Cardboard OCD Chapter 7 (Revised): The Trick To Stick

Back at the start of the pandemic, I wrote an OCD article about processing mail packages and printing labels.  At that time, I was printing the labels on paper and taping them to the mailers.  

I've updated the process now to use sticker labels.  And with all the set sales and TCDB trade packages that have been flowing out of here, I'm glad I did.  The trick is aligning the label as it comes from eBay or the database to the proper orientation to print out on the actual stickers.  Here is that process...

So you get your label from eBay or PayPal/ShipStation etc. and it shows on the screen like this.  (eBay labels face one way, and the others are the opposite, in my experience.)  Hit the CTRL + Print Scrn buttons to take a screenshot.

Then open your favorite graphic editor.  I still use Paint Shop Pro 4 from the early 90's.  One of these days I'll take a course in PhotoShop.  I also recommend PhotoScape X that will do the same job.  Either way, you just need some way to crop and rotate your label screenshot.  Select just around the lines and below that little code box in the corner.  I leave off the tag lines (lower left). 

 

Then rotate the image 90° to the left (or right) to stand it up. 

Then copy the label image to the clipboard.

I print labels out of Word since it's less cumbersome than the Avery program.  

Paste the label image in, select it, and right click.  Go to Size and Position...

I've found that 68% is the right proportion to make the image fit the label properly.

With the image still selected, go to Mailings > Labels in the menu bar.

Confirm that you still have it set for the right label under Options - I switch between 5168 Shipping Labels and 48160 address labels, and even though I have two different documents set up to print each one, Word in its infinite genius only keeps whatever the last setting was.  Then change to Single label and set the position of the next available sticker on your current sheet and hit Print.

That's probably overkill as far as useful procedure.  Many of you probably have a totally different way to print these out.  Let me know in the comments how you get 5168 labels to print properly without having to modify them like this.

Trading With Myself (Or The World)

Business is good.

Those sets are flying out of here, almost a couple every day or two.  I'm still in disbelief about how 1988-1990 sets are selling so well.  And if you don't know ~ eBay is a lot of work.  This is why I'm only posting a couple times a month.

But anyway, that's not what this post is about.  I finally photographed my last COMC order that I submitted in November 2024, and took delivery of in January.  I was trying to come up with a better way to show over 200 cards, but I ended up just laying them out and taking pictures with minimal glare.  I was only mildly successful at even that.  All the little bar-coded slips are still in each card's sleeve, though I did try to overlap them and crop them out.  But since they're all in penny sleeves, they catch all the reflections they possibly can, sorry.

Since my inventory on COMC is down below 100 cards, my credit balance is way up.  The last batch I submitted was 90% from the storage hoard (the upstairs batch in my house).  They've done well, and I've paid the owner his part, though I haven't cashed out the credit on the site.  I figure since I've paid out the money, I might as well get the cards from the site for myself.  My last order was over 200 cards like I said.  And most of them were around a dollar or less, so there are many more coming back than have gone out.  

  

The Trout above is one of several set hits that I knocked off with this purchase.  Set hits were not the majority of this order, though.

Stupid reflections...

The four 2006 Ginters are set killers.  The Trout is the penultimate 2012, but I still need Harper's rookie too.  Cal is the last one I've been searching for to finish that SP insert - and he's been elusive!  As you can see, the Pacifics are promos, and the first half of that group that I decided to dive into while picking out this order.  Jeffries is the proper Prism version - not the circular type.  And the Dominators and black GQ minis are both rather lifelong quests it seems...

Brett & Brady are the entirety of my football set hits this time.  They are also two of the more elusive finds and set killers.  Favre is a throwback promo from 2005 and Brady kills my 2015 Field Access set.  There have been many attempts at a Stadium-Club-like, unusual photo themed product in recent times, but they never seem to last more than a year or so.  They just keep getting different names.  

Some hockey list hits from a few different decades.  Guy & Mark leave only the big rookies for those two sets (Yzerman & Roy respectively), and Gretzky for the former.  Pretty sure the three '89-90s should kill that set.  The Flames team card is from one of my favorite hockey sets - 2005 Parkhurst.  Still looking for the Leafs and some of the higher number cards which aren't short prints, but are still hard to come by.  The remaining inserts are from Parkhurst of '16-17.  I have more trouble finishing the huge sets of recent years than I do the older ones.  

While I'm working on hockey sets, I always have to get a second batch of the Capitals too.  Many of these complete the team sets either outright or by upgrading the last ones.

