Ep.262 w/ Brian Lee & Jesse Glass of Arena Club

SPEAKER 1: What is up everybody? Welcome to episode 262 of said Sports Card Nation.

SPEAKER 1: Got a good show for you on tap today, Jesse Glass and Brian Lee of Arena Club, who are bringing new grading a online card show, showcasing, your cards transparent.

SPEAKER 1: And, trying to do things, a little bit different and a little bit safer for the hobby population. They're gonna tell us a little bit about what they're doing. We're gonna chop up, a little hobby, as well. So, fun conversation.

SPEAKER 1: Both of those gentlemen are, are good guys and, glad, glad they came on and we could talk about what they're doing a year into, their new, their new company, Arena Club, grading. They do, a repack product called Slab Packs.

SPEAKER 1: But they do it again with, you know, transparency involved, for hobby, safety wise. So, we're gonna, we're gonna learn a little bit about what they're doing. They, sort of announced their presence at the National this year.

SPEAKER 1: Derek Jeter is a founding partner. He was there to, promote the company as well. And so we wanna talk about his role, with the company, as well. So we're gonna take a quick, one minute break and then we'll start the show.

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SPEAKER 1: All right. Joining me on the sports card shop, guest line. Not one guest this week, but, what's better than one? But, two gentlemen are, are on the show today. Brian and Jesse from, Arena Club.

SPEAKER 1: They're gonna tell us all about, what Arena Club do, does what, what they're doing, what they're bringing to the table. I wanna talk some hobby stuff too, but definitely I wanna highlight what, what you guys are doing with Arena Club. Welcome, gentlemen.

SPEAKER 4: Thank you so much for having us. So super excited to be here. I'm Brian. That's Jesse. Thanks for John.

SPEAKER 5: Thank you.

SPEAKER 1: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, welcome. And, and I know you guys are busy so I appreciate you. You're making some, some time. I, I guess the first, you know, question right out the gate, guys is, is Rena Club fairly new, kinda where, how it started.

SPEAKER 1: And, and where you're at now, you know, all that kind of the birth of the company and that sort of thing. Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER 4: So, I'm super excited to be on this podcast, by the way, we're big long time listeners.

SPEAKER 1: And so I appreciate it.

SPEAKER 4: Yeah. So for us, it's well, for me, it's, it's, I've been collecting cards really since I was a kid, right? My dad took me to my first L A Dodger game and Steve Garvey was our first baseman at the time. And to fill up with the sport, the game, I wrote my bike to the local card and comic book shop in Fountain Valley, California.

SPEAKER 4: And I bought a Steve Garvey Rookie card and I was kind of hooked ever since then. I, I kept collecting. It was like most of my friends stopped collecting in junior high school high school, you know, I I would just keep going to the card shops and card shows and then, started collecting with my son when he was, like, five years old, I started bringing him to shows and card shops and everything else.

SPEAKER 4: And, and then he's 15 now. And so we kind of, we kind of took a pause truthfully during COVID when prices were getting a little bit out of whack and so forth and a lot of the shows were closed anyway because of COVID.

SPEAKER 4: But yeah, I, I've always loved the hobby, love it, love it, love it, very passionate about it. And, but I've always had issues truthly within the hobby. I always thought that certain things could be done better. Right. With a little bit more transparency.

SPEAKER 4: And I thought if we could make it more fun too. Right. So, we're kind of like, I kind of felt like the hobby was stuck in this old ways, right. Antiquated ways.

SPEAKER 4: From the grading companies to the market places that were out there. I thought they could be improved upon using technology.

SPEAKER 4: And so brought the idea up to Jesse. Jesse liked it about building kind of what we call an online digital card show. Right? So that's what Arena Club thrives to be. It. It basically is a, is an online card show where, you know, we all, I love card shows. Like we love going, buying, selling, trading the action the energy. I just thought that that was lacking online.

SPEAKER 4: All we had were like, buy, sell, auction kind of places that, but no rural communities, no real, you know, trading volume and so forth. So that was the, the initial idea behind Arena Club. I, I approached, Derek Jeter, who's been a longtime friend and he loved the idea. He collects mostly memorabilia. He has some cards too, of course. But he just loved the concept of using technology to improve the hobby.

SPEAKER 4: And so we all kind of, the three of us got together and we launched Arena Club about a year ago and it's been so much fun. It really has been. I, I, our, our, our grading, imagine going to a card show where they have on site grading, along with, you know, a bunch of showcases, you know, that you could buy on trade. And so that's what Arena Club is.

SPEAKER 1: Yeah, I don't, I think he said everything now.

SPEAKER 4: I agree.

SPEAKER 5: I agree. No, no, I, I used to collect, that's so funny. I used to collect as a kid growing up.

SPEAKER 5: I stopped when you just kept going and so I got to high school and, I just kind of like moved on with life until we started this up again. And, and, and, and, and tragically, I lost my, my collection in a, in a, in a fire. And so it's, the, the vaulting model really hits close to close, close to home and, it's been a lot of fun just to really, like, get back into it.

SPEAKER 5: Yeah, but rebuilding the collection card by card. So send me your Kobe offers.

SPEAKER 1: There you go. Kobe Bryant can't go wrong there.

SPEAKER 1: You know, guys, when we talk about vaults, when we talk about grading, those, you know, those are hot button, topics, f for folks in, in the, in the industry, in the hobby.

