INDUSTRY CONFERENCE HIGHLIGHTS!!

We recently attended the second annual 2019 Topps Industry Conference. It is a Topps-hosted gathering of hobby shop owners, direct dealers, online retailers, breakers and distributors, with the intention of learning information and creating relationships within our growing community. The last two years, this conference has been held at the beautiful Talking Stick Resort in Scottsdale, Arizona. Opening night is a time to reconnect with new and old faces over good food and drinks, all while participating in Topps giveaways and meet and greets with up-and-coming MLB stars like Fernando Tatis Jr., whom we met this year and who posed for photos and personally signed exclusive Industry Conference baseball cards for all us in attendance. There were probably over 150 attendees this year! The next day is filled with key note speakers, informative presentations by select hobby shop owners/breakers, Topps "State of the Hobby" address, social media presentation, all mixed in with more food breaks and fun Topps giveaways. Speaking of social media presentations, I have been asked to represent our business in a presentation the last two years, speaking about how we have used social media to our benefit and how it could benefit other businesses in the hobby. It has been an amazing experience for me, as I strive to be a positive ambassador of the hobby. The experience is one that I hope is beneficial to others in the energy and information I provide, and one that I hope will continue.  The end of night number two is usually used to connect with others in a casual way over more food and drinks and really just continue to cultivate relationships, because relationships are what makes this hobby happen. Day three is more of the same as day two, except this year there were some breakout panel sessions, where we got an opportunity to go deeper into a few hot topics of knowledge like social media, breaking and vintage card awareness. There was also some Q&A time with Topps execs, who are always very open with addressing our sometimes frustrating questions/problems within the hobby. Not enough can be said about the effort that is put forth by the people at Topps and the hobby shop owners, direct dealers, online retailers, breakers and distributors who collectively make up the backbone of this hobby. Behind the logos, websites, corporate tape, YouTube videos and Instagram photos etc., we are all just human beings, collectors who want to have fun and do what is best for this hobby that is made of many, many moving parts. This conference has been a huge learning experience for me personally, one that I am grateful for and one that I hope will continue to allow me to grow as not only a business owner in this hobby, but as a champion of the hobby itself. In fact, if you're reading this right now and you have any specific issues with or questions about the hobby that you would like help getting answers to, please drop a comment below or send us an email and we will do our best to address these issues and act as a mediator between the collectors and the manufacturers, as best we can. Above all else, remember: This is a hobby, it's our hobby, and at it's core is designed to give us a healthy outlet from the daily grind of life. So let's keep on collecting and keep enjoying this hobby, because we never know what tomorrow might bring. "It's a beautiful day for collecting", enjoy it today and have fun! Cheers all. -Card Shop Erik

Copy and paste this link into your browser to watch the highlight video: https://youtu.be/SThrOYK_L7I