  

And finishing out the hockey theme, I updated my list of Manon Rheaume cards that I have and want and looked at a whole lot of her stuff on the site.  Ended up with these that didn't exceed the cost threshold - a couple bucks or less.  Her older stuff is still surprisingly costly.  I suppose she's the only reason that people still look at early 90's off-brand hockey.  She's officially on my player collection list now.  Like Edwin Jackson, and Jordan Addison, it's only on the Database for the moment. 

Let's keep going with the player collections, and I'll save the coolest stuff for the end.  (Sorry about the mammoth image count if you're on a phone or something).  Found a few missing entries from my smaller football PCs.  The Upper Deck on the lower left is Dan LeFevour in the CFL. 

Of course, my biggest football PC is still Priest Holmes.  I found tons of his and had to filter out my take just to the cheap ones.  Had to draw the line at these so I didn't spend all my credit.  Between him and Jordan Addison, I could go all night.  Except for a half dozen "easy" base cards, I've been down to mostly serial numbered and scarce parallels - and mojo hits - for Priest for years.

Now, here's where I really went nuts.  I said I narrowed down my choices for Jordan Addison.  And I really did cut out any regular base cards that I figured I'd get in trade on TCDB.  But I still ended up with all these.  I'm out of control.  Here's a look at some of them close up....

A couple jerseys among them.  Only a few bucks apiece. 

Got these "Keepsake" base and parallels.  Don't even know what they are, except low numbered.  

And there was this silly thing.  

And these are the epitome of the parallel glut that is happening these days.  These are, in fact, different parallels.  The left one is the "Mini Diamond Refractor" version, as opposed to the "Speckle Refractor" on the right.  Come on people, you're really running this stuff into the ground.

Rounding out the player collection theme, here's all the baseball PCs from this order.  Lou Piniella isn't really one of my major guys, but there are so many of his managerial cards out there for less than a buck or so, that I can't help but try to fill them in.  The Pookie Bernstine in the very top left is the eighth one out of his ten total cards.  The only ones left are the gold version of that one and a TCMA.  The MCI Sparky Lyle isn't normally autographed, but at only $3, I couldn't grab it fast enough.  Got a pair each of minor league coach cards and Chrome Anniversary parallels for Gene Tenace at the same time.  The bottom corner Edwin Jackson is a 2010 Printing Plate that was only $8.50 - one of about a dozen cards over $2 on the whole order.

Moving on to fictional beings, Deathlok is my favorite comic character.   The Specialist card finally ends that Marvel set.  The first two cards are the same Captain America cover shot, but vastly different interpretations as far as color.

More sci-fi, but this time the classic stuff.  The last card to finish all the color series of the entire Star Wars set.  I'm also whittling away the 1977 Star Wars stickers - the cheap ones of course - these were all less than a dollar.  I'll be finishing the 1980 Empire Strikes Back set soon too.

And now the bonus for reading all the way to the end.  A few lovely ladies to complete the package.  A strange playing card Sheena Easton - my first musical love, before I heard the sound of metal guitars years later.  A Farrah mini from Golden Age to knock another of the five backs off the list.  A recent Saraya wrestling card - AKA Paige from WWE.   And some colorful images of golf influencer and total smokeshow Paige Spiranac.

Thanks for plowing through all my mediocre images of some cool cards.  As if I needed to add more cards to my overflowing desks, I have yet another order kinda like this one (though not as large) being picked right now and shipment is set for early March.  Stay tuned for that one!

My theory is that I'm basically swapping the cards I sell for all this, so it's really a bargain. It's kinda like trading with myself - or several hundred COMC users all at once!

Some Swag Among The Slabs

I made a trade last week on the TCDB with a guy named Eric.  Turns out he lives near Hagerstown, MD which is just about 20 minutes from me.  So we met up about halfway in between to swap packages.  He primarily collects Paul Molitor, Robin Yount and Travis Hafner. We had a good conversation about our collecting habits, etc. before he had to get back.

He texted me later and asked if I knew about the show going on in the Silver Spring Civic Center, which is about an hour to our south.  I knew there were shows that rotated through there, but wasn't planning to go.  I have so much to put away around Hivemind Headquarters, plus the two piles of stuff for sale, I probably didn't need to add to any of it.  But I decided to go anyway. 😀 

So we made plans to meet along the route and made our way down there.  Upon arrival, I realized that I had been there once before.  It's a smaller venue, with a main room in the middle, and two other rooms at each end, plus a hallway between with a few more tables. 