SPEAKER 1: You know, when it comes to vaults people or you either love them.

SPEAKER 1: There's very few in between, right? People either love them or will speak against them. I see the need. I, I get it as someone that has, you know, some expensive card, you know, but I also see the other side to that, right.

SPEAKER 1: It's not like having, your collection on hand where you can look at it anytime you want, put something out on the desk or your home office or your office or wherever you, you choose to, you know, to, to display them.

SPEAKER 1: You know what, you know, but at the same time, you know, Je J, Jesse just mentioned, you know, losing, some, some of his inventory in a fire, right? If had those cards been in the vault, if that was the case, you know, they, they, he'd still own them. So, you know, I I get it, we've seen, you know, card shops.

SPEAKER 1: It just seems like every day where you're reading about a card shop, you know, being broken into or, or robbed or burglarized. I've even read stories where homes, people who, other people who know that that person has certain things in the house are, are, you know, even breaking into homes to, to steal inventory.

SPEAKER 1: So to, to, to just write off a vault. Ii, I get the whole love affair with having your cards in hand and I won't argue that. But you know, me personally, I, I can see, you know, both both sides to that coin, so to speak. Anything you wanna add when it comes to a vault.

SPEAKER 4: Yeah, absolutely. So, so I, I would say most collectors are probably like me and you John, I love holding my cards. But the thing is I have a lot of cards and I'm sure you do too. I don't need to keep, you know, 100,000 cards in my house. I just don't, right. I'll keep some of the most valuable because I like I like sleeping with them, right?

SPEAKER 4: Or whatever it is showing my friend flex it when they come over and say look at this mantle, right? Whatever it is. But there's a lot of cars that I, I'm more than happy to put into our vault at a reader club, to display them, to show them to, to other users and also to take offers just, you know, why not.

SPEAKER 4: Let's see what people offer me and price some for sale if you want to move some. So it's a lot of fun to have the flexibility of putting cards into a vault, you can withdraw them anytime. We charge a very nominal fee to withdraw the cards out of the vault. But while it's in this vault, just rest assured that they're highly, highly secure.

SPEAKER 4: Our facility truly is, is state of the art. It's waterproof, earthquake proof, fireproof theft proof, truthfully, I mean, this thing is, I wish we had a picture of it to show you, but it's a real vault fault, right? And so, you know, highly secure. I sleep really well at night knowing that my cards are in there.

SPEAKER 4: And I also sleep well at night knowing that I'm getting a bunch of offers on my cards. I mean, I made a lot of money just this past weekend, you know, selling some cards that, that are in our marketplace and, you know, it continues to grow and a lot of excitement and more and more folks are figuring out how to work with the Arena Club, how to open showrooms, and buy some trade.

SPEAKER 4: So there's a lot of action happening here. We're very thankful to be accepted by the, the community and to grow with y'all.

SPEAKER 4: And to offer something new and exciting.

SPEAKER 5: Yeah, I think, I think, I think Volt really implies like stash something away and never get it back. But really what, what, what this is, it facilitates you being able to do whatever you want with your cards. Right.

SPEAKER 5: It's like you don't have to set up a full on shipping operation, build up an Ebay accelerating or do all these things if you wanna move cards. Right? Just ship it to us and you can make it. Yeah, you can, you can move them super easily, right?

SPEAKER 4: Yeah, I mean that's one of the, remember I said at the beginning of the the the show that, you know, I have a lot of issues with what was out there. And one of the issues I had with existing marketplaces that were out there was that sometimes I would get a fake card, right? Sometimes I would get a trim card. The bait and switch is pretty prevalent, not raw cards online, right?

SPEAKER 4: And then, and then, and then the worst is like when they don't ship it loss in the mail, non payment, you know, whatever the reasons might be, we we solve all of that at a club by using technology. And so every card in the marketplace and people's showrooms are authenticated by either PS A Beckett or Sec slabs, right?

SPEAKER 4: Or if you send us a raw card, we will grade it because we want to make sure that everything is authenticated. Everything is slapped right in our marketplace. That way you, you feel secure that, that the card you're actually getting cause we put every card on Blockchain we recorded on Polygon. And you know that is the exact card that is now belong to you and you can call it from the vault anytime.

SPEAKER 1: Yeah, you mentioned some problems, right? The the old, you know, you buy a card, let's say on Ebay and I don't want to just pick on Ebay but any kind of online platform.

SPEAKER 1: And let's say it's so like you said, a raw card, there's no guarantee you're gonna get that exact card that, that's photographed. They can, I've had it happen. So you, you get a different condition one and then you, that's an uphill battle to try to open a case and, and resolve that.

SPEAKER 1: Sometimes it may not even go in your favor when it, when it should. You, you, you have someone sort of deciding that, that maybe, you know, not part of the hobby, it doesn't get some of the intricacies, of the hobby. And so, you know, there's that issues among some of the others.

SPEAKER 1: You, you, you mentioned, I got, I just backtracking a little bit guys you mentioned, you know, Derek Jeter being one of the, the partners, you know, how involved. I, I know he was at the National, I, I, we, you know, he was at, at your booth. I know a few people, I didn't get to see him but someone said he was, you know, on the floor in a golf cart kind of waving to people and then at the booth.

