Well Done Upper Deck

[piper1]

As someone who had been buying your hockey products for 30 years I want to congratulate you for finally curing my addiction to breaking hockey card boxes. Keep on increasing those prices and reducing the content and soon you will have this Canadian addiction completely cured.

[09232003]

I agree, I have been a collector for a very long time and have enjoyed the hobby very much at times, but recently I have not. The product is not better at times and the prices are just going up and up. Also getting hard to trade and buy from other collectors.
I find myself in the position lately that I will either just take a long break from it all or just stop collecting altogether. I dont have the same fun and excitment about the hobby as I have and did in the past.

jim

[jameslacarte]

Yeah i hear you!! $60 for a Tin now that was $40 not that long ago. Im done buying too, its cheaper just to buy the cards i want on EBay.

[piper1]

I agree, I have been a collector for a very long time and have enjoyed the hobby very much at times, but recently I have not. The product is not better at times and the prices are just going up and up. Also getting hard to trade and buy from other collectors.
I find myself in the position lately that I will either just take a long break from it all or just stop collecting altogether. I dont have the same fun and excitment about the hobby as I have and did in the past.

jim

At least I still enjoy and get plenty of trades.

[G0SHARKSG0]

I'm in the exact same boat. Haven't opened any products this year (2020-21 products) and I can't even remember the last time I opened a box (maybe early last year).

It makes no sense spending 200$ for a box of Artifacts when I can buy more than I would get on the secondary market plus I can choose only Sharks hits.

My itch to break is completely gone and I'm spending much less than I used to. Harder to make trades when I never have new cards but I still enjoy buying the cards I like

[scarrman]

I can proudly say I have not bought any wax in 6 months. Hi my name is ...... Seems like I should be saying it like that! I really love opening boxes, it truly is an addicting thrill and you can't beat the rush of hitting a really nice card. Of course that is offset by the countless gut punches of the stinker boxes and pulling maybe $20 worth from a $100 + box. No I'm not in it for the money, I keep what I pull. But the realization of 1 good box to 10 bad boxes, well I can simply take that cash and buy whatever big hit I was hoping for, or buy the complete set, or just a bunch of nice cards. My collection was growing way too big with 100s/1,000s of cards worth pennies. Now it grows with way fewer cards, but cards I choose.

Now I will say someone needs to bust those boxes, or those sets and singles simply won't be available. What UD is doing with this money grab, along with some resellers capitalizing, is going to price some of this out of the market. We are at a weird point in this hobby, prices have skyrocketed to unseen levels and I don't know what is going to happen. There will come a correction, and maybe some of this overpriced wax will sit and eventually price correct.

[Stryfex]

i'm not quite at quitting-stage - but I'm close.

The prices and quality of the wax is embarassing. I'm absolutely not buying into series 2 at the cost of wax for it - and that'll be the first time in many years that I don't buy a few boxes of series 1 or 2 (i did buy series 1 this year)

Tim Hortons actually makes sense from a cost-perspective - maybe i'll just shift to only collecting that

i also DGAF if it's UD vs distributors vs retailers ultimately causing the cost increase either - I blame UD for not controlling it like manufacturers do in just about any other industry

[creasecollector]

As a collector who rarely, if ever, breaks boxes, I can only imagine how it must have been to see these crazy box prices these last year +.

Another reason to just collect what you like and you'll never make a "bad" purchase in this hobby. I'd rather take box breaking money and turn that into pure PC cards. Simple, but it works for me.

[odjickfan]

I'm picking up retail wax during sales. I got a few older Parkhurst fat packs for Christmas, and I have a bunch of 19-20 UD1 mega boxes on my shellf. I'll be slowly opening them. But, hobby wax at boosted prices? Count me out!! Usually, I was spending several hundreds during the Black Friday Sales on older wax, there were no good sales last november, so I kept my money!

I'm trying to trade, but most set building is dead, people are all collecting the same bunch of rookies.

[discomike]

I'm with you on that. Plus sitting at home through this pandemic has made me realize that my collection is way too big and taking up way too much space anyways. That being said, now is definitely a sellers market if you're looking to unload stuff. Even on Kijiji, which is usually bargain bin prices, I've been getting good value for what amounts to inserts and lower end product rookies