etopps done?

[Keyser Soze]

Any advice?

I just put the 8 cards I have left on eBay. Kept the Tommy Hanson and Jason Heyward rookies and am just dumping the rest. I figure I can GET $30 for them that I can use to spend at the TriStar show next week, or i can PAY them $20 to ship me the cards. I am taking the $30

 

[ebechols]

I'm playing around on the trading post. I package 3-4 $1 cards and pick up an Andre Johnson RC valued at $3. I lose on "value" but if I get them shipped I save over $1 per card that I no longer own. It's also better in my opinion to have a rc than a bunch of $1 base cards.

Thanks for the advice, what do you think about my idea of cracking the cases, getting IP autos and having the autos authenticated, graded and slabbed? Is there any upside, or would I just be chasing my tail? Granted there are some cards that I will keep in my collection, but there are quite a few that I bought out of irrational motivations.

 

[goldenegg1]

I can't believe that Topps can get away with this!
I just listed the last 3 cards I owned at a penny each for one day. I am done.

 

[ChasHawk]

@toppscards Can we get some answers about what exactly is going on with etopps?

@ChasHawk8 we plan to provide faq on site within next week to provide community with more info and answers

For what it's worth... :?

 

[tpeichel]

Will this increase the value of cards already in hand now and in the future? I know I rarely see the 2002 and 2003 Andruw Jones cards. I doubt many people are going to pay the price Topps is asking to ship Andruw Jones cards. So the cards in hand right now are likely to be the only ones on the market for a great while.

Not sure how etopps works, but are all of the cards produced already and waiting to be shipped? Or are they produced as people request them? The reason I ask is that if the cards are already produced, I am sure they will make their way into the market one way or another. I highly doubt Topps is going to destroy these cards.

Either way, sucks for those of you with cards in your account. Very shady situation!

I'd think that in-hand copies of eTopps would increase in value as many cards will be abandoned. People that abandoned their cards may feel it is cheaper to replace them on the open market, increasing demand for the in-hand cards. And people that have their cards shipped to them for resale, will want to charge a premium to recoup the extremely high shipping costs.

Some people will ignore the eTopps cards on their player checklists, but most collectors I know, see an item on their checklist and have a very strong desire to own the card.

I never paid any mind to eTopps until this thread, but the in-hand cards seem very interesting now.

Did the price of the eTopps portfolio cards shrink so much because buyers knew they would eventually have to pay a shipping premium to ever own the card so buyers took that into account kind of like on eBay?

 

[rbadger]

@toppscards Can we get some answers about what exactly is going on with etopps?

[quote:3cfl9wxp]@ChasHawk8 we plan to provide faq on site within next week to provide community with more info and answers

For what it's worth... :?[/quote:3cfl9wxp]

Thanks for the info! They'll probably also mention another shipping fee increase before they make it clear to everyone they're scrapping the program and holding your cards hostage! What a scam! My key 2011 cards aren't even available so I can "save" on getting all mine shipped at once...they will probably never even produce some of these.

 

[Greg Cleveland]

I just browsed through trade offers for cards I have, most notably a 2001 Pujols. Begs the question what are the points good for? Best point offer I have is 100 points for the 2001 Pujols. (Worst trade offer is 103 Robert Gallery cards.) I also have the A&G Milestones set, which I originally bought in the hopes of using for future autograph offers by eTopps (which never materialized, of course) It would cost me over $30 to have the set shipped to me. This has been a great post to read for the different opinions and thoughts going on with this situation. What would you guys do with what I have? Should I break up the set via trade offers? Redeem the Pujols? (Already have one in hand--having two couldn't be a bad idea, could it?) Thanks in advance for the advice.

 

[yrocks2001]

Just imagine how rare some of these insanely cheap cards will be in-hand! I think a lot of people aren't going to pay to have these shipped and there may be less than 30-40 cards taken in hand (IMO)

 

[P_Manning 18]

I just browsed through trade offers for cards I have, most notably a 2001 Pujols. Begs the question what are the points good for? Best point offer I have is 100 points for the 2001 Pujols. (Worst trade offer is 103 Robert Gallery cards.) I also have the A&G Milestones set, which I originally bought in the hopes of using for future autograph offers by eTopps (which never materialized, of course) It would cost me over $30 to have the set shipped to me. This has been a great post to read for the different opinions and thoughts going on with this situation. What would you guys do with what I have? Should I break up the set via trade offers? Redeem the Pujols? (Already have one in hand--having two couldn't be a bad idea, could it?) Thanks in advance for the advice.

Best thing might be to toss them on eBay and get what you can and hope for the best.

 

[Rickzcards]

Etopps needed to be regulated by a independent entity. Who's to say that they didn't start selling more cards than the stated IPO? Maybe once someone ordered their cards to be "in hand" what's to have stopped them from reselling the e-card again or giving it away, i.e. rewards points. Like I've said before, Topps doesn't actively buyback their etopps cards so where are they getting all of the ones that they are giving away? Without anyone overseeing them they could have possibly collected the money for 2500 IPO's but stated that only 1500 were issued, who would be able to contradict them? The whole system is flawed and manipulated with only one winner - Topps.

