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Collector Nation
Josh Luber on Fanatics, Trading Cards & the Future of Collecting | Hosted by Ryan Alford
01:00:21
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- [00:00]
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- [01:00]
Josh Luber
All these products, they're all the same, all hype economy products. They're all supply and demand driven. Just having the leagues as equity partners in their own product that should have been that way for decades. It's their product. It's their business.
- [01:13]
Ryan Alford
Welcome to the trading cards and collectibles podcast on the Radcast Network. From chasing grails to calling bluffs, going inside the hobby. Are you ready to collect? Let's get at it. Here is your host, Ryan Alford.
- [01:31]
Podcast Host
Yo, what's up? Welcome. We appreciate you for tuning in. We got a treat today, folks. You like collectibles? We're gonna go top to bottom here. We're covering the gamut today, guys. We got everything from shoes to toys to cards. He's had his hands in all of it. He's the co founder of StockX, the co founder of Ghostwright. He is Josh Luber. I can't even keep up. You got. You're touching everything that I like. How'd you do it?
- [01:59]
Josh Luber
Hey, I just get to make businesses around things that I like and that's it. Right? I just happen to be the right age for the right history of the products that we grew up collecting. And then we're so lucky everything else and happy to be here. But this is the fun stuff to talk about.
- [02:15]
Podcast Host
I know, man. And I think like every kid growing up, if they were going to, you know how you have to do in like third grade, fourth. What do you want to be when you grow up? I think if the job description and path that Josh Luber took, I think 98%, I can't. And maybe little girls now, too, but definitely little boys like this. This guy would have wrote down the path that Josh Luber is taking. I would like to have that. I mean, dude, I mean, it's. It is. You get to do the things that you grew up collecting and loving. I know you got a deep history there, but it's just cool, man, that you've, I don't know, made this ridiculous. And I know nothing's easy. You've worked your ass off, but it's just crazy, the things that you've touched. It's almost like overwhelming knowing where to start with the successes you've seen. But congratulations.
- [03:02]
Josh Luber
Thanks, man. I appreciate it. We didn't know that this career path existed when we were, you know, we grew up before the Internet. We grew up before, you know, all of this. And it's fun now to look at it. You know, we both have young children. We both have young boys. And, you know, and watching now what his view of this is, and he understands some of this. He understands some of what StockX is and meant, but, like, he just loves Pokemon cards more than anything else, right? And so now we get to be there to sort of guide them and like, talk about the business side of it. Like that. By the way, that is, like, the. The most fun part of all of this for me is, like, we had a conversation literally last night because he has Pokemon cards that he wants to get graded, and I told him that he has to fund it, so he has to figure out what card he's gonna sell to pay for his grade. Like, and him going through the math of, well, if I get a nine on this and sell that, I mean, like, how cool is that?
- [03:55]
Podcast Host
That's so cool, man. That's so cool. And I'm so glad you went there, man, because, like, part of why I started this show, like, I've been doing podcasting and what. And doing stuff that I think is pretty cool for most dads, you know, but they didn't really want. Dad's a podcaster and owns a marketing agency that's didn't really want anything to do with it. And then they started getting into the hobby a little later. This is probably 18 months a year ago. And I started using my connections just to get us in experiences, like calling a friend or somebody that's been on the show. And then it all snowballed into doing this show that I'm blessed to do, but the Biggest rewarding part has been teaching them supply and demand, teaching them E commerce, teaching them, you know, in a cool, fun way, because they want to collect and they want to know, you know, what's worth. And you're exactly right. Hey, if you want that, you got to sell something to make it happen. And that's been really cool. And something that I really want to expand upon on this show but is through that lens. So I love that you're a dad and you're teaching him these things because, I mean, shit. I mean. But he gets to say, my dad started StockX. Is there a bigger play for him that's cool than that?
