Donruss Elite Extra Edition Scam - Beckett Associates

Here is my story...

I saw the box break for the Donruss Elite Extra Edition. The price seemed high to me so I did some research and wound up buying my own lot of 250 Hobby Packs for $280. Bad OMEN.. their eBay ID was KARDSHARKS. Just like the group box break, my packs were searched. I received no jersey or patch cards. In fact some of the packs had retail price tags on them. Scans below. Text from the auction stated...

These packs came directly from Donruss packaged and sealed as blister packs. They are NOT repackaged packs from open boxes and have absolutely NOT been searched!
The buyer will receive 250 factory sealed blister packs!!

I contacted the seller and he said he stands by his statement. yes, I saved the e-mail message. Interesting address on the box caught my eye. Beckett Associates eBay department. At first I thought this was Beckett Magazine but I did a quick Google Search for Beckett Associates and guess what! They are the people that stock the retail stores. Here is a link to their web site.

http://www.beckettassociates.com/

They took their retail returns and call them "directly from Donruss" and then resell them on eBay. They screwed me over big time. I guess it's time to contact Donruss and the Better Business Bureau in Bedford park, IL.





Any advice on how I can turn this over to the Blog community to draw some attention to this scam?

Link to completed auction.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... K:MEWNX:IT


Tom

Yeah, Beckett associated are the ones who stock the shelves. You got crap product sir. I've seen these guys stocking Walmart shelves.

Sounds like this...

viewtopic.php?f=4&t=53436

he already referenced that at the beginning of his thread.

vwnut13 said:

Sounds like this...

viewtopic.php?f=4&t=53436

Click to expand...

Sorry to hear all that.

The packs do say "Hobby Exclusive" on them, and the retail sticker means nothing in the end. They are factory sealed from Donruss as blister packs. You might not win if you tried to file a claim via PayPal. There is also no way to prove that they were searched.

I would however try because PayPal does side with buyers often. You clearly got screwed, but PayPal CS won't really know anything about the hobby.

I'll also be adding them to my blocked list on ebay.

Card Magnet said:

Sorry to hear all that.

The packs do say "Hobby Exclusive" on them, and the retail sticker means nothing in the end. They are factory sealed from Donruss as blister packs. You might not win if you tried to file a claim via PayPal. There is also no way to prove that they were searched.

I would however try because PayPal does side with buyers often. You clearly got screwed, but PayPal CS won't really know anything about the hobby.

I'll also be adding them to my blocked list on ebay.

Click to expand...

I challenge the phrase "Directly from Donruss". In this case they did not go directly...

Donruss -> Beckett Enterprises -> WalMark,K-mart, etc -> Back to Beckett Enterprises -> Suckers like me

markakis8 said:

he already referenced that at the beginning of his thread.

vwnut13 said:

Sounds like this...

viewtopic.php?f=4&t=53436

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Oh, all I saw was this...

saw the box break for the Donruss Elite Extra Edition

Click to expand...

I didn't know for sure what break he was talking about.
I figured if he saw the break he might have thought twice about buying a lot of blisters off of ebay.

Tom Oates said:

[quote="Card Magnet":hi8fvcjp]Sorry to hear all that.

The packs do say "Hobby Exclusive" on them, and the retail sticker means nothing in the end. They are factory sealed from Donruss as blister packs. You might not win if you tried to file a claim via PayPal. There is also no way to prove that they were searched.

I would however try because PayPal does side with buyers often. You clearly got screwed, but PayPal CS won't really know anything about the hobby.

I'll also be adding them to my blocked list on ebay.

Click to expand...

I challenge the phrase "Directly from Donruss". In this case they did not go directly...

Donruss -> Beckett Enterprises -> WalMark,K-mart, etc -> Back to Beckett Enterprises -> Suckers like me[/quote:hi8fvcjp]
Definitely sounds like that's what happened. The only thing is you can't actually prove it.

Have you tried asking them for a refund? If they refuse, then try filing a PayPal claim. If that fails, talk to your credit card company. Odds are your cc people will want to keep you happy, and might help you do something about it.

Card Magnet said:

[quote="Tom Oates":15jweln5][quote="Card Magnet":15jweln5]Sorry to hear all that.

The packs do say "Hobby Exclusive" on them, and the retail sticker means nothing in the end. They are factory sealed from Donruss as blister packs. You might not win if you tried to file a claim via PayPal. There is also no way to prove that they were searched.

I would however try because PayPal does side with buyers often. You clearly got screwed, but PayPal CS won't really know anything about the hobby.

I'll also be adding them to my blocked list on ebay.

Click to expand...

I challenge the phrase "Directly from Donruss". In this case they did not go directly...

Donruss -> Beckett Enterprises -> WalMark,K-mart, etc -> Back to Beckett Enterprises -> Suckers like me[/quote:15jweln5]
Definitely sounds like that's what happened. The only thing is you can't actually prove it.

