Frequently Asked Questions
This is a difficult question to answer as your intentions for your collection play a large role in what you buy. Collectors may want to complete full sets whereas investors focus on individual cards offering high returns.
As a general rule, it’s a good idea to select a niche and stick to it. For example, you may choose to collect cards for a single team or type of player. You might even focus on a specific player or only collect certain types of cards. Choosing a niche ensures your collection does not become chaotic. It also prevents you from acquiring cards that have no place in your collection.
With so many card producers around, you should expect prices for packs of cards to vary a little bit. However, you may not expect the scale of variance we see with hockey cards. Some packs can cost as little as $1, with high-end packs costing $100 each.
If you’re paying a high-end price, you should expect to receive more content, inserts, and more valuable cards. High-end packs tend to include jersey cards, autographed cards, and rookie cards. Cheaper packs will usually only feature base cards. As such, investors should focus their money on more expensive packs and immediately store any card they receive that has the potential for future value.
Here are the main hockey card brands:
● O-Pee-Chee
● MVP
● Upper Deck
● Artifacts
● SP Authentic
● SPx
O-Pee-Chee is the most common brand and tends to offer the lowest prices. But you do get a chance to pull patches and autograph cards from these sets. Upper Deck’s cards come in Series One and Series Two varieties. Both of which feature its popular Young Guns rookie cards along with patch and autograph cards.
Artifacts is the best choice for collectors who love premium cards, though both SPx and SP Authentic also produce high volumes of rookie, autograph, and patch cards.
Finally, MVP tends to offer the first card sets of the year. You may benefit from limited run cards and plenty of parallels with this brand.