SPEAKER 1: But how, and, you know, obviously most people know Derek Jeter is a huge name. A huge, icon of, even outside of baseball, just a sports icon. But obviously, a Yankee, a Hall Of Famer or World Series champion. How involved, I'm, I'm, I'm sure he's a busy guy.

SPEAKER 1: How involved? Well, now he's not GM in right at the moment. So maybe he has a little bit more time but, but how involved you know, is, is how hands on, I guess maybe is the, the question?

SPEAKER 4: Yes, he's, he's, he's very involved especially with strategic decisions, the growth of the business, helping us promote market and so forth. So he, he is very well. We speak weekly.

SPEAKER 4: Great, great guy. One of the most humble folks you'll ever be like the kind of guy that you want to just hang out with, grab a beer, grab some pizza. He's a, he's, he's, he's truly an amazing partner.

SPEAKER 4: We love working with him and he's got a lot of ideas, man, got a lot of ideas and he's sharp, super, super sharp. And so, you know, he's, he's truly a business partner. It's kind of interesting cause II I partnered with kind of closer or, you know, celebrity for lack of better work in the past.

SPEAKER 4: And honestly it's like they're just like us. They really are. John. It's like they're, they're people and they're your partner. And I actually, when we meet with Derek, I don't even consider him Derek Jeter the, the all-star. Right. I, I don't really think of it that way. I, I just think of Derek Jeter, my partner and I'm sure Jesse.

SPEAKER 5: Yeah, he's, he, he's, he's great. He's just a anything we need from him, he's willing to help pick up the phone call. Anyone give us feedback on the product.

SPEAKER 5: Just really anything we ask, he makes himself available as well.

SPEAKER 5: So, you know, we, we love, we love working with Derek. He makes it really, really easy. So we, we, we love what he leans in as often as he does.

SPEAKER 1: Now you imagine obviously from his playing career, like you said, he's probably has traded with the fellow people in, in baseball, you know, equipment and, and different things like, yeah, he said he has some card you, has he gotten more into cards with being involved with the Arena Club and, and have you been a bad influence or I get it, has he, has he expanded his card portfolio? Maybe Brian.

SPEAKER 5: Brian created a one of a fake card. He actually got accidentally got for one of his World Series drinks. So, you know.

SPEAKER 4: He's, he's, it's been great and I would say we've been a good influence on him, getting him back into that really guy. He, he, he really does influence. He was collecting players that he is looking forward to in terms of their growth and prospects.

SPEAKER 4: I know that he's collecting Ro Reggie Crawford right here on the drive. I know he's collecting some other players like that. I think he's got some good Ethan solid cards.

SPEAKER 4: So, yeah, he's, he's definitely into it and he, you know, he's got an amazing showroom in the club right now, but he put some of his cards in there and, you know, he's actually, you know, super excited whenever he sells a card.

SPEAKER 1: I think he's doing all right. Even if car sales are down, he, he's probably doing all right. But, but you mentioned something I wanted to touch on you, you know, and checking the site out and, and, and others can do this as well. You can see, you know, different people's showcase showrooms a, as you say, of their inventory and what's available. And it's kind of cool to obviously do that, right?

SPEAKER 1: If you know someone, whether it be someone in the hobby, Derek Jeter, you guys, whoever it might be just to kind of see, you know, the eclectic this of, of what the, you know, what you collect, what you've acquired, what's available is that something like right from Jump Street, you knew that's kind of approach you were going to take or is that something as you launched the company, you said, let's, let's think about doing it this way.

SPEAKER 5: Yeah, I mean, the, the sh the showroom has always been a super important element of, of our site. Right? It's when people send us cards, it's not just, they're not just be listed in a, in a marketplace, right? It's really your display, your profile, how you merchandise, it tells you a lot about who each individual is, right?

SPEAKER 5: So the showroom has always been, you know, very, very core piece. I think that was actually like the first thing that you drew the back of a napkin, like, like like these aisles of cards and everything. So it's always been part of the part of the vision.

SPEAKER 4: So we always felt like everyone should have.

SPEAKER 4: That's basically what we do.

SPEAKER 4: Like everyone should feel like they're part of the show, they're displaying their car, they're waiting for folks to come by and come talk to make deals. That's really what a Rita Club is. And if people aren't really catching now, I.

SPEAKER 1: Gotta ask this, not something I would do, but if someone said, hey, I, I don't have a problem, you know, put my inventory on there making it available, but I don't really wanna attach my name to it for whatever reason they may have personally is that allowed, can someone, you know, say, hey, like you'll know who I am. Like if there was an issue or, or that sort of thing, but I really just don't want it out there publicly.

SPEAKER 5: Everyone has a user name and.

SPEAKER 4: You can create your own user name and your own showcase.

SPEAKER 4: Truth be told. We have like a a three time NBA all star who opened a showroom on our, on our, at a club.

SPEAKER 4: And he, I only know this because he, he told us but you see the man and he, he's got an amazing, amazing show.

SPEAKER 1: So everyone's probably trying to figure out right now. Googling three time NBA all Star and seeing, seeing the, the current probably some of the more current names. But I kind of like that. I, I, I'm all for transparency but you know, someone like, hey, I just don't want necessarily my name being out there, you know, I, I can understand again, both sides to, to, to that coin.

SPEAKER 1: You're competing in a space guys. I, I, I'm not breaking news to you right here with where some things have been established for a while. And you make a great point too, Brian that, you know, there's issues there and, and you wanna sort of you know, fix those or do, do it differently to avoid those same pratt falls.

