Is Chris Potter Sports still in business
 

Been trying for a couple weeks to reach Chris Potter Sports to see where my autographed ball is from one of there private signings and 2 emails and 2 phone calls from the info on there website and no reply at all. The phone message says the mailbox is full each time I call so no way to leave a message or talk to anyone. They were supposed to mail out items from there private signings according to there website on Oct 5th and now almost 3 weeks later nothing. My question is does anyone know if they are still in business or something going on with them? Seems strange that you can't get any reply back after a couple weeks from a business when items were suppose to be sent out 3 weeks ago. Never did a mail order with them before and might never again if I can't get a reply back. Thanks

I receive periodic emails from them about sales on their eBay store. See if they are still selling on eBay. I think their ebay ID is baseball superman. Or something like that.

I've done mail order with them 3-4 times in the past and never have had a problem....Perhaps he is on the road doing the signings and just hasn't had the time to return messages...

Keith, I received one of his emails a month or so ago and I believe it did say that he would be out of the office for a bit but would respond to any inquiries.

Thanks for the info. I have been trying to email, phone calls and also their email from eBay and for 3 weeks I get absolutely no reply from any of it. You would think even if they are out on the road or not in the office somebody would contact me after 3 weeks as I'm sure there is employees. Even their feedback on eBay is recent so they're selling stuff and shipping on eBay. It's just one baseball from one of their private signings so it's not a high end item but still when the website says items shipped on October 5th and 3 weeks later nothing kind of makes you wonder what's going on especially when I sent my money on August 14th. My patience is getting thin.

Did you pay with a credit card? If so, file a claim with the credit card company.

Matt, No I paid with a check so I figured I'm out my money. Live and learn. After calling once every day the whole month of October and getting their answering service every day saying the mailbox is full everytime I call I'm guessing I'm not the only one looking for their items. So apparently no one for the whole month is answering the phone. Strange. I have bought from them on Ebay with no problem but no more after this.

He is active on sportscollectors.net as Rip8cp1. He has received feedback on there as recently as 10.29.

Did you get your item? I won something from him on eBay and I have been having difficulty getting in touch with him about it. What's up with this guy?

Yea I finally got my item after months and months and no communication from anyone there back in December I think. I have done Ebay with them but it has been a couple years ago and it seemed ok then. I would have thought if they would have read all my emails ( phone calls never got through either mail box was always full) that I sent they would have had an explaination or an apology for the trouble and delay but I didn't receive any of that and if they did I would have forgot about the whole thing and said no problem. Just seems like it would have been good customer relations as a business owner. I needed the item and it put me in a bind not having it. It could have taken 6 months I didn't care but at least return my emails or calls when I was trying to find out where my item was. Just got me madder and madder when I wasn't get any response back. Payment was sent in August for a signing in October and didn't receive till December

I have used Potter's services on numerous occasions. Except for the occasional rescheduling of a signing, there were no problems. Three or four years ago (perhaps longer) Chris had his first child, and from that point on (fully understandable) the frequency of singings and quality and quantity of players slipped. It has been three years since I have used his services but I still hold out hope for a rebound.

Bringing up an old topic, but I think there may be some relevance. I can't seem to find his Ebay ID and some old links to auctions on eBay from his site say the store doesn't exist. I used to get emails from them and have not seen one in a while. Anyone know if they changed names or stopped selling?

The website went dead. Stopped answering emails and voice mail messages. Just packed it in without a peep. Interesting that his motto was "The collector's friend".

I hope things were left settled with all buyers. I enjoyed shopping for some obscure player signatures with him. My only complaint was that his shipping was always very slow. I always got what I purchased though.

Things were not settled with all buyers.

You guys don't even know the half of all the things he did. He has tens of thousands of dollars and product still owed to people and he basically took a flame thrower to anyone he dealt with or tried to help him. He is a true psychopath.

I guess I should consider myself lucky then. That is too bad. It must not have been a lucrative enough business, but it was nice seeing a lot of names that were possible, some previously hard to find.

Past Pros seems to be picking up some steam with some recent new player additions that are a little more exciting than a lot of the first bunch they rolled out with. I have still not sent anything in to them yet, but would like to get myself to do it someday soon.

I'm with Curt, in that I'm fortunate to have not been one of the big losers.
Lee "Bee Bee" Richard cancelled out on a signing and I still had a little bit of credit due with Chris, but not a big deal.
I will say that Chris did in fact provide an excellent service for his first few years in business. He managed to round up a few signers that were off the grid that I had been trying to get through the years...

Is there an article or has this been in the media in any form? Seems to me that it would be good if there was something to inform the community rather than stumbling across this in a chat board. Who knows if he is still trying to do business or trying to sell off stuff he doesn't own.

(Not saying he is... just that an informed community could help prevent the situation from becoming even worse...)

I was left with holding a credit as well. I am sure there are others. Did not hear anything about Potter "owing tens of thousands" and the whole flamethrower business, although I would not be surprised. Potter offered a niche service for mostly obscure off the show circuit players. I have yet to come across a board thread were thousands (even hundreds??) of collectors were screaming bloody murder. No board I frequented had a forum dedicated to Potter dealings. Any postings were a one here, one there wondering aloud if Potter was still in business. I would love to hear the entire story. Do tell.

Someday, I fully expect to see Potter at an obscure show in a former Elks Lodge, perhaps set up at a flea market or swap meet, hawking his wares.

He was still selling on ebay as recently as this mid November....two weeks ago, he closed out his Linkedin account....

Chris Potter
 

SigningsHotline - thread is reporting that Chris Potter died. I could not find an obituary notice.

http://forum.signingshotline.com/ind...-chris-potter/

His passing is also being reported on SCN.

I had forgotten about Potter mostly, although I mentioned him by name just a day or two ago on a facebook group posting. The guy had cards with Sergio Robles and I asked him how he got the signatures if it was something like a Potter signing?

Unfortunate about his passing, if true. Still too bad that his business apparently went south at the end too. I especially liked it when he ran eBay auctions because many of his signing prices were steep, but he would start items out cheap and see what happened and often buyer were winners on those deals. Not at too tremendous a discount, but cheaper than the mail-in price, I was able to nab Mike Marshall. Possible one of his biggest accomplishments, getting Marshall to sing more. Chris was able to exponentially increase the supply of Marshall cards in the market.