A previous year's show

There was a LOT of slabs.  And several tables - especially in the outer rooms - of Pokèmon.  But I did manage to find some treasures among them.

I should have put this at the end, so as to not give away everything I got, but here you go.  The first thing I found (that I could get into - it was wall to wall people in the narrow aisles) was some vintage singles.  I found four of my '65 commons for a buck a shot (center above).  They're nice, though I left a couple sketchier ones there. 

At the same table, I picked up this set killer / upgrade to finish my '73-74 set.  The top corners are a bit weathered, but it's half the price of similar ones on COMC right now.  I think it's much better than the one I started with.

There were a few hockey-centric tables, though I wasn't looking for much in that realm.  I came across these fancy shiny SP Authentic inserts.  For this price and the presence of a parallel Ovie, I said what the heck.

Lots of tables had rows of toploadered singles sorted by team.  This one corner dealer had some that he hadn't priced, but instead was asking customers to make him an offer.  And he was taking pretty much all of them it seemed.  I figured I'd get these Jordan Addisons for about a buck a shot or slightly less, but it worked out even better - after I also picked out these:

Jayden Daniels was very present in a lot of showcases at this show.  I saw these initially and did a quick bit of market research to see how other dealers compared - or at least one other.  I asked the guy at the table across the room what his prices on the same Mosaics and a different insert were, and he said $10 each.  I immediately went back and pulled these out.  They totaled $20 with another Terry McLaurin card.  I handed them to the dealer and he replied "Just make it an even twenty".  I had to check later to verify that I basically got the Addisons for free.  I should have gotten that guy's business card or contact....  That brings my JD5 total to ten cards so far.

And the grande finale was this, the second set killer of the day.  Mantle/Mays "Managers' Dream" is the last card I need to finish my 1962 Topps set.  I don't usually buy graded cards, but lately they have bucked the trend that I always assumed they cost three crooked numbers just for being graded.  This one was nicer than any of the same grade on COMC and fits my set very well.  For a "4", it's well centered and has nice corners and no major flaws that I can see.  

Eric had a family deadline (that we didn't quite meet), so we left the show after a little over two hours.  That was enough.  We got lucky that the winter weather forecast was wrong, so it was clear sailing all the way there and back.  My thanks to Eric for the invite and ride.

Ginter Gap Cards #4

The fourth installment of Ginter Gap cards - custom A&G cards with subjects that Topps didn't include - uses the 2024 design.  

It's unfortunate that this tribute comes at the time of Bob Uecker's passing.  I won't go into his career and biography, since almost everyone that knows baseball knows who he is.  Just check out some of his appearances on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson via YouTube if you want a good laugh.

I took a bit of a liberty and moved the Topps name from between the subject name and the A&G wordmark.  It seemed so crammed in there.  

This picture is somewhat more square, so there's a lot of headroom (and background to fill in when I removed the player that was in the original template image.)

You can see that Kirby is shown from halfway to his beltline, while Uecker's image stops just below the collar.  It didn't take me nearly as long as it typically does to create the framework and then integrate the image in it.  

I actually started with the name.  I moved the "U" on top of the "P" and then copied the "E" into the space that was created.  That gave me "UECKE", so I just had to find an "R".  It came from Gunnar Henderson.  That "R" was out in the middle of a bright background of the same color, so it pasted right in.

Then all that was left was to adjust and fill in the background around him.  And paste over the side "rails" where the image covered them, or extend the blue areas of his jacket to meet the side edges.  And voilà!

State Of The Collective Part 3: Distributions And ... Sales?

I briefly mentioned at the end of my last post that I have been trying to move two large batches of cards out of HiveMind Headquarters.  

The first was documented here and the major revenue has come from a COMC shipment, including a $350 graded Michael Jordan PSA 7, and a few unopened box and set sales.  There are still some sets left (of early 90's Classic 4-Sport and mid-90's basketball series) and a lot of bulk singles (a little baseball and football and a whole lot of basketball, all through the 90's decade).

That pile is on the second floor of my house.

