Collectors Are FURIOUS Over PSA Price Hikes.

YouTube people, is this the moment? Is did have they pushed too far because the collecting community is pissed pissed about the PSA price increase. People are fired up. Fired up. I'm recording this late Tuesday evening. uh very late in the day. Should be in bed or should be heading to bed as I have to get up for work in like six and a half hours. The feedback in the comment section, on Twitter, on social in general, on the stuff that I've posted and stuff other people have posted has been insane. The question is, is it actually enough? Are people actually going to follow through with what they are saying or is it all talk? Oh, I do want to mention one thing before we get too far into this video and I and I lose the train of thought and I am not going to play the clip of this. I'll reference this. You could go find it. I'm sure other folks have been talking about it as well, but and I I've gotten some comments on it. I've I've briefly mentioned in a few live streams, but I I keep getting questions on it, so I'll I'll address it here. Sports Card Radio flat out said some racist stuff on their live stream covering the Pac-Man situation. And you can dislike Pac-Man for the way that he ran that break. You could dislike his business practices. You could dislike the way that he handled himself. Whatever the case might be. That being said, there is no room for that kind of stuff in the hobby, in life. just period. And I know Sports Card Radio likes to fly close to the sun on stuff that they have said and stuff that they say on their live streams, but this one definitely crossed the line. So, don't don't say racist It's really not that hard. It's 2026. Come on, people. All right, let's rant about some PSA stuff. Uh, I knew that the price increase would not sit well with folks at all. That's no surprise. It's there as as I discussed with Orion on the interview that dropped yesterday. It's the fourth price increase basically in a year. And demand keeps going up. You know, it's like like K-pop demanders up up. The demand for PSA grading specifically is crazy. It it it's absolutely insane. even after four price increases. So, you know, they announced this one and the blowback. I could tell early. I could tell early. I know my videos when I post them, you know, I do them every single day just about. And I could see very early on one the views uh for a 45 minute long video out the gate were strong. Not as strong as Pac-Man and not as strong as the Fanatic's leaked document, but they were very strong. And the thing that stood out to me was the engagement. And what I mean by that is the comments. Uh this video as of time of recording the interview here. And once again, this has been live for 14 hours or so is and this is day one. 14 hours in and a bulk of the views will will be today. They'll trickle in from going forward. This video in 14 hours is now my record holder for most comments on a video. Uh I think it's creeping up to 500. It's in the four 468 at time of recording. It'll probably be over 500 by the time I wake up tomorrow morning. And that's on day one. I I broke my record. My the previous records were in like the low 400s in regards to comments. And most of that is viewer comments. I I just do not have the time to interact in the comment section as much as I would like to. I try to get in there. I read everything. I just don't always have time to respond uh to everything. Some sometimes I'll hop in here and there. Uh but that is mostly all viewerdriven comments on Twitter. I did the post early in the morning because I knew that the switch was flipping overnight. Uh, so I had a graphic, you know, ready to go that I I I I threw together in the old AI machine. Uh, threw it up at like 5:30 a.m. this, uh, Tuesday morning when I woke up. Let me refresh this to see if we've gone over the magic number yet. Probably not. No. 992,000 views on this tweet. This will probably cross a million. I don't think I've ever had a tweet get a million views before. 114 comments, 170 retweets, uh 222 likes, 88 bookmarks, and the heat is real. Same on the comment section of this video as well. People are angry. They are angry. But are folks willing to put their money where their mouth is and actually seek out change? And it's twofold. There are two things here. And you could debate which one matters more. Is it slow down on submitting to them or like I there's the crowd of I'm not using them anymore. I'm done. And that's perfectly fine. Do whatever you want. I personally haven't sent anything to PSA in a year. It's been a full Yeah. I'd have to look at exactly the submissions, but I think it's been a full year plus since I have sent anything to PSA. In fact, the video is not posted yet on the TCG channel and it's on its way in the mail system right now. I just sent a 25ish card order to CGC. TCG. It's all one piece on its way to CGC because of and and it didn't have to do with the pricing for me. It had to do with turnaround times for me personally. I didn't want to wait three months to get the four months to get the cards back. CGC, I paid up slightly for economy, get the cards back in 20 days. So part one of this is are people actually going to stop submitting or all my the thing I would love to know and it's impossible to know because a lot of people in the comments down below are like I'm done. I'm never submitting with them again. I I would love to know how many of those people have submitted cards in the last year because I I have and maybe I'm just wrong on this. I have a sneaking suspicion. Most of the people saying that they are done sending cards to PSA probably don't send a lot of cards to PSA to begin with. Maybe I'm wrong on that. You all could tell me in the comment section down below. But that's that's one half of the equation is is the I'm not giving them my business anymore. I'm either just not going to grade. I'm going to go somewhere else. I'm going to toss it in a mag. Whatever the case might be. The other part of it, and it's what we've talked about before, if you really want to raise up competition against PSA, you have to buy nonPSA slabs for PSA prices. that will move the needle more than your lack of submission to PSA because let's be honest