When 2010 Exquisite was released last week, there were very few people who expected parts of the 2011 rookie class to be included. Hell, even I was shocked. Funny enough, these cards have turned out to be a great addition to the product and are selling for ridiculous prices on eBay as we speak. Considering that these cards are not autographed, and do not feature any affiliation with the NFL, its crazy to believe how much they are fetching. Obviously, since Exquisite has the brand recognition with the most expensive cards on the market, its easy to see why the cards arent cheap. However, when you see just how much they are selling for, it goes to show just how starved people are for 2011 cards.
I think the one thing that needs to be mentioned here is that Exquisite is more limited in production than any other year it has been produced in football. Couple that with the ridiculous notion and stupid practice of only allowing one online retailer to sell it, and you have a perfect storm building rapidly for secondary market value. Basically, this product is tough to find, very expensive, and has the name attached to it that beats out both Five Star and National Treasures combined. Even with no NFL license, collectors still recognize Exquisite as the top of the mountain, something that may seem ludicrous to people reading this. It has to do with the fact that only a small portion of hobby participants follow message boards and twitter, and an even smaller portion follow this site or ones like it. This means they arent as clued into the fact that UD is in a state of vast flux, both in terms of their name and their bank, and when they see that eBay isnt turning prices around for UD stuff, they wont get it there either.
Basically, Exquisite is Exquisite, and its the one reason I have no clue why Topps or Panini doesnt buy out UD’s stuff like UD did with Fleer back a few years ago.
Anyways, because the rookies’ inclusion in a 2010 product WITH NCAA licensing for the jerseys they CANT wear in Press Pass or SAGE junk, these types of cards will be highly sought after until the first post-rookie premiere product with NFL uniforms hits shelves around May or June.
What this also means is that UD has started to prove that their purchase of the NCAA exclusive is definitely paying off, at least short term, something I never expected to happen. Considering that their cards still hold very good value, even though they are basically premium versions of the former Press Pass style cards, maybe is an indicator that I was wrong when I believed that the college collecting sector was miniscule.
Check out these prices, they speak for themselves:
I got peer pressured into buying one of these last weekend after swearing I wouldn’t, and I ended up making most of my money back on a Dez Bryant rookie patch auto and an AJ Green rookie card. If I end up flipping everything, I might end up MAKING money on this box. It’s especially amazing to me, considering I thought I was bound to take a huge hit just because of the NCAA thing, but like you wrote, it looks like I was completely wrong about the college collecting population. It wouldn’t shock me if boxes skyrocketed like basketball Exquisite always has (at least in the short term), so I’m glad I broke one early-ish for once.
I don’t care for this year’s Exquisite Football too much, but those rookie inserts for this year’s drafted players look pretty sweet. I helped bid that Locker up to $102.50 last night, although it surpassed my max bid by $22.50 :^) I’ll wait for the super-fans to pick theirs up for major $$$ first and then get mine for a little less. I think Locker will be a much better pro-style QB than Newton. Newton might very well turn out to be another Vince Young and I’d rather not drop $100+ on any of his nicer cards when I have no clue how he’ll perform in an actual game.
The college collecting base is larger than you might think. Plus, you have the premiere rookie brand in the industry combined with cards that have logos on them. Prices will fall off a bit since the early birds have swooped in for the cards they want, but the price floor is not as low as some people would think it could be.