 

The second is a stockpile of complete sets - factory and hand collated, and including traded/update sets in many cases - of baseball, primarily from 1988 thru 1990, with a few older single sets, plus Topps football sets from '87 thru '89.  The itemized list is below

1984 Topps set - verified and sold.
1985 Topps - no Gooden.  I have an agent hunting that one down.
1986 Topps - 2 hand collated sets, unverified.
1987 Donruss set - factory sealed.
1987 Fleer set - factory seal broken but set intact.
1987 Topps set - hand collated, unverified.
1988 Donruss - 10 sets, selling well
1988 Fleer - 10 sets and 10 Updates, selling well
1988 Score - 6 cases (8 sets each)!  10 Rookie & Traded sets
1988 Topps - 10 hand collated, 10 Traded sets, and 2 unopened wax boxes
1989 Bowman - 10 hand collated sets
1989 Donruss - 10 factory sets, 10 Traded sets
1989 Fleer - 10 factory sealed sets, 10 Update sets
1989 Score - 10 factory sealed sets, 9 Update sets
1989 Topps - 10 hand collated sets, 10 Traded sets, and 4 wax boxes
1989 Upper Deck factory sealed sets - sold first
1990 Donruss - 10 factory sets
1990 Fleer - 6 factory sets
1990 Score - 10 factory sets
1990 Topps - 9 hand collated sets

1987 Topps football - 10 hand collated sets
1988 Topps football - 10 hand collated sets
1989 Topps football - 9 factory sealed sets - sold in one purchase

Not everything is currently listed, but you can see what I have available by searching for my seller name qaplagca (https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fss=1&_saslop=1&_sasl=qaplagca&LH_SpecificSeller=1)

Those are all still stacked in my living room on the ground floor as they were when they arrived.  My house is now officially full of cardboard, since my collection and tradeables fill the middle floor and these two hoards occupy the other two.

I'm amazed that sales have been so steady since I started listing things after New Year's.  1988 sets are the most popular so far - especially Fleer and Donruss.  I would have never though that was possible.  Not sure what the draw is except that I think I'm about the only seller that pairs the Fleer base set with the Update.  Plus, I assess what each item has actually sold for and set my prices accordingly.  A lot of these are bringing less than $10 each after eBay fees and me paying for shipping.  But it all adds up.  The original owner said just get what you can for them, and the revenue is already approaching what I thought the whole shebang would go for. 

It's a lot of work though.  Every day or two, a couple more sets sell.  So then I pull them from the boxes, and cut a bubble envelope flat and wrap it around the set.  Then I cover that in brown bag paper and print the label sticker.  I've had a couple orders of multiple sets - one was all nine '89 football sets, and another was three '88 Donruss sets.  Had to find the right size boxes for those.

Most sets are listed individually, but I did also offer a couple bundles of all the sets for a particular year.  I will probably do the same for the Traded/Updates.

I'm just glad the stuff is moving.  I was afraid I had burdened myself with a whole pile of unmovable merchandise for the next ten years.  Though at some point, I will take what's left of both batches to the local dealers I know to get rid of them.  

For the longest time, I thought the worst thing I could try to do was sell something, even if it is cards that I know so much about.  The one time I set up at a show, I didn't sell a damn thing.  So this has been a revelation.

I'm also doing halfway decent in my COMC sales as well.  Half of my total revenue was from the first batch above, but I had sent two submissions of my own stuff before that (and took back a portion of the first one that didn't sell).  Here's my progress:

Excluding the graded card sale, I'm averaging around $4 a sale.  And they're constantly trickling in all the time.  I put up 20% discounts on Thursdays that run through the next two weekends every few weeks.  The best part is I've exchanged 186 extra cards for 672 cards that I wanted for myself.  I had $400 store credit at one point until I put in another order.  (I paid the owner of the basketball stuff from my own fundage.)

I'm going to take a week off from work since I didn't really get a break during the holidays.  That way I can catch up on managing all this, plus my TCDB trades, and clearing off all the incoming singles I have for my sets and other collections.  And maybe thin out some of my total collection to make room for the stuff I don't have boxes or space for .

But that about wraps it up for what's happening at HiveMind Headquarters.  Stay tuned for the previous 200+ card COMC order, and other recent activities.

State Of The Collective Part 2: Assimilations

My last post pointed out so many things that I'm not doing in the hobby.  This one is about all that I actually am doing.  And regardless of what it felt like in the previous read, it's a lot.

Vintage Sets

1957 Topps

My main man Marv in Michigan steadily supplied me with most of the remainder of my 1957 list.  I still lack a few, including Hank Aaron, Mickey Mantle, Brooks Robinson's RC, and several of the scarcer mid-series.  (273 JDavis  276 Pyburn  313 Parnell 339 Speake).  I'm looking for the right prices on the big ones, and just to find decent copies of the others.  They are elusive.

