Review: St. Augustine, FL Ponce Mall Show

[BackInTheDay]

Attended this show on Friday. It's advertised as having 50 tables, but I think I counted 8 or 9. Not much organization; just a few guys scattered about a lightly utilized shopping mall sitting behind tables with random sports stuff on them. There was no vibrant floor activity as far as people talking or trading... I'd say 90% of the people in the shopping mall were there for the stores- not the show. I didn't even see a sign on the main road saying "Baseball Card Show" or anything like it, to let people know what was going on. Seemed like very limited effort went into this. "If You Build It, They Will Come" might work in the movies, but it isn't a good strategy for a card show.

Selection of cards overall (variety)

Extremely limited. One very good primarily vintage dealer aside (Mr. McManus), the show had a very uninspiring selection. Most dealers were the types where you could glance at their inventory for about 10 seconds and just keep walking...

Does the show emphasize one sport over another?

No. Anyone who wants a table can have one.

Selection of Wax Boxes

Limited. I think there were only two tables that actually had unopened material. The sports card rack at Wal Mart had the entire show crushed, as far as availability and variety of unopened material.

Prices on cards from the show (FULL BOOK, HALF BOOK, etc)

Generally unrealistic, from what I saw. The one "good dealer" in question made an effort to accord his prices with realistic, real world selling prices. There seemed to be lots of 'junk bins' and the like, dealers with "circa 1992" type delusional pricing, etc.

Do they have signers

No

Admission price to get in

Free, and I still felt a bit taken

Any Raffle or Prizes

No. It was clear that virtually no effort went into making this any kind of "card show" experience. Rather, it was a casually assembled group of scattered tables.

Friendliness of the Dealers'

Dealers were friendly. No bad experiences there and I didn't see them blowing off anyone.

Overall Experience

The dealers were friendly- and maybe things 'pick up' on the Saturday as far as dealer attendance- but overall, aside from one exceptional dealer, the show came off as a complete flop. Most dealer inventory was lame and unorganized (unorganized and "random" inventory is a peeve of mine... "It's somewhere in that 5000 count box" isn't a suitable answer, but it seemed to be standard operating procedure for almost every attendee...) , extremely narrow selection of singles. One dealer had a card table full of supplies, but in limited quantity. To give an example, I needed some shoeboxes, and there wasn't anyone at the show who had a stock of them for sale. The lone supply guy was kind enough to sell me his one remaining personal empty shoebox for a couple bucks.

Fifteen minutes on ebay kicks this shows butt in every conceivable way. One good dealer aside (who seemed to be selling a lifelong collection), this show had no redeeming qualities. Now that I have the telephone number of the one "good dealer" so I can contact him direct, I don't foresee any reason to go back to this show.

In its defense... The economy is bad, the sports card hobby certainlly 'isn't what it used to be' and St. Augustine is a very small market, but overall, I think a better effort could've been made. They either need to get in more tables, or scrap the show all together.

[theanswer0221]

nice review...sorry to hear about the bad experience...

[hoeser]

Great review. Thanks you.

[UofLnMU]

I think that you said a mouthful with the ebay kicks its butt comment. That's where the buyers have gone, and that's where the sellers have gone. The toilet, sadly, is where the hobby has gone.