here, people are pissed right now, justifiably so, that it is 25 20 what is it? 20 25 bucks a card for bulk to get it back in god knows how long. People are genuinely pissed off. Don't blame them at all. I like I said, I am choosing not to use them for my current submission because of this. But a year from now, let's say they catch up. PSA drops bulk back down to $20 per card. Oh, basketball season. Let's run a little basketball sale. Uh six $15.99 a card. Uh you'll get it back in 45 business days. 50 business days. We'll say, let's say they say 60 business days, but it's really coming back in two months. They've cleared the backlog. Demand has calmed down a little bit. You know, whatever whatever nonsense you want to throw out there, they come out with a special for 16 bucks a cart with decent turnaround times. Guess what? Most of the people that said they were done, I'm never using them again. They're the devil. You know what you're going to do? You're going to be on PSA's website filling out paperwork to send a submission in. Let's just let's call a spade a spade. Most folks, that's what's going to happen. Like I said, the the real turning point here is if you really want to enact change, pay for the other grading companies like their PSA. If it is a gem mint card, whether that's a CGC 10, a Tagbot 10, uh whatever other acronym you want to throw in there, 10, pay for it like it's a PSA 10. Don't try to get the deal on it. That's what really moves the needle. If a bunch of people went out, and it had to be a bunch, goes out and starts buying. We'll use CGC because they're the example everyone's running to. goes out and buys up a bunch of CGC10 slabs on eBay. It's got to be on eBay because we got to get that comp out there. That would have more power to move the needle than you not sending a submission into PSA. Spoilers, PSA doesn't want your submission right now. That's why they raised prices. And like I said, people are pissed. They raised prices four times and they kept getting more cards four times. They raised prices and people submitted more and more and more and more. I don't have I guess I could I could probably scrub to it in this video. Uh I don't know if I have that little chart handy. Ah, there it is right there. Gotta pause on a better image of myself. Come on. There we go. That's a little better. They raised prices and demand went higher. They have basically been chasing their tail since early 2025. And I get it. No one wants to hear all that. They want them to be fully staffed up and ready and and teams of graders and invest billions and millions of dollars and all this that and the other thing. And that's fine. That's your prerogative. And I see a lot of folks saying this is CGC's opportunity. They they have to seize it. They have to do this. They have to do that. I I think CGC they want to grow. I don't know that CGC wants to be the next PSA. Some folks that work there might. I don't know if Blackstone wants them to be. You know what Blackstone wants? Profits with as as little expenses as possible. They want the most profit possible. Let's not forget who owns them. Everybody loves to cite it that they have this huge financial backing that they have all this money they could potentially spend. Sure. In reality, not so much. I don't think they want to spend that money to the degree that it would take. They'll spend money. They'll invest. They're hiring graders right now. CGC is. I'm sure they're probably looking at other locations to expand to a second US location. They've expanded a lot abroad. They've been mostly focusing on TCG cards. The amount of money that Blackstone would have to throw at CGC to catch them up to PSA is massive. You know, Bobbles and Ballards did a great video about this yesterday. PSA has such a massive lead. They are getting buried in submissions and they have spent more money, time, tech than any other grading company combined and they are still getting overran. Do you know what it would take for someone like CGC to potentially even to catch up to the infrastructure and manpower that PSA has? And PSA can't even keep up with that. It would be tens if not a hundred million plus dollars probably to catch up. And I don't know that they're willing to do that. And here's what's going to happen. I bet you CGC probably got great volume today. I bet you a lot of people did go over there and submit cards to them and are going to try them out and they're going to get slammed. Well, let's just kind of play this scenario out. They're potentially going to get slammed. They're going to get backlogged and then people are going to get pissed off at them. I sent my order and it said 20 business days. It's been two months. This is just like using PSA. I might as well just use them and then I could at least sell it for the most. You know how I know that? Because it's SGC 2.0. SGC during the pandemic days were like, "Hey, we're doing great. We're open for business. Send us the famous Pete. Send us your cards." And people did. And it blew up in their face. Now, they ended up turning it around. It took them a a good year to clear out their backlog and it took them another good six months to a year to reearn the hobbies trust after that debacle. But they eventually turned it around. It took them a long time to do it. A lot of work. And in the meantime, PSA was sitting there growing expansion, cleaning up their stuff, getting things running smooth. Now they ended up falling apart again, but for a while there they were running pretty good. 2024 pretty good. Pretty clean year for PSA in regards to turnaround times, but people are mad. This is the most vitriol I have seen towards PSA. I don't know if ever, but at least from an engagement standpoint, it has been. Like I said, this video is 14 hours old and broke my record for comments. I have a tweet that's going to go for a million plus views and the there's there's very little positive comments, if any, outside of people enjoying the interview and and and you know that sort of stuff, but there's I I cannot find very many positive comments in regards to the PSA side of things. There are people that have some logical takes in there in regards to just like day-to-day business stuff and like understanding the business