 

[yrocks2001]

Etopps needed to be regulated by a independent entity. Who's to say that they didn't start selling more cards than the stated IPO? Maybe once someone ordered their cards to be "in hand" what's to have stopped them from reselling the e-card again or giving it away, i.e. rewards points. Like I've said before, Topps doesn't actively buyback their etopps cards so where are they getting all of the ones that they are giving away? Without anyone overseeing them they could have possibly collected the money for 2500 IPO's but stated that only 1500 were issued, who would be able to contradict them? The whole system is flawed and manipulated with only one winner - Topps.

eTopps holds cards back at IPO to put in the catalog.

 

[js0000001]

Etopps needed to be regulated by a independent entity. Who's to say that they didn't start selling more cards than the stated IPO? Maybe once someone ordered their cards to be "in hand" what's to have stopped them from reselling the e-card again or giving it away, i.e. rewards points. Like I've said before, Topps doesn't actively buyback their etopps cards so where are they getting all of the ones that they are giving away? Without anyone overseeing them they could have possibly collected the money for 2500 IPO's but stated that only 1500 were issued, who would be able to contradict them? The whole system is flawed and manipulated with only one winner - Topps.

eTopps holds cards back at IPO to put in the catalog.

Judging from the number of cards to appear in the catalogs they must hold back 99% of each IPO

 

[Rickzcards]

Etopps needed to be regulated by a independent entity. Who's to say that they didn't start selling more cards than the stated IPO? Maybe once someone ordered their cards to be "in hand" what's to have stopped them from reselling the e-card again or giving it away, i.e. rewards points. Like I've said before, Topps doesn't actively buyback their etopps cards so where are they getting all of the ones that they are giving away? Without anyone overseeing them they could have possibly collected the money for 2500 IPO's but stated that only 1500 were issued, who would be able to contradict them? The whole system is flawed and manipulated with only one winner - Topps.

eTopps holds cards back at IPO to put in the catalog.

I don't believe that for a second, why would they hold back something that they can get money for? Only a fool would believe such a thing would happen.

 

[cmnkb8]

Etopps needed to be regulated by a independent entity. Who's to say that they didn't start selling more cards than the stated IPO? Maybe once someone ordered their cards to be "in hand" what's to have stopped them from reselling the e-card again or giving it away, i.e. rewards points. Like I've said before, Topps doesn't actively buyback their etopps cards so where are they getting all of the ones that they are giving away? Without anyone overseeing them they could have possibly collected the money for 2500 IPO's but stated that only 1500 were issued, who would be able to contradict them? The whole system is flawed and manipulated with only one winner - Topps.

eTopps holds cards back at IPO to put in the catalog.

I don't believe that for a second, why would they hold back something that they can get money for? Only a fool would believe such a thing would happen.

This is Topps we're talking about.

 

[uniquebaseballcards]

Etopps needed to be regulated by a independent entity. Who's to say that they didn't start selling more cards than the stated IPO? Maybe once someone ordered their cards to be "in hand" what's to have stopped them from reselling the e-card again or giving it away, i.e. rewards points. Like I've said before, Topps doesn't actively buyback their etopps cards so where are they getting all of the ones that they are giving away? Without anyone overseeing them they could have possibly collected the money for 2500 IPO's but stated that only 1500 were issued, who would be able to contradict them? The whole system is flawed and manipulated with only one winner - Topps.

eTopps holds cards back at IPO to put in the catalog.

I don't believe that for a second, why would they hold back something that they can get money for? Only a fool would believe such a thing would happen.

Easy - to make it look like what you're selling is more rare than it really is

Of course you could be acting sarcastic here.

Great point about an independent auditor.

 

[mwheeler27]

It would cost me around $2,000 to have my cards shipped to me. For that price, I could fly/drive to Topps and pick them up myself.

Does anyone know if Topps would allow me to do this to save me "shipping" fees?

 

[mwheeler27]

I am also bothered by the fact that I never received any email notification regarding any of this. You might say, "no big deal...you could have seen it on their site", but why would I have felt the need to check their site for updates when they used to email me about anything significant.

I used to get all kinds of emails from eTopps. Pretty convenient I didn't get one concerning shipping fee increases or no longer being able to use my over 1100 rewards points for shipping.

 

[rsmath]

I mean suing them only pays the lawyers; frustrating is all.

If you can find any violation of the TOS, you can probably get the NY State AG or NY Consumer Protection division to do the dirty work for you and even moreso with a violation of TOS and a huge class like eTopps customers.

Topps should do a special reduced shipping day promotion so a lot of you guys can get your cards delivered for a more reasonable fee.

 

[ebechols]

The situation with eTopps isn't really surprising, the number of cards available has dropped year over year, and the values have been steadily decreasing, at least the in-portfolio values. I believe that Topps was losing money on the shipping of the cards, by allowing people to use the reward points. What I don't understand is the significant cost increase for shipping the cards. No way can they convince me that the shipping costs on large lots of cards are equal to the shipping fees they are charging.

Topps should allow a mass delivery discount where people who would like to have their entire portfolio of cards delivered, get a discount to what the actual shipping costs of the cards.

With eTopps I expected to pay more for the cards themselves, because of the limited number available and the cases, however it appears that Topps is double dipping, by basically charging eTopps owners the cost of encapsulating the cards and the delivery at the time of delivery.

 

[koal]

i bet there are still alot of people with ports that still do not even know about all this. i like how topps is deleting all etopps comments on their facebook page. they must have someone perched by a keyboard monitoring it. and in their house rules they say "be real". shady bastards