SPEAKER 1: But some of these companies have been a around a while. Some of these selling platforms, talking about the difficulty of sort of entering and, and no pun intended entering in that Arena and competing, you know, even in, even in good terms, competing with some of those long established companies, how daunting, can that be.

SPEAKER 4: Truly, it could be very daunting, right. We're competing against some very large established players with, with strong distribution, right? But we, what we, what we try to do is we continuously try to innovate that Arena Club and just make things better.

SPEAKER 4: And for us, if we really want to build a a strong ground with a strong foundation over time and we know it's gonna take time, right? Because look, some of these brand new companies have been around for 30 plus years, right? Some of these online platforms, marketplaces have been around for, you know, almost 25 plus years, right?

SPEAKER 4: And so when you look at that, yeah, we're newcomers and it takes time to build a brand, it takes a few things to build a brand, right? It takes, it takes time, it takes some capital, but it also takes an extreme consistency in the delivery of your promise.

SPEAKER 4: And if you continuously do that over time, if you continuously bring the customer happiness right to satisfaction over a long period of time, you win, right. Mcdonald's is Mcdonald's because a Big Mac tastes like a Big Mac anywhere you go in the world, it's extreme consistency in their promise Ok.

SPEAKER 4: And, and so what we're trying to do here is win the long game. We're not in this for the flash. We're not in this for like, hey, let's build. So tomorrow I truly am building this for the hobby. I want this to exist because it's better. So, yeah.

SPEAKER 5: Yeah.

SPEAKER 5: Nothing to add to that. Really. It's like, you know, well, Brian. Brian, he's been a collector's whole life and this is truly coming from a place of, of, of, of real passion, right to like fix things that he's personally experienced.

SPEAKER 5: So, I if if he's experienced certain issues, I'm sure there's plenty of other collectors who have and we really just be believe in our vision in delivering that consistency over and over again, right? And we're confident that we're gonna build a big brand.

SPEAKER 1: Yeah, and I'll, I'll follow up to Brian with this too, Jesse, you know, we, we talk about, you know, whether someone wants to come the big three or the big four, right? That have been around a little bit. You have your PS A, they have their, their awards.

SPEAKER 1: So people, you all you gotta do is go on a message board and, and you can see what those are GC which I'm fond of. And, and the sponsor of this show, full disclosure have always sort of had the, you know, Vintage, they're great at Vintage modern, but I, I think they're trying to change that, that narrative Beckett has probably lost out of all the big ones if you will, the, the most full hold have fell back a little bit.

SPEAKER 1: The most for, for good. I've done a whole show on that but could do, you know, I'm not gonna put you guys in the, but they've, they've kind of been their own worst enemy at different points.

SPEAKER 1: A a and others you got CD CDC.

SPEAKER 1: They're not new but they were known more for kind of the, the comics and now getting into the, the card side and you have about 100 50 other ones with some crazy names and, and maybe less viable if you will or less, less active, but there's no shortage of, of grading card companies, some better than others.

SPEAKER 1: You know, what was when you launched the Arena Club? Like what was, how are you gonna say, hey, we're gonna do this better sort of what your, you know, your, whatever you wanna call them rules or, or, or mantras for, for how you wanna make the grading space better and why you can do it better. Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER 4: So look, I, we're fans of all those companies, by the way, I, I actually really like PSA, I really like SGCCGC Beckett and I, I honestly wish all of them succeed because it really helps our marketplace as well, right? Because we, we, we allow for PS A back at SCC Slab to be submitted to, you know, the shows.

SPEAKER 1: I don't, I don't, I don't mean to cut you off too. Brian, but I want to point that out. That's a kudos to you guys too because you're like, you're grading stuff yourself, but you're not excluding these other companies either. And I think that says a lot about what, what you're building, right?

SPEAKER 1: You could easily have said, listen, you wanna put your Arena Club cards on here. That's it. But you know, that's, that's what we recognize but you, you haven't taken that stand. So I didn't mean to cut you off, but I wanted to definitely, you know, let people know that that's the case. But, but go ahead. My, my apologies there. Oh, no, absolutely.

SPEAKER 4: So, I mean, we love, we love those companies. I, I think, look, I grew up with these, these companies and, and collecting those slack and, you know, nothing but really respect for them for what they built, but I don't think anyone's taken down any of them, anytime soon, right? Especially not Arena Club in our grading.

SPEAKER 4: It's like we really didn't start this to be a grading company. We started this to be an online card show with the safety of knowing every card is authenticated, right? And so if you sent us a raw card, we would authenticate and we would grade it before putting in your showroom.

SPEAKER 4: But with that, with that, I thought it could just be done a little bit better so you can love and respect a company, but you can still improve upon, you know, the offering. And so for me, it was really about transparency, right? Understanding why a card scored a certain way. It was, it was in the back of my head. Like I I was sending cars to certain grading companies.

SPEAKER 4: I I sent them to all the truth like, and I would get a card back and it would have a score and I was like, gosh, I thought I was gonna get a 10 and it got an eight or gosh, I thought I was gonna get an eight and it got a nine, right? It goes both ways.

SPEAKER 4: So yeah, I just didn't know what I was gonna get and I was, I was always just like, gosh, I really wish they would just give me a grading report and actually show me what imperfections they see in this card so that I know, you know why it scored a certain way. And so we use computer vision here and machine learning A I grading mixed with humans, right?