- [05:06]
Josh Luber
He doesn't realize that yet, but I have in a couple years, I think he's gonna figure that out. My daughter, who's a couple years older, like, she's starting to figure that out. And as kids start to understand what shoes people are wearing. But, you know, we all grew up like our first businesses. We're all flipping trading cards and buying and selling cards when we were a kid. And so now to get to do that with my son. And part of it is. It's exactly right. You know, you mentioned the sort of, you know, education of the economics of supply and demand and having those conversations, which obviously is we as parents, we all want to help our kids grow and become smarter and learn these sort of things. But I had this realization early on at StockX, when we were very fortunate to be asked to come and speak at a lot of different places because it was sneakers. And I would go and I would talk at many different places all over the world. And by far the best ones were always when I got to go speak at a school, a high school or college or middle school.
- [06:03]
Podcast Host
And.
- [06:04]
Josh Luber
And, you know, even though they all came, they wanted to hear about $30,000 sneakers or the time that I met Eminem. When I got into the economics of it all, you could actually see them, like, refocus and be super interested in that part of it as well. At least most of them. Some, you know, still want to goof around in the back and then the line afterwards of people that wanted to come up and talk to me. And some of them were about, what's it like to meet Eminem? But. But most of them were, what do you think it would be a good idea if I bought this and sold this or whatever? Like, really. And, like. And then, you know, 10 years later, now, for me, having that conversation and doing it with my son is obviously super rewarding. But, like, that was a realization early on, in terms of what we were doing that was like, oh, okay, this is a really good, like entree into education and everything else.
- [06:50]
Podcast Host
What led to starting StockX? Let's talk a little bit about that story before. I mean, I want to spend the majority of the time talking about ghostwrite because a lot of, you know, people can find the Josh luber story on StockX. But for our audience, for people, you know, set the table, talk to us about that and you know, the damn shoe game, man. Insanity.
- [07:10]
Josh Luber
Yeah, there's obviously a lot to that. I'll say. One of the most important parts of sort of my story of starting StockX is that, you know, I'm an entrepreneur. I've started and run I don't know, maybe a dozen companies at this point. And there was a probably good four or five before campus, which is the company that became StockX. And all the companies that I started before that, none of them had anything to do with sneakers or collectibles or trading cards or any of my personal passion. And almost intentionally, like, I almost intentionally tried to avoid creating a business related to sneakers so that it wasn't just an excuse to play with sneakers. And also, you know, sort of pre social media at a different time with sort of the businesses you could build online. It was like, well, am I going to build a sneaker store? There wasn't as clear of as many opportunities, so. But it wasn't until I created Campus, which was a side project while I was at IBM, I always, in between every business I had some corporate job to pay the bills and sort of jump to the next one. And so I was at IBM as a strategy consultant and I was running Campus on the side which was like, you know, the Becket for, for sneakers. Right, the price guide for sneakers. And, and that was. We started working on that in 2012 and it wasn't until 2015 that I met Dan Gilbert. So I was doing this on the side for three years, nights and weekends, just trying to grind in and trying to create something and do something and just really find a way of what was going to be my next business. How do I leave IBM? What is this, this next business that I can create? And I wasn't exactly sure what it was going to be, but I had a pretty good, you know, sort of at least path with, with what I created in campless of now trying. Is there a real business within the sneaker industry? And I talk to everybody in the industry. Nike, eBay, Footlocker Complex, you name it. And there's never Really a good fit of who to work with and who to take Campless and evolve it to the next level. And it was really just, you know, there's a lot of just luck and serendipity involved in any. Anyone's success story. But for me, you know, In April of 2015, I met Dan Gilbert. Dan, who's the owner of the Cleveland Cavaliers and Quicken Loans and pretty much the entire city of Detroit. And the short version is that he was trying to build the same thing. He was trying to build a marketplace for sneakers based on, you know, stock market mechanics. And that's an even longer, crazier story because Dan's got no ties to sneakers whatsoever. But he understood the value of the StockX. The real business is not sneakers. It's the bid ask model, it's the pricing model, it's the marketplace. Part of was just fortuitous to me that maybe the only other person in the whole world trying to do the exact same thing at the exact same time happens to be one of the most successful business people in the world. And so I ended up selling Campless to Dan. That was sort of the data layer and then moving to Detroit to work with him and his team to turn that into StockX. And so I moved to Detroit in 2015 and then we launched StockX the next year. But it was very much a granular, step by step, had no idea where it was going other than in this direction. And I got lucky that I met Dan. We got lucky that we had an amazing team that we worked on it with at StockX and here we are. But yeah, the whole thing is nuts.
