News from SGC

[Snowman]

I would bet that over 99% of all graded cards today are modern or ultra modern. This market used to be split between PSA and Beckett until the pandemic grading explosion happened. Then both companies shut down and younger collectors decided to give SGC a try because they still wanted to flip gem mint raw modem cards, and really, SGC was their only option at the time. This was their moment. They had the opportunity to capture significant market share overnight. An entirely new ocean of submitters showed up on their doorstep with boxes full of cards. But the modern market rejected them. SGC 10s often barely outsold PSA 9s in some sports, and couldn't even come close to PSA 10 prices. The problem wasn't the graders though. Peter's fatal mistake was believing that the ultra modern collectors would love their slabs because of the new tuxedo look with the black & white flips. Don't get me wrong, I like the look, it's certainly a huge improvement over the green old school flips, but just changing the flip was never going to be enough. They needed to change their slabs too. They're just way too big and bulky. The ultra modern guys started getting them in hand and thought, "WTF am I supposed to do with these?" They don't fit inside most storage solutions that the kids are carrying around these days, and they're just unnecessarily bulky. And they really do look cheap when compared to some of the nicer slabs. The long time, hard core vintage collectors here don't mind. We're used to the slabs, and to change them now would just be annoying since all of our other cards are in the dollar store slabs that they use currently. So we want our vintage stuff to match. But they really should have invested in a new modern looking slab for all these ultra modern cards that were being submitted. CSG absolutely nailed this when they came out with their new slabs. They are the nicest looking slabs on the market, and it's not even close. And when the hobby rejected their ugly green flips, they quickly corrected their mistake and redesigned them. And their slabs are the same size as PSA, and even stack perfectly with PSA slabs, so collectors can store them together in a way that looks clean and fits together nicely. SGC really missed an opportunity here. If they had offered a new slab design, while still offering the choice of the old one for those of us who still want them, then I think they could have made some serious progress toward closing that gap between them and PSA. But they failed to see that this was a move they needed to take. Peter thought that all the market cared about was fair, accurate, and consistent grades with good turnaround times. He was wrong. The market also cares deeply about the product itself. And it rejected their slabs. I don't know if it's too late to make that change now. It might be. But I wish they had offered two different slabs. One for vintage guys, and a nicer looking newer one for ultra modern. And a registry. Had they done this, I think they would be in a much better place today than they've suddenly found themselves in. But now that the ultra modern market has collapsed, especially ultra modern base cards, there's just no value at all in sending most of these cards off to SGC anymore. And they need those cards to stay afloat.

Brian Gray predicted, "it's going to be a race to $10". I think he's right. And I think SGC might end up going back to being just the vintage card specialists they were before. They failed to capture the modern market when they had the chance. I think CSG will be the beneficiaries of that.