SPEAKER 4: To do final kind of reviews and in that process. So we mix basically computers and humans together to provide fully transparent gran new reports on every card submitted every raw card submitted. And so that's just something I've always wanted to do. And I love it. Right. I love knowing why, you know, a card scored a certain way.

SPEAKER 5: Yeah. I mean, it's just, it's also just to make it so much easier. Right. It's, it's, it's why I go through the hassle of sending it to multiple places. Get it back. I, it's just, it makes it so much easier if we just take it in grade it and give, give buyers in our marketplace all the information they need to make a decision. Really.

SPEAKER 5: Our grading is supposed to our, our card detail page for the Arena. Arenas labs is supposed to give you all the information that you need to make a decision on whether you wanna buy a card. It's supposed to really just replace you being able to pick up a rock card at a card show and kind of grade it yourself. It's like we're, we're making that easier for you because we're doing it right.

SPEAKER 5: So that's, that's, that's why we, we build the grading, right? A and we love our grading too and that's really just to enable like that, that type of like ease of ease of purchase when you're buying something and analyzing your card.

SPEAKER 4: Especially online because like I said a at card shows, which I go to a lot of if I find a raw card, I'm just like you John, I'm sure it's like I pick it up, I'm looking at it and I'm examining it and I'm wondering how it will work when I look at the corners, the edges, the center, all of it. You can't do that online. Right.

SPEAKER 4: And that, that was the issue that I have with, with online raw cards. I'm like, I think, I, I don't think we should have raw cards in there because you don't know what you're getting. Right. And so, so that's why we authenticated raw cards and gave full transparent grading reports so that it's like holding the card in person because you know exactly what's wrong with it.

SPEAKER 1: Yeah, I, I like that value to the service. Right. You, you know, you, you rather than just give a numerical grade, you, you're given the explanation too, right?

SPEAKER 1: You know, when you're in school and you take a test and you get your 85 or 90 you know what questions you missed to get that 85. And now, you know, if you got 100 I didn't miss anything but if you get a 90 it's the 10 question, you know, you missed one? Which one? Which one was it? I'd like to know, you know.

SPEAKER 1: And III, I like.

SPEAKER 4: That's great.

SPEAKER 4: I mean, I like not knowing why you scored a certain place.

SPEAKER 1: Yeah.

SPEAKER 1: Yeah. What did I miss? I studied if you did like, I want, I want to know what I missed in that way. If, if I take a similar test or I just won't miss that same question twice. Right. Obviously, cards are different than, than a test, but you still want to know what was it that caused not to be 100 right. In this case, not to be a 10.

SPEAKER 1: Why did I get a nine or a 9.5 or what? Depending on what, you know, what, what grading scale you, it, it falls under. I'm a fan of sub grades. Very few people, do that. And more so the fact that you're, you're sort of giving that synopsis, you know, kudos to you guys, I think every company should have to do it.

SPEAKER 1: I mean, that, that's easy for me to say and play armchair, you know, grading card guy. But, you know, I always like to know and sometimes I, and, and in some cases you do, sometimes you send the card in your life like on the Vintage side, like I know this is gonna to get, you know, a six or seven here is probably why.

SPEAKER 1: And we all do that too guys, right? When we, when we send a card for grading in our own minds, we've kind of given it a grade. We think it, it's gonna come back or, or graded with and then we kind of like we, we test our own skill like, how did we do or how, how, how accurate was I, or, or, or wasn't I.

SPEAKER 6: Time for a quick break, but we'll be right back.

SPEAKER 7: Iron Sports Cards is your number one source for all your PS A and other grading submissions. Their elite status improves turnaround times. Heck, they even provide the card savers. Their chat rooms provide updates on all your submissions.

SPEAKER 7: They also offer wax options and single cards to cover all the bases. Check them out on Facebook at Iron Sports Cards Group or on the web at Irons Sports cards.com or even give them a call at 1877. Ironps A Rob's got you covered.

SPEAKER 1: We, batch, I've had Nat Turner on the show, Peter Steinberg on, they talk about the difficulty in training, graders and, and to get up to speed, now with it and, and they established companies obviously, being new again, the degree of difficulty I don't want to speak for you.

SPEAKER 1: I'll let you answer the question you're here. But I, I would imagine that's probably even more difficult. Start starting from, you know, ground zero, so to speak and, and building that, kind of speak to that if, if you could.

SPEAKER 5: Yeah, it's, it's not easy, it's not, it's not easy, right?

SPEAKER 5: We have an extremely rigorous training program.

SPEAKER 5: I, I, it takes people a long time to really get ramped up how we do it, right? Cause we really break it down, with each, with each of the sub grades, right? How we do it, just how we reference certain cards that we grade the corner.

SPEAKER 5: You know, this is this, this much of a deduction. These, our grader see it like 1000 times it gets hammered into their heads and then they eventually learn it and, you know, we've built all the controls as well.

SPEAKER 5: So, you know, day one you're not just grading, it's like people reviewing your work and then as you get better and better, it's, it's, it's obviously you're, you're closer to the final decision. But yeah, it's not, it's not easy that reader, right.

SPEAKER 4: This was you know, the club was a, it was a hard company that to get off. I'll just, I'll just put it that way. It's a, it was, there was a lot of, you know, learning a lot of education involved.