- [10:24]
Podcast Host
What's something that maybe people haven't heard or known about that story? You know, with StockX, like, what's something that's maybe a nugget as we turn to. I mean, you know that, that rocket ship, I mean, I, I watched that from afar. Is, you know, someone in, you know, tech and marketing. And my. Had kids that were younger but got. Were sneakerheads pretty fast. I mean, I, I wrote you a lot of checks indirectly.
- [10:47]
Josh Luber
Sorry. Not sorry.
- [10:48]
Podcast Host
Yeah, I know, I know. And maybe what's a. A scoop or something that was there a turning point with StockX? Like, what was the day that you went. You knew you're on. I mean, look. Yeah, you just nailed it. Like the biggest thing is, hey, Dan Gilbert happened to be doing the same thing. And then, you know. But I do say smart ideas find fortune and luck. And so I think you found you made your own luck there. But I think you know, talk to me about something that's maybe not out there or something that was just the, the game changer, turning point.
- [11:19]
Josh Luber
Yeah, well, so I'll give you two sort of one in the beginning and then one sort of the day that we knew that this was going to work. So first of all, business is just people. That's it. And I was unbelievably fortunate that the team that Dan had in place and in particular the guy who was the CEO of that company before I got there, Greg Schwartz, who then became the COO and my co founder in building StockX, he and I ended up being perfectly complementary in every way and you know, in skill set, in temperament and personality and sleep schedules. I mean like we were effectively co CEOs and you know, running that company and I didn't know him beforehand. I mean it could have gone wildly the other way or it could have just been not as great. And so much of our success is a function of our partnership and being able to build that company together. That's, that's, you know, that starting it. But you know, we, we got together in June of 15. I moved to Detroit. We launched Stockx in February of 2016. And then in September of 2016 was the first time after we launched that there was a big Nike drop. It was the Jordan one bread, the, the black and red sort of OG colorway. And from February of 16 when we launched until September of 16, we were grinding out two trades a day, four trades a day, six trades a day. Just slowly, you know, couple couple more sales every day. And by the time we got to September we were doing about 66,0 sales per day. And it was like we're grinding and just trying to figure out if this thing's going to work. And that day we sold 301 pairs. And from the moment the drop happened in the morning and we started seeing, you know, just a higher rate of sales every day. You know, we had all dashboards on our phone that we can see all the metrics for the company and we were glued to our phone all day and we just realized that like, you know, this is, I mean It's a company jumps 5x that day. And it was the realization that we always knew that the power was in the model, that it was about the pricing models, about bid ask. You know, it happened to be that we were selling sneakers. And to see what had happened was there was so much liquidity that came into the market at one time from Nike, right. That for us all of a sudden then the spreads between bid and ask were getting smaller and so the trades were moving quicker. And to see all that happen kind of in real time, the data in real time and the customers and people on Twitter and everything else, that was the moment that said, oh, this is going to work. This is a better model, period. And we didn't make up the model. All we did is copy parts of the stock market and areas of finance and apply it to areas of commerce. But that was that this is going to work. Now, we had no idea that it was going to be the size and scale and success and brand that it was, but that was the moment that we knew the model was the right model and that it was going to work. And by the way, just for context, so we did 300 sales that day. I've long since, you know, I left StockX in September of 20, so almost five years ago, you know, when I left, we were selling somewhere around 35,000 sneakers a day. So, you know, we were nowhere near scale or success or anything in when that that release happened. But it was understanding the mechanics of supply and demand in the model that was like, okay, we're onto something here.
- [14:54]
Podcast Host
Yeah, man, there's brilliance in all of that. I'd love to explain just briefly the whole ebay model, which is, you know, for some people like bidding and you know, you establish value by how much someone will bid versus your with the bid and ask. So that'd be part one. But I just a comment like the way you guys tied into these cultural moments and I'd call it borrowed interest until you created your own. And it's like because you have all these large brands, you had Nike in doing these shoe releases and feeding into that and having this engine. Damn, it was smart.
