s exclusive athletes and purple lighting, giving the address of far different feel than those held in a conference room.
Panini discussed the company’s growth and where it believes it is headed. Here are the highlights from the address:
1. Panini has seen 60 percent growth of its company as it has generated more content than the other card companies. Panini has licenses in the four major sports, including several entertainment licenses, and its Panini Authentic department.
2. Panini has made a strong push into social media and has tried to leverage that success into stronger sales for its products. One of its biggest successes has been The Knight’s Lance blog. In 2011, the blog drew 1.7 million pageviews. It grew to 5.5 million in 2012 and in 2013 has already had 9.3 million pageviews.
3. The company is going to push soccer products starting with 2014 World Cup stickers. In 2010, the stickers sold in over 100 countries. Eventually, there will be soccer cards, including a high-end brand. In the meantime, if dealers want to acquire soccer cards Panini makes in Europe, it could put dealers in touch with a distributor
4. Panini is making Prizm Hockey. Collectors can first find these cards in 2012-13 Rookie Anthology as a bonus pack.
Promos
Basketball: The Starting 5 promo was held in 260 hobby shops this year. It was capped, but Panini will open it up to more stores next year. Along with providing packs of cards to shops, one collector will win a trip to the NBA Rookie Premiere in New York in August.
NFL Player of the Day: This was used in 540 card shops this year with about 50 new stores participating. In a survey done with the card shops, 89 percent said the shop saw an increase in sales of Panini products.
The POD promotion ended with an NFL player meeting with the national grand prize winner. On April 27, a New Jersey resident will host Hakeem Nicks who won in a contest held by the Attack of the Baseball Cards in Union, NJ.
Hockey Player of the Day: In 2012, 266 shops participated with 112 of them in Canada. The next season’s POD will have a heavy focus on the double rookie class on cards.
Redemptions
Panini processed 34,000 redemptions this year – 9 percent of the redemptions have taken more than a year with 91 percent taking less than a year to fulfill. In 2012, Panini processed a whopping 120,000 redemptions.
Any baseball related news from Panini? I wish they would revive the Donruss brand.
I like the comment about the redemptions. What a crock!! I have been waiting for 2 years for a redemption card from 10-11 Crown Royale hockey and when I contact the Panini Company, it usually takes 4 – 8 months to get a response. Panini has the worst customer service ever. Upperdeck used to be really bad but I have found that they have really stepped up and made the customer feel valued. I have stopped buying Panini’s products because of this reason.
Let’s see Panini states only 9% of their redemptions takes more than a year to fulfill. I am going to say that is a load of crap. I have 3 that I have been waiting for for well over a year. And god forbid you ask for a replacement….. Panini thinks a replacement for a Julio Jones auto patch is worth ……….wait …………a Ryan Mallett auto. Are you frigging kidding me. Panini customer service and supervisors are clueless they byfar have the worst ever customer service department. And they are truly clueless about the hobby.
Oh and explain why you can open box after box of their products and all you get are mid line to below average player redemptions????? I would be able to fulfill a Joe shmo auto quick as S**T too. These players don’t play so they got nothing but time to sign STICKERS.
Thanks for artical, sad part is they don’t care about the collectors.
On the money Mark I have been waiting on a Bo Jackson auto out of limited for over a year myself. I have seen his auto pulled out of brand new product and the response I received on a question (8 months) after I submitted it was not a very nice response.
Agreed with the redemption fiasco. I have an even better story. I have been waiting for over a year for a Jordan Eberle Auto Jersey /25 from limited. When I contacted them they responded by saying (laughing to myself). the agent for Eberle contacts Panini and then sets up a signing day. Let’s see, so it’s the agents that control what the players should be doing with their free time. What a load of B.S. I have 25 outstandng redemptions and yes the no name person who will never see a profesisonal field, court or ice rink to play on signs. I can’t even use them as door stoppers. Thanks for nothing Panini. Your big Vegas shows was just that, a show with a lot of smoke and whistles.
I don’t know, I pulled an expired Kobe redemption out of a pack of 2010-11 Donruss last Monday, contacted Panini about it and received it in the mail this past Monday.
Also, with redemptions, I have received about 90 percent of the cards I was supposed to, and the ones I didn’t get I thought were decent replacements.
Just wanted to share some good news, LOL.
Actually, I have been told Panini honors all expired redemptions.