EBay opens 31,000-foot vault for precious trading cards

Christopher Hutton

June 13, 05:00 AM June 13, 05:00 AM

EBay has taken a significant step towards simplifying the sale and shipping of investing cards.

The online auction web page introduced Tuesday it was opening a vault in Delaware focused to helping customers trade collectible playing cards. The vault is a 31,000-square-foot, spherical-the-clock secured, temperature-controlled facility, and it will act as a digital market for collectors.

"eBay is the only market that has much more than two a long time of deep collectibles category expertise," reported Dawn Block, vice president of Collectibles, Electronics, and Dwelling at eBay, in a push launch. "As we continue on to see exponential progress in the category as fanatics merge their passions with expenditure prospects, the eBay vault is a essential featuring that will allow collectors streamline and securely retailer their portfolio of assets. It truly is truly the long term of amassing."

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A customer's trading card is suitable to be saved in the vault if it was bought for $750 or extra, if the buyer procured it directly from eBay, and if it was authenticated by trading card graders these as the Specialist Sports activities Authenticator or Sportscard Guaranty Company.

The moment positioned in the vault, cards can be bought and offered inside of seconds devoid of obtaining to be authenticated once again or subjected to delivery fees.

There are no added expenses for transactions happening in the vault, according to Speedy Enterprise. There are also no product sales tax fees on the transactions because of to them happening in the exact condition.

Providers like PWCC Marketplace have offered both of those security and safety for beneficial investing playing cards in just their vaults. However, PWCC's 2,000-sq.-foot vault is substantially smaller sized than eBay's 31,000-sq.-foot facility. EBay's choice would also simplify the purchasing process and allow for collectors to trade and obtain playing cards in auctions with relieve via its previously established market.

Trading playing cards, which includes sporting activities playing cards and playing playing cards for video games such as Pokemon and Magic: The Gathering, have been a dependable source of worth for eBay. The business saw a 142% surge in domestic trading card gross sales in 2020, an improve of four million from the yr prior, in accordance to inside information, and the gross products worth of cards marketed in the 1st half of 2021 totaled an normal of approximately $1 billion a quarter.

The company has continued to spend in buying and selling card profits, together with by launching an authentication company for investing cards in January.