aspect of it. And I'm sure it is tricky for PSA, you know, maybe and this could be a video in itself. Does PSA and I think Bobbles might have talked about I feel someone talked about this. I just don't remember who. If it was Bobbles, great. If it wasn't Bobbles, sorry. Does PSA not believe in the current market? And is that the reason why they are af I don't want afraid might not be the right word. Is that why they don't want to go fullbore open up a billion offices open up a ton of square footage hire thousands of people to staff up for demand that they are worried might disappear or might pull back I guess is the correct term. you the hobby will always exist but pull back from it the heater that it has been on for a while now because let's be honest cards in general have been hot for the last year plus like we are back we have been in a hot market in cards for a year plus now both sports and Pokemon a lot of it's been Pokemon but sports has gone right along with it maybe maybe they're like hey man this is not going to last we are not going to overstretch our bounds we are not going to spend even more tens of millions of dollars to expand. We've already done it a ton. We opened up Jersey. We bought SGC and turned that into Florida. We bought Beckett. And you know, I I have to imagine there's plans for a PSA Texas office in or around Becket. They already have one down the street for tickets. I have to imagine that they leverage part of that Becket office for PSA stuff as well. It just makes too much sense. Speculated on that when they initially bought them. I believe that Becket office is huge. I think there is tons of space there that even the Becca grading company doesn't use. But maybe they don't have faith that this hot market could last and they don't want to overstretch their bounds. So they they would rather have a really big backlog for a year plus than overbuild the empire and then the demand falls and then they overspent, have all this money, extra square footage, extra humans that they don't need, etc. Maybe that's the case. Maybe it's not. You could you could pitch the opposite that they're just a bunch of bumbling idiots over there and this is what they're doing to manipulate prices and increase profit margin and do this and do that and everything that you want to run down on the list. I don't know which one's the correct answer. Maybe it's a little bit of column A, a little bit of column B. The one thing I do know, the pitchforks and torches are out. Now, will it actually impact stuff? find out in a couple months. The reason I say that is gem rate data data lags. They have a three, four, five, six month backlog at PSA. So, it's going to take some time for the gem rate numbers to fall out. And we'll also know, guess what? If submissions dip, Ryan said it in the video, they you'll see prices decrease and they will run specials again because they need to feed. They have built the machine. They have built the beast and the beast needs fed and the the beast gets fed with cards. So I do believe them when they say prices will come down again if demand lessens because they want cards coming in the front door to go out the back door so they can make their money. And if submissions do drop and they get caught up and they need cards in the building, they will start pulling the levers in the opposite directions. And I do believe them that they'll run specials again. prices will come back down again to some degree. It's never going back to $6 a card or $10 a card or whatever nonsense it used to be in 2005. It's not going back to those prices. $15 a card for a special maybe. We'll see. But I do think we see them again. At some point in time, either people are going to get so pissed off or the hobby itself naturally pulls back. And I don't know what's next. I don't The market could cool. the the this could be the real revolt against PSA that everyone's been hoping and wishing for. But the problem is I don't think anyone is ready to step up. CGC is the closest by a wide margin. TAG is they're a joke. They're not even close. So TAG bots chill out. All the other random three-letter acronym grading companies that no one's ever really heard of that mostly grade TCG, they're not ready either. The ball is in CGC's court, but they're not ready for this much volume either. If they get a massive increase in volume, my prediction, it will break them and people will get pissed off at them. We'll see what happens. It's going to be an interesting spring into early summer for the grading space. It's all I got. Catch boys and girls in the next one. Peace.

What is going on YouTube people! In this session, we discuss the latest PSA grading updates, specifically focusing on the recent application for late fee submission and its impact on the sports cards community. We explore how these changes are perceived, especially concerning how to increase prices in the hobby. This analysis provides important context for collectors dealing with graded cards. Have a collection to sell reach out to our friends at Just Collect: https://neo.justcollect.com Discord: https://discord.gg/HHv7dkcB98 eBay partner link: https://ebay.us/zmiusO #ad MySlabs partner link: https://myslabs.pxf.io/nLNBJx #ad Fanatics partner link: https://fanatics.93n6tx.net/mgALb7 #ad Amazon partner link: https://amzn.to/3uh7ovE #ad PWCC partner link: https://pwccmarketplace.pxf.io/6eVAy3 #ad Link to the market movers tool set: Coupon Code NEO for $1 for your first month, partner link: https://marketmoversapp.com/neo/ #ad If you enjoy the content and want to support the channel consider becoming a member: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkry0N3iMPzDLUBr24i4fcQ/join Follow me on Twitter & IG: Twitter: @NEOCards_Comics IG: neo_cards_comics https://www.instagram.com/?hl=en Discord: https://discord.gg/HHv7dkcB98 "As an Underdog Fantasy Associate I earn from qualifying deposits via my affilate link" “As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.” “As an eBay Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.” “As an Fanatics Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.” “As an Topps Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.” “As an Walmart Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.”