What this seems to indicate is that people will pay more today to have a card slabbed than they actually paid for the card many years ago.

What a total scam on the TPGs part. What's really sad is that people actually buy into their business model.

How do they justify the fees? They don't seem to back up what they've graded in the past too well. Does that mean, since it's a known fact, that the PSA8 (first graded Wagner) should be in a holder with an "A" that they would be responsible for paying the owner the price between the "A" grade and the "8"?

If people are really paying that much to have cards graded, then PSA stock should have a high valuation. Yikes. :eek:

Don't mistake me for someone who is a grading fanboy; I have plenty of my own personal issues with "professional" graders - in fact to the point where as of the current moment my preference is raw, low grade. However:

How is their business model a scam? They are providing a service that (in the vast majority of cases) makes valuable cards inherently more valuable. With the exception of a questionable trimmed Wagner aside, this is certainly true for say, Marshall Fogel's PSA 10 '52 Topps Mantle (a card he paid something like $120K for 30 years ago...) or even just you and me as garden variety collectors trying to sell a nice card of a HOF'er from the 1950's. A random Ted Williams in a PSA 5 is going to sell for more, maybe even a couple of hundred bucks more - than the same card raw. There are exceptions here and there of course, and preferences vary widely - but it's hard to argue that's not more or less true.

Of course people pay more today to have their cards graded than the cards were originally worth - the nominal value of each card in a pack at least up until some point in the 1980's probably was one penny per card. I don't think anyone is debating that. While I would agree with you that TPG's can engage in "scams" - it's not with their business model. They are charging an arguably nominal fee to make your card worth more and to give you the ability to sell it for more because it's in their slab with their flip and their pronouncement of grade. The "scam" in all of this lies within the subjectivity inherent in any type of grading that at the end of the day ties back to eye appeal of a vintage piece of ephemera. Yep, they got us all (including me...) pretty much there. I may hate creases and you may hate OC beyond a certain point or dinged corners, but if the card is in a PSA slab with any of that - it might still be worth more. The subjectivity and preference question is where they make their money. Oh - and with the registry and the resubs.

Thanks! I know it's low grade but I've seen 1's with corners missing. My card might not be pretty but it's complete!
















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John,

Perhaps not a scam because people willingly roll with this.

I guess it's how you interpret the story of the Pied Piper.

One way to look at is that the Pied Piper (TPG) is pulling the rats away from the hobby and the tune ($$$) is too harmonious for people to turn a deaf ear to.

Oh, not to offend any one here. I'm guessing a lot of pure hobbyist are hoping that at some point this whole mess comes crashing down and everyone runs for cover and dumps it all and people that love this for the hobby it was can again pick up the card board for the pleasure of having it for what it is and not the monetized abomination it's become.

Hey, let us at least dream...:D

The first cards I had graded, under a $7 special all cost more to grade than the card had cost.
One of the weird things about getting old.....