SPEAKER 4: Some missteps early on, you know, there's, it's, it's growing pains, right? And so for us, it's like the, the great thing is we're still a small team. We're pretty nimble. We learn very fast and we learned from our mistakes.

SPEAKER 4: And we try to improve and, and that's the battle every day. You try to become better every day. And so that's kind of like what we take to heart. And I think today, I think we have a, a pretty strong grading product and service compared to what's out there.

SPEAKER 4: And, you know, I, what I, what I'm truly hoping for John is that once people understand once the collector understands how cool it is to get a grading report and to see the exact imperfections of a card, they will demand that from the other big four. That's what I'm truly hoping for so that they will embrace technology and embrace the future if you will and, and, and especially with transparency what people actually want.

SPEAKER 1: I, I like that. I mean, I think every, I think every grader regardless of name, you know, PS A to, you know, Jimmy's basement graders that should, should give, you know, give a, why did this not, what was the issue with the car where it caused it to score? I didn't want to say issue because it could be a grade nine, right? But why, what was it that led to the grade?

SPEAKER 1: You know, it, it got, if you guys, like you just mentioned, you know, Brian, if, if you guys doing that kind of forces someone else's hand in a positive way, that's a, that's a, that's a good thing. I think they should be doing that already but maybe it takes sort of that.

SPEAKER 1: Hey, more people, more grading companies are starting to do this and we're now in sort of the minority not doing it and it's, it's, it's not necessarily a good look, that's how change kinda can occur. So, I, I appreciate you, you know, you saying that, you know, you ask 1000 people in the hobby. 990 of them will tell you they could grade a card tomorrow and, and work for you.

SPEAKER 1: But I, I think we all know right. That it's, it's not as, as simple as that. There's a lot that goes into it.

SPEAKER 1: Especially some of these people doing unscrupulous things and, and making fake cards. Some of them are, are very difficult to, to tell. I've, I've been fooled. Not, not where I've, I've necessarily bought a card but, I thought it was real and it eventually turned out, to be not.

SPEAKER 1: And, you know, it, it's, they're getting better, you know, these people that do these things are, are honing their, you know, illegal skills but they, they, their skills in their own. Right. Not for the sight of good, but they're kind of stepping up their game. So it, it's, it's, it's hard. Everyone thinks I can just show up to the building, go in the back room and let's start giving these things numerical grades.

SPEAKER 1: It's not, it's not as cut and dry as they may be in there maybe in their mind. But, those of us that have done this, a while or been in the hobby and seen the things, we've seen and, it's, it's not as simple and, and I, I think you mentioned it too. Jesse that, the, you know, you just don't grade right away.

SPEAKER 1: You've got to learn, sort of apprentice and then eventually, get in that pilot seat, you might have to be a copilot, for a little some time until you're ready. Sort of the, you know, to use another analogy, fly the plane. But, you know, and I think that's important, I think people should like to hear that.

SPEAKER 1: You know, the, because do you, you know, do you want someone that doesn't necessarily know the landscape?

SPEAKER 1: You know, you're, you're paying for a service, you want the best, you know, service you can get for the best value, right? So, it's good to hear you guys, you know, talk about that as difficult as it can be.

SPEAKER 1: I, I, you don't have to mention numbers, you know, with starting kind of with zero graders, were you able to get any that had experience in the industry? You know, that if you don't wanna mention what companies are, but were you able to get folks that done it before somewhere else and have taken their skill set to Arena Club?

SPEAKER 4: Absolutely. I mean, where else where we start?

SPEAKER 4: Yeah, we, we, we, we, we, we've been pretty good at recruiting, the team that we have, we're super excited about the team. We have, like I said, we're a small team but we're very, we're very cohesive and, and we're really jelling right now.

SPEAKER 4: You know, creating some really fun products and functions for within our club, like Slab Packs that we just launched a couple of weeks ago. That was kind of a, a fun project for us and we'll continue doing that.

SPEAKER 4: The consumer seems to really enjoy that.

SPEAKER 4: And so we'll add some more functions as we go, including even like possible meet and greets via video, with, with athletes and so forth. It just like you would meet an athlete at a card show and so forth that there's a lot of things that we're, we're drumming up to make this even more exciting in the future.

SPEAKER 1: You imagine that was one thing on my list, you know, repay p in your case, flab packs as are as another hot button like topic. Some people are just very adamant against it. I'm actually go in the process of writing an article for publication about repacks.

SPEAKER 1: I'm, I'm, I'm not one of those people that say do away with them. I'm just saying do your research. You know, there's people who sell them that do unscrupulous things or just getting rid of junk for the sake of, of making a quick buck. But there's people who do a great job with them too.

SPEAKER 1: You can't throw the baby out with the bathwater stealing a line from someone else, but that will appear in the piece I'm writing, right. We can't just paint everyone with the same brush and say everyone does it the same exact way and it's all bad, right? Kind of speak. I, I know that's a new, project, a new line for, for you guys.

SPEAKER 1: Kind of, I'm sure you've heard all the repack buzz, the, some of the BS, some of the, the Venom or vitriol tours. Repacks just kind of your take in doing that, you know, and trying to avoid, you know, some of that, you know, some of that stuff. Yeah.

SPEAKER 4: Ok, for you. So, so for us, like I said, II, I love the hobby and there's a lot of things that I just wanted to fix, right? And make better and more transparent.

