Quote:
Originally Posted by Jewish-collector
No, most of the regular National card collector attendees budget & take a few thousand dollars for this show. The National changed after COVID. It depends on your perspective if it's better, worse, or the same as pre-COVID Nationals. The crowds are so much bigger than before that it is evident that any of the venues (IX Center, Stephens, etc,...) having the National are now too small.
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I'm guessing a lot of the older guys still collecting at these prices are leveraging from the appreciation in collections accumulated when ordinary folk with ordinary incomes could do that. Nobody loves everything forever, so you sell the things you don't have to have anymore to be able to make a play for things you otherwise wouldn't be able to afford. And, as others have said, there's the "wealth effect" of big appreciations in homes, the market, etc. I have no clue what the younger dudes are up to at these shows, and I wonder how many are actual collectors who love their cards like the older folk, but whatever they're about it's great to see them put some juice into the hobby and some of them will inevitably gravitate to vintage and keep the life going in that, too.