Setting up at Shriners (Boston) show 😬; advice?

[Belfast1933]

I will be sharing a table with a dealer friend at the Nov 1-3 Shriners show here in the Boston area… while I have enjoyed lots of success buying and selling online, my show experience has been limited (and my limited experience was pretty bad!). Another dealer friend said my display looked almost too good - like a museum to look at but not to buy.

He also said my prices were too high - based on my sales, I think he was spot on!

I’ll have a really great collection of pre-war, t-cards, and others for sale so I’d like to at least have a punchers chance of reasonable sales.

I love shows as a collector - but am far less experienced as a seller and would welcome helpful advice here from this crowd

Thx all - I’ll report back how it goes… good, bad or ugly!

Jeff

[gunboat82]

Originally Posted by Belfast1933

I will be sharing a table with a dealer friend at the Nov 1-3 Shriners show here in the Boston area… while I have enjoyed lots of success buying and selling online, my show experience has been limited (and my limited experience was pretty bad!). Another dealer friend said my display looked almost too good - like a museum to look at but not to buy.

He also said my prices were too high - based on my sales, I think he was spot on!

I’ll have a really great collection of pre-war, t-cards, and others for sale so I’d like to at least have a punchers chance of reasonable sales.

I love shows as a collector - but am far less experienced as a seller and would welcome helpful advice here from this crowd

Thx all - I’ll report back how it goes… good, bad or ugly!

Jeff

I'm glad this is happening again. This is usually the only card show I get to each year.

I won't give you advice on price points (I'm more of a buyer than a seller, so I selfishly wish everybody sold at cost). But I can tell you what I look for (some of which is obvious).

1) List prices.

I try to be friendly, but I don't want to have to stop and ask dealers for a price on every card that catches my eye, or to wait while they look up comps on eBay, or VCP, or Beckett, or wherever.

2) Don't use museum prices to start negotiations if your goal is to sell.

This is just a psychological thing for me. I understand that many sellers like to start high in case a sucker comes along (usually me), while leaving some room to negotiate. But if the card is priced absurdly high as a "starting point," I'm not even going to bother starting a conversation to see how far you'll come down. I'll assume that you're a shark hoping for a minnow, and nobody wants to be a minnow.

3) Presentation does matter to some of us.

Some people love to ask dealers to open the case so they can flip through stacks, but I'm shy and lazy. If you've got stacks of toploaders or slabs under the glass, I'm probably not going to be curious enough to find out what's underneath. If you have the space, spread out your inventory as much as possible so that people can see what's there without having to work for it. This seems obvious to me, but I've seen dealers put out stacks of cards without any apparent theme or chronological system, and I tend to walk past those without stopping.

I'd quibble with your dealer friend on one point: there's no such thing as a display that looks too good. The prices will tell me whether you're a museum or a legitimate sales booth.

[Belfast1933]

Originally Posted by gunboat82

I'm glad this is happening again. This is usually the only card show I get to each year.

I won't give you advice on price points (I'm more of a buyer than a seller, so I selfishly wish everybody sold at cost). But I can tell you what I look for (some of which is obvious).

1) List prices.

I try to be friendly, but I don't want to have to stop and ask dealers for a price on every card that catches my eye, or to wait while they look up comps on eBay, or VCP, or Beckett, or wherever.

2) Don't use museum prices to start negotiations if your goal is to sell.

This is just a psychological thing for me. I understand that many sellers like to start high in case a sucker comes along (usually me), while leaving some room to negotiate. But if the card is priced absurdly high as a "starting point," I'm not even going to bother starting a conversation to see how far you'll come down. I'll assume that you're a shark hoping for a minnow, and nobody wants to be a minnow.

3) Presentation does matter to some of us.

Some people love to ask dealers to open the case so they can flip through stacks, but I'm shy and lazy. If you've got stacks of toploaders or slabs under the glass, I'm probably not going to be curious enough to find out what's underneath. If you have the space, spread out your inventory as much as possible so that people can see what's there without having to work for it. This seems obvious to me, but I've seen dealers put out stacks of cards without any apparent theme or chronological system, and I tend to walk past those without stopping.

I'd quibble with your dealer friend on one point: there's no such thing as a display that looks too good. The prices will tell me whether you're a museum or a legitimate sales booth.

Great advice and feedback.

You are reminding me. If I follow the same principles of what draws me to a table as a collector/buyer and apply that to my role on the other side of that table, good things might happen!

[JollyElm]

I'm a buyer, not a seller, so take it for what it's worth, but just realize it's all about the PHONES.

Everyone will be endlessly talking about comps to combat you on your prices, and they will constantly have their devices out 'proving' their number is right and your price sticker is wrong. (Of course, many of these people will trot out single - extremely low - outliers that in no way reflect reality, but that's a different story.)

Obviously, you can charge whatever you want, and as it's been discussed here a million times, comps aren't an end-all to pricing. Great eye appeal and other factors blow comp prices out of the water.
But I suggest you research your pricing based on relevant comps to at least be up-to-date with what your customers are looking at. To 'defeat' a buyer, you must think like a buyer.

Good luck!!!

[Kutcher55]

Look at comps. Most buyers do.

[Belfast1933]

Originally Posted by JollyElm

I'm a buyer, not a seller, so take it for what it's worth, but just realize it's all about the PHONES.

Everyone will be endlessly talking about comps to combat you on your prices, and they will constantly have their devices out 'proving' their number is right and your price sticker is wrong. (Of course, many of these people will trot out single - extremely low - outliers that in no way reflect reality, but that's a different story.)

Obviously, you can charge whatever you want, and as it's been discussed here a million times, comps aren't an end-all to pricing. Great eye appeal and other factors blow comp prices out of the water.
But I suggest you research your pricing based on relevant comps to at least be up-to-date with what your customers are looking at. To 'defeat' a buyer, you must think like a buyer.

Good luck!!!

Yep, will be ready for Comp-A-Palooza for sure!

[toppcat]

Check out Adam Warshaw's blog for a bunch of show-selling advice: https://adamstevenwarshaw.substack.com/