SPEAKER 4: And so both Jessie and I, we go to car shows and we saw a lot of these green pack products and really to your point. Oh, not all of them, but a lot of them were unscrupulous it. Like, you know, you don't know what's in the packs.

SPEAKER 4: They don't tell you, you know, there's no checklist, there's no, there's no transparency. They'll tell you, hey, there's a shoe ot Rookie card in one of these packs. Well, which show ot Rookie card is it?

SPEAKER 4: Right. And what, and are you sure you can put it in there? And how do I know you just sold it to your brother-in-law? Right. So, so all this stuff was always popping into our heads, like gosh, we can do this so much better with full transparency and actually show people all the possible cards that they might get in their pack.

SPEAKER 4: And then basically an end with the percentages of hits, right? Like what are your odds of actually getting one of these?

SPEAKER 4: And then, and then so, and, and basically, once you purchase the slab pack at a club, it just basically shows up into your showroom where you do your reveal and disappears from the, all the cards over here and gets replenished with equal value cards. And so it's an ongoing replenishment program, but the cars are disappearing into people's showrooms as they purchase a slab pack.

SPEAKER 4: So there, there's no other more transparent product. I, I think that we're bringing truthly, I should hope unmatched value, right where we're putting a lot of value into these packs cause we're fine taking a very slim margin because that's what we're doing to be fully transparent with you.

SPEAKER 4: We're taking a slim margin on it because we want the hobby to have fun, right? Let, let's open, let's rip some stuff up and let, let's see what you get, right? We're putting some really fun, you know, cards in there.

SPEAKER 4: We're putting high value cards, but we're also putting really fun redemption cards in there. So, for example, like, we got like Ronald Lacuna sign bats that you could redeem the card for or like a Derek Jeter sign baseball you know, all this kind of stuff that we're doing to make the hobby fun again.

SPEAKER 5: Yeah, I think that's, that's the name of the game. It's like, it's just, it's just such an exciting product that our, our customers just absolutely, absolutely love. Right. It's like that, that chase, that feeling, the, the anxiousness of, of, like, before you open a pack, like being able to dream of getting the chase card or the grail card and, and people hitting them, actually hitting them.

SPEAKER 5: It's just like that is the fun that our users and collectors just really live for. Right? And, and I think that's just, it's just so critical to like our entire ecosystem that we're building. So we're su super happy to have it and we're go, we're gonna butts off to, to keep building on it and get it, keep it as live as often as possible.

SPEAKER 1: A couple of things I'll, I'll add there like, like you said, guys being transparent, hey, these are what's in here, here's your odds of getting, right? Some of your, your, you know, we can't put $1000 card in every pack. It's just not, not feasible, but they're in there, right? You have a shot at it. Here are your odds.

SPEAKER 1: Even if you don't necessarily hit that card, there's plenty of other stuff that you can hit that you know, will be, will make you happy too and, and you know, just like Jesse said, I think one of the most fun things you can do in the hobby, right. Is rip a pack, rip a repack open and not knowing or anticipating what you possibly could get in that adrenaline rush. Right.

SPEAKER 1: It's probably the, the biggest adrenaline rush in the hobby, even, even getting your cards back from grading if you don't know already what they've graded out at, that's an adrenaline rush, but not even the same as, as even open in the pack. And so there's something to be said, about that and doing it above board in, in the right way. And, you know, I'm, I'm while I may not participate in it, I'm not against them.

SPEAKER 1: Right. As long as, you know, I always tell people that ask me John and, you know, you know, and I've had people get mad at me that I don't like, swear against repacks. And I'm like, no, I'm not gonna, because there are people that are doing a great job with them. But you, you need to do your research and figure out who those folks are and who those folks aren't.

SPEAKER 1: And it's probably easier to find out the ones who aren't, and sort of by process of elimination. Figure out the ones who are doing, a decent job or, a great job or a better job, with, a product such as that, but to throw a complete line out because of what, you know, 60% of people do it the wrong way. Why should the 40%?

SPEAKER 1: And I'm just making up percentages and, you know, but why throw the 40% people doing it the right way and a great job with it. Why should they suffer because of, of the other 60% you know, the 60% should, should take it on the chin, not to, not to complete 100. And that's been my stance. I've had people not like that answer, but I'm, that's my honest answer, right.

SPEAKER 1: I'm not gonna make up because someone say that I don't believe in cause it, someone will like me more. That's not, I haven't done that in 51 years. I'm not gonna start, you know, now. So, you know, it's, I, I think that that product has a place in the hobby for those that want to partake in it.

SPEAKER 1: And it sounds like you, you're doing it with transparency and above board and, and that's, that's great to hear when maybe some, some folk, other folks don't do it along those lines.

SPEAKER 1: So, you know, that's a, that's a, a positive thing, not a, not a negative thing coming down the home stretch guys, you know, you, yeah, like you said your year into the launch o of Arena Club kind of assess, you know, where you are. Are you kinda on on track where you wanna be. Has it been better than you expected, that sort of thing? Just kind of an assessment sort of a year in, I.

SPEAKER 4: Think I would say we're definitely doing better than what I thought. Right. I, we, we have super high hopes we started the company and we remain very hopeful that this is gonna be a very successful business over the long term, but I feel really, really good with where we're at. Really thankful truthly to the community that's part of Arena Club.

