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Old 07-26-2012, 03:17 PM
BleedinBlue BleedinBlue is offline
BRIAN C0ATS
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Join Date: May 2009
Location: Farmington, CT
Posts: 667
Default I've been in the shop and bought from online

About 10 years ago I went into Burbank Sportscards, drawin by their large inventory. I never went back. In many respects they reminded me of 707Sportscards. They often have the card you want but you can be expected to pay for the priviledge of doing business with them. Customer service in the shop was far less than I had hoped for and prices were far more than I could find elsewhere. Back in the pre-internet days I'm sure they could get away with this level of service but I was discouraged enough to walk away with my money still firmly in my wallet.

I did break down and buy some hard-to-find (but far from rare) chase cards to finish out a few sets through the mail a few years ago. I knew going in that I would be paying 5x what I would pay if I could find them elsewhere but at that point I was willing to pay $2.50 for a 50 cent card just to finish up the set. To me that is the niche they fill in the hobby today and I wouldn't even consider buying anything else from them.

A few weeks ago Burbank Sportscards listed a large number of T206 cards. I think they were all graded by BGS or some other second tier grading company. At the time I was actively looking for a T206 Tinker Bat Off in a PSA 3-4/SGC 40-50 range. VCP and ebay history says this sould be a $150-200 card and there were several on ebay slightly above that target range. (I eventually bought a PSA 3 for $135). Burbank listed their copy with a buy-it-now price of $656, far above Levi's asking price of $400. I didn't expect anything different after having dealt with them in the past.

I never had to return the cards I bought so I can't speak to their return policy but I've moved away from the 50 cent card market and have no further use for Burbank Sportscards.
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