Have you tried asking them for a refund? If they refuse, then try filing a PayPal claim. If that fails, talk to your credit card company. Odds are your cc people will want to keep you happy, and might help you do something about it.[/quote:15jweln5]

I will be pursuing those options tomorrow to see what I can work out. In this large of a purchase I should have received 50 autographs or memorabilia cards. I wound up with 25 total so now that I have counted them and calculated, it was 1:10 or exactly one half of what I should have received.

For what has happened to you I really dont trust blister packs, though, I have pulled all my ATFF autos from them.

And I did pull my Matt Williams 97 Precious Metals from a 10 year old blister tin...

I think the problem is you can weigh the blisters themselves.

Beckett Associates [not to be confused with the other Beckett] supplies the retail chains and whatever is leftover is resold to anyone who would touch them.

All the parties involved would plead ignorance, this the blisters are sealed - it is the consumer who gets screwed, because he or she is the one opening them up and finding absolutely nothing in value.

Edit: If it looks too good to be true, stay away.

Lars said:

I think the problem is you can weigh the blisters themselves.

Beckett Associates [not to be confused with the other Beckett] supplies the retail chains and whatever is leftover is resold to anyone who would touch them.

All the parties involved would plead ignorance, this the blisters are sealed - it is the consumer who gets screwed, because he or she is the one opening them up and finding absolutely nothing in value.

Edit: If it looks too good to be true, stay away.

Click to expand...

Yeah, those clamshells are easily searchable...

Just so everyone knows:

I have SEEN a Beckett Associate stocker searching packs.
He was pulling blisters from his stocking box in groups and weighing individual packs and sticking certain ones back in his box. He said it was his way of "randomizing packs for different stores". I have NEVER purchased a blister after that.
THese guys are NOT associated with Beckett Media, and I'm surprised they are allowed to use that name. I'm also fairly sure that they are associated with the company that produces the Mix Boxes.

A_Pharis said:

Just so everyone knows:

I have SEEN a Beckett Associate stocker searching packs.
He was pulling blisters from his stocking box in groups and weighing individual packs and sticking certain ones back in his box. He said it was his way of "randomizing packs for different stores". I have NEVER purchased a blister after that.
THese guys are NOT associated with Beckett Media, and I'm surprised they are allowed to use that name. I'm also fairly sure that they are associated with the company that produces the Mix Boxes.

Click to expand...

winner winner chicken mother frackin dinner

I too have seen them doing shady stunts. That would explain my recent retail drought.

It makes no sense that anyone would carry in sealed boxes and then weigh the packs on the store floor.

If this were to happen, wouldn't it make a lot more sense to do this in the privacy of your truck or other vehicle?

Now, while I don't believe that A_Pharis was suffering from hallucinations...I have a hard time buying the notion of weighing packs on a store floor in plain sight.

200lbhockeyplayer said:

It makes no sense that anyone would carry in sealed boxes and then weigh the packs on the store floor.

If this were to happen, wouldn't it make a lot more sense to do this in the privacy of your truck or other vehicle?

Now, while I don't believe that A_Pharis was suffering from hallucinations...I have a hard time buying the notion of weighing packs on a store floor in plain sight.

Click to expand...

I've seen it too sir.

Look at it like this. They're coming into the store, from what I've seen, with sealed product. Perhaps something would be said if they wheeled in opened goods. Anyways, the guy had his big rack in front ofhim, and was weighing blisters of Americana II right out of a beckett associate box. People were walking by, no one looked twice. No one but me.

That's just crazy.

Regardless, if anyone can...next time you see it, take a picture...even a crappy cell phone picture. Clearly this sort of information needs to blow out through the blog circuit.

Store managers/employees apparently don't know or understand what is going on, so the buying public should at least be informed to avoid them.

I forgot to mention another point. These supposedly "direct" packs are supposed to come in 20 Count boxes from Donruss. I received 250 loose packs. If you look at the warehouse picture on their web site, you see that the cards are neatly arranged in boxes. If you were going to ship someone factory direct packs, you would just put the 20 count boxes into a larger box and be done with it. In this case they dumped 250 random (retail returns) packs into a box. The auction even states that these packs are not from random boxes but they obviously were. If you are running a warehouse (And I did in the Marine Corps) you would not try to stack hundreds of small items on a shelf. You store them in smaller quantities in boxes.... i.e. the boxes that they came in "direct" from Donruss.

Tom

And I actually thought I was a little bit safer opening the clamshells (back when I busted wax). ::facepalm::

200lbhockeyplayer said:

It makes no sense that anyone would carry in sealed boxes and then weigh the packs on the store floor.

If this were to happen, wouldn't it make a lot more sense to do this in the privacy of your truck or other vehicle?

Now, while I don't believe that A_Pharis was suffering from hallucinations...I have a hard time buying the notion of weighing packs on a store floor in plain sight.

Click to expand...

For fun, my friend and I would weight blisters on the fruit scales in Wal Mart :lol: Granted, it was like 2 AM, and I was usually drunk so it was pretty funny, and we always got some weird looks from the night crew and insomniac shoppers.

I never actually bought anything though. It was more of a curiosity/bored thing.