SPEAKER 4: The earliest kind of, collectors who open showrooms with us to display their cars and put trust in us. We owe you everything truthfully. And, and you know, who you are and, you know, we, just, we're just thankful, just thankful and, and, and, and blessed to, to call this our job really to, to, to in this hobby and to, to, to actually try to build a business of this.

SPEAKER 4: It's, it's, it's, it's awesome. It really is. It's like, I, I sometimes just like, wonder, like, how did, how did this become my life that, that it doesn't even feel like work. It really does. It's just so much fun and it's, it's just awesome. Yeah.

SPEAKER 5: Ii, I echo that I, I'm really happy with, with, with where we're at and, just having this super exciting product that our, that our customers just love and, and just, we have such a big plan to continue to grow, it, expand it, add more fun features, add a lot of awesome cards to our marketplace. We're just, we're just both very, very, very excited about, about this.

SPEAKER 5: And yeah, working in cards all day, it's, it's a, it's a lot of, it's a lot of fun. I mean, it's kind of a crazy world from time to time. But, like, it's definitely, it's definitely fun to navigate, that's for sure.

SPEAKER 5: I've got a lot of character.

SPEAKER 1: Yeah. Like, if you're not having fun, like, the hobby should be fun. Right. That's why we, we do it. I always tell people sometimes I'll get an email, guys, you know, someone say I'm kinda, I hit a wall or I'm a little burnt out or I'm not having, well, try something, do a different angle. There's more than one, multiple ways to hobby. Try a different way. Try a way. Maybe you thought about doing something different.

SPEAKER 1: You never did it yet. Try that before. You kind of exit stage left. Right. The hobby. It should be an outlet to, to, you know, to sort of escape some of the, the regular mundanes of, of life and, and have fun and a, as an aside, to that. So, it's, it's, it's nice hearing you say that, guys that you, well, it's, well, it's a business and a job. It's also fun. Right.

SPEAKER 1: That's, one of the best things you can say, you know, when, when you're working that it's, you enjoy what you're doing and you have a passion for, probably a few, you know, there's other people who like to say that maybe and, and can't, but, it's good, you know, good on you and, and it means you, I think you're doing it the right way and, and that you, you're in that place. I always give the guest guys kind of the final word.

SPEAKER 1: Give out all your socials websites where people can see everything you guys offer and all that good stuff.

SPEAKER 5: Yeah, the we're primarily on, on, on Instagram At Arena Club. And we just launched a Discord actually, which is, it's been going kind of crazy, which has been a lot of fun just to see all of our customers just kind of talking all the time new people joining, explaining how we work. I'm like, wow, this is amazing. This is like my number one sales team.

SPEAKER 4: And, and come to Arena Club.com, check us out, you know, it, it is a lot of fun. It is a lot of fun just to see what's in the marketplaces and people's showrooms, come check out Derek Jeter's showroom, Steve Nash's showroom, a bunch of other kind of great players that have joined our platform.

SPEAKER 4: Yeah, it's, it's, it's pretty, it's pretty awesome.

SPEAKER 5: Just don't send Brian, a low ball offer. It makes him angry. Then I have to deal with him all day. So it's just, just, just like try to pay like 20% below whatever he has left with. And it'll accept.

SPEAKER 4: Somebody offered me, I have this this, this side show here to card and card and it's like $1000 card. Some guy offered me like 85 cards of this for that one card. I'm like, oh, come on, man.

SPEAKER 5: I have, I, I have a confession. Was that you right? It's me do what I can do.

SPEAKER 1: That's, that's funny. Well, guys continued success.

SPEAKER 1: I look forward to meeting you whether it be at the National or, or even before, as well. We'll have you back to, I don't like to do just 111 appearance only as long as you come back. So again, continued to cause continued success.

SPEAKER 4: Thank you so much for having us happy holidays. Yeah.

SPEAKER 5: Likewise, looking forward to the next one. Thank you. Thank you.

SPEAKER 1: All right. Very cool having Brian and Jesse on telling us a little bit about Arena Club, check out their website. They're doing, you know, they're trying to do stuff, the right way and above board and, bring some transparency, to the hobby and that's, you know, that's a, that's a good thing that checks all the, good boxes.

SPEAKER 1: So, appreciate their time like I said, to them, I, I know they're busy, with that new company a year end. So, appreciate them. Carving out some time for us here on sports coord nation. Time to hear from our hobby is the people announcer of the week and then some closing thoughts.

SPEAKER 6: Time for our hobby is the people announcer of the week.

SPEAKER 8: What's up, everyone? It's brodie. The kid always remember the hobby is the people peace out.

SPEAKER 6: If you'd like to be the hobby is the people announcer of the week. Do a WAV or MP3 file and send it to Sports Card Nation PC at gmail.com.

SPEAKER 9: That's a wrap for this week. Huge thanks to you, the listeners out there because without you, there is no ice.

SPEAKER 9: If you like the show, we truly appreciate positive reviews. Big ups to our great guests who drive the show and our awesome sponsors who make it all possible. Sports Card Nation will be back next week, but don't forget to catch either hobby, quick hits or cod Mens coming up on Monday.

SPEAKER 9: I'll leave you with this.

SPEAKER 9: How do we change the world?

SPEAKER 9: One random act of kindness at a time.

SPEAKER 9: Remember the hobby is the people.

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