1962 Topps

When I finished my 1964 set, I officially started '62.  Marv provided so many nice cards, and did so basically on a monthly schedule, that '62 passed the '57 set and now stands with only the Mays/Mantle combo card left to finish it!  I think that's the fastest I've completed a vintage set, like ever.

1965 Topps

So then I found a binder at Chantilly that started me on 1965 Topps.  I got a big head start on the set, including many stars and almost all the team cards.  I only needed 12 of the 40+ high number short prints (they're not all SP's), and promptly got them from you know who.  I picked up a handful of the HOF'ers at the same show, and then got two more installments from Marv.  So now I'm down to Clemente, Spahn, Mays, Gibson, Oliva, Carlton RC, Banks, and Bob Uecker, plus a bunch of commons.

1961 Golden Press

I got a handful of these from a trade on the Database.  They were nice and that guy had amassed a pile of them.  Then I started finding them at the Chantilly show.  This is one set I'm only tracking on the TCDB, so you won't see it on this site.  I have 18 of the 33 cards.  Haven't tried to pay more than $5 each for them and still get nice looking specimens.  At some point I'll have to track down the book they go into, but for now, they're a stack of Card Savers.

Vintage football

I haven't added much of anything significant to my football setbuilds lately.  But I've got a few sets still plodding along.  A couple of them fall into the "wait until prices come back down to 2019 levels" category ~ namely 1958 Topps (Jim Brown), and maybe 1971 Topps (Bradshaw).  But I'm down to just a few on all four sets: 1958 - 4, 1968 - 5, 1970 - 1 variation, and 1971 - 2.

Vintage Hockey

Picked up a few big stars here and there this year, including the Mario above.  Still need a Parent for the '74-'75 set.  Also down to one on '73-'74 (Orr AS upgrade), '75-'76 (Orr again), '86-'87 (Roy RC), and '79-'80 (that Gretzky guy).  I actually haven't finished all the '80s hockey yet.  And I'm still working on tons of newer sets too, and Capitals.

More Modern Sets

The bulk of my wants are, of course, newer products.  Every trade, COMC order, shop visit, and show add to the tallys.  

These are some of the sets I have going that I don't even have boxes or shelf space for any more.  Most of these have stacked up via trades.  A couple of them are Database only....

...As are most of these.  I have built the bulk of the 1985 inserts from 2020 Series 2 and Update, as well as a damaged block of 1988 Score, plus the 2008 Update baseball and full set of football.  Recently I threw on the 2015 A&G set since I have almost none of it.  Did the same for 2005 Upper Deck too.  They have all been wildly successful and haven't cost me a dime.  All I give is my extras that I want to move out anyway.

One of the little set-ish collections I started this year was all the parallels from 2019 Topps that show the World Series champion Nationals.  I'll start a binder with all these down the line.  I've traded for a few, and got a bunch on a COMC order. 

Player Collections

My favorite hunt at shows and shops is for my player collections.  Almost every time, I get a few more odd things for them. 

This is why I wish there were more sets with retired players in them.  But then I might complain about having too much new stuff to chase.

There are a few guys that I try for EVERYTHING.  But usually they have short checklists, or I got lucky and got a head start.

Two of my most thorough PCs are football players.  I added several new ones to my Priest Holmes collection on the last COMC order - which I'll post after the conclusion to this series.  I started another one for local guy Jordan Addison this year.  I've been getting his stuff in chunks too.  Buys, trades and show purchases have built up my total to nearly 75 initially, but then in that same recent COMC order, I just about doubled it to 141.  He's only tracked on the Database too.  There are WAY too many to keep straight any other way.

The latest addition was also originated on that order.  Rashad Ross has played for three teams that I follow in his career - Washington Redskins, the AAF's Arizona Hotshots, and the 2020 XFL's DC Defenders.  He was drafted by the Bears, so that's what most of his cards depict.  He's only got 144 total cards, and a lot of those are rookie autos and 1/1's etc. with Chicago - most of which I'll ignore unless cheap.

I also dabbled into the comic realm.  I have a co-worker who loves Captain America, so I search out his cards for her when I can.  And in the course of that search, I have found a few of my favorite cyborg soldier along the way.  He's only got about 16 cards that I want, so it's a very finite PC.

That's not the complete list of collections I'm working on, but it's all the major highlights.  Most collectors would probably specialize in certain parts, but I'm just crazy this way....