Today is “Black Friday,” which for a long time meant it was the one day of the year where many of us frothed at the mouth waiting for hourly price drops on card products we didn’t really need, but always justified purchasing by telling others that “cards are NEVER on sale.”

The shopping holiday has been around for decades and is named as such because retailers would slash prices that would ultimately get cash flowing and put their coffers in the “black,” which in bookkeeping terms is positive. Over the years the single day turned into a whole weekend of stuff that now includes Small Business Saturday and Cyber Monday.

Over the last decade and a half this has meant some exciting times for our hobby. It was a time to purchase boxes at half of their regular prices, to find deals on consignment site CheckoutMyCards.com, or win various prices on messages boards. Hell, I remember getting up at 5 a.m. on a non-work day just to constantly watch Twitter for the latest drop and even tried various times to be the lucky caller to win a Beckett magazine subscription by calling Blowout Cards.

This day always started the same for me. I’d peruse the sites and load up my cart with items such as 2004 Deck SP Prospects (loved the signed prospects) and 2009 Upper Deck SP Legendary Cuts (always wanted to pull a massive cut auto). And the day would always end the same as several hours later I’d come to my senses and just empty the cart when I realized that I was about to spend $400 on stuff I really didn’t need.

Over at COMC I’d click “purchase” dozens of times over on cards I’d been watching all year long, items to fill out various projects I was working on.

But this year things feel different, and I’m not sure if it’s just me or if its true for anyone else.
For the better part of a week COMC has had a banner on its site, advising sellers to set up their free sales, and offering tidbits to buyers who were urged to partake in the price slashing event. I failed to set up a sale beforehand, and even as of this writing I have not purchased a damn thing.

And on online retail sites I glanced at some of the sales and ultimately just kinda threw my hands up and literally said “meh.”

The thrill is gone.

I’m sure some of you are still stoked about things today, and if you are that’s great. But from my perspective it feels like I’ve become numb to the idea of new product and sales prices. Because for years now there has been a barrage of products weekly, and all of the prices have been so high by comparison to the past that any “sale” price just feel like the prices we should be seeing normally. So I find it incredibly hard to justify purchasing things under these circumstances. At some point a “deal” is really no longer a “deal,” ya know?

Anyhow, there may be something that pops up today, this weekend or even over the upcoming weeks that changes my mind, but as I sit here and write this, it just feels like any other Friday.

This entry was posted on November 25, 2022 at 8:09 am and is filed under Commentary with tags baseball, baseball cards, Black Friday, sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.