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Business & Tech

Business Q&A: Card Shack

A haven for card collectors in Lynbrook.

 

Steve Cardi turned a childhood passion into a full-time business when he opened his first card collector store in Lynbrook at the age of 17. After spending 18 years operating out of Valley Stream, Cardi moved back to Lynbrook in 2008. His store, on Atlantic Avenue, sells both cards and memorabilia.

Here, Cardi explains what it’s like to own the store in an ever-changing sports business marketplace.      

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What do most customers come into Card Shack looking for?

I’m a specialty store for all sports cards, going back to the late 1800’s. I have a four and a half million card inventory.

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How has the memorabilia business changed since you started?

When I got into the business, there was almost no market for regular sports memorabilia, it was just sports cards. Back then, athletes didn’t charge to give autographs. People used to just go after them. There wasn’t a standard “signing.” It was basically going to the games and following them around. They would always love to sign for people.

In the early 90’s, autographs became more of a memorabilia store business.

How is your store different from other memorabilia stores?

I carry a lot of the local players. That’s my market. I obviously deal with out of town players as well.

What makes me different is that I’m very organized. I have every one of my four and a half million sports cards logged on my website. If you come in looking for a player that played 17 games in 1963 and was somebody’s uncle, I can type up (the name) right away and do a search within three minutes. If I have the card, I can pull it for you.

Is the card business still very baseball-centric? Is there a big gap between baseball and other sports?

It used to be about 90 percent baseball, ten percent other. Now, it’s about 60 percent baseball, 40 percent other. The other categories are combined between football, basketball, and what we call assorted. Assorted includes soccer, wrestling, and even boxing. Assorted is all sporadic, not consistent like baseball, football, hockey, and basketball. For example, two years ago during the World Cup, for about two weeks 70 percent of my business was World Cup soccer items.

Do you host any in-store appearances?  

We do. The last one was We used to do a lot before we moved here. The problem is (that in) the last five or six years, the appearance fees have gotten very expensive. 10 or 15 years ago, I would negotiate with the athlete. Now, I have to go through the agents. Agents take up to 20 or 30 percent. There’s not much leverage. The athlete is getting paid so much today that, if it isn’t worth their while, they aren’t coming down to your store to do a signing.   

Your 25th anniversary is coming in May. What does that mean for you and the store?

We'll be celebrating our 25th year in business on May 30, 2012. We will be leading up to the event with many special offers and events like Pack Wars, Trade Nights, free giveaways, and free cards for good students. Stay tuned!

I'm very excited that I am still working each and every day on something that I have been so passionate about since I was a youngster. Work is fun, and something that I cannot wait to do each day. Who can say that for 25 out of 41 years of their life?

I have made some of my best friends from this business including customers whom have been so loyal to me, you never see that in any other business, especially with this business being so popular on the internet. That is why I have diversified to online with my huge sports card inventory to catch faithful collectors that cannot come to my store. I treat each customer, either in store or online, with the same level of professionalism.

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