- [15:36]
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- [16:36]
Podcast Host
And it, it, everything makes sense to successful. You know, it's like why did I think of that? You know, like after the fact, you know, you don't appreciate the grind and the doubt. You know, everybody believes it when they see it. Not everybody believes it though before they see it. Yeah, and that's to the fruit come the spoils. But talk about that bid ask and anything you want to expound upon on that last point I made.
- [17:00]
Josh Luber
Well look, this is my favorite part of all of it and I've sort of become an accidental economist through all of this.
- [17:07]
Podcast Host
But the model is really collector and economist Josh Luber.
- [17:14]
Josh Luber
That part is true at the most basic level. Anyone who's ever used eBay understands eBay is what's called a listing based marketplace, meaning that anyone can go list whatever they want. And so if you want to buy a pair of Jordan 1 breads, then you will go and you will put in the search term and you will get thousands of listings of everyone selling theirs. And you know, this one has a picture this way and this one has a receipt and this one has a cat in the back of it. I mean all the like. But the reality is is that a Jordan 1 bread is an asset. It's a, it's a single standardized thing. Particularly if we're selling brand new shoes, you don't need pictures of all different ones. I mean if you think of, if you go buy a share of Nike stock on the New York Stock Exchange, there's not thousands of people saying buy my share, buy my share. It's a standardized thing. We know what a share of Nike stock is. And so we create what's called a product based marketplace, meaning that the product is the page as opposed to listing. And we create that catalog on StockX. And so we create one page for the Jordan One Bread. And every bid, every ask and everything is all one page. And that creates the efficiency and the transparency around, around the dollars and the data. But now you know, if you want to buy a pair of Jordan 1 breads, there's one place to go and you don't have to go all the way around. And so our goal, our entire goal in building StockX was how do we create a product Based marketplace. How do we create where we can sell one page? And so everything that you've seen that we've done is a function of that. And in order to do that you have to standardize that product to be able to sell it off of a stock photo. That's kind of like, that's kind of your rule. Because if I have one product page, I can't have pictures of all the different listings. So you have to have a stock photo. So in order to do that we had to do a couple things. First of all, we only sell brand new or dead stock sneakers on StockX. If they're used, you would want to see how used and all the different variants. So it's only brand new, comes with the box, comes with all the accessories, like we know exactly what that is. Second, and what was more complicated was we had to authenticate sneakers and we created authentication centers. And I've since lost count, I don't know, StockX probably has 14 or 15 all over the world now. And authentication is of value. And if you're a 14 year old kid who saved up all your money to buy a pair of Yeezys, then you know, knowing that you're not going to get a fake pair, there's real value in there. I'm not saying there's not, but it's really just an ante to play. It's a red herring to the overall value. The purpose of authentication is authentication is one part of standardization and you need to standardize in order to have a product based marketplace. And you need a product based marketplace to be able to have bid ask. And that's the business. And so everything drives back to that. And if you look at now, 10 years later, the companies that won StockX and Goat, StockX and Goat are wildly different from a brand standpoint, customer experience and in ui. But at the core we both have Bid ask. They call it something a little bit different. There's an offer, but same thing. And it's a product page and it's bid ask and they authenticate and that's it. Everything else is gravy, everything else is brand, everything else is how you move beyond it. But at the core it's how do we. And by the way, obviously we're copying the stock market and there's one ticker symbol for Nike and every bid, every ask happens at that ticker symbol for Nike. And so you never have to worry, you never worry you're going to get a fake pair of a fake stock, whatever, right? So that's what it means to have a stock market of things to copy the bid ask. And that's really the key to the whole thing. And so that also then became the sort of benchmark as StockX expanded and we added other products which is, is this a product that can be sold off of a single product page with a stock photo and you know, everything around it. And so you know, that's really what we built. And it happens to be, start with sneakers. It happens to be that sneakers work really well for that but it doesn't necessarily need to be the only thing. As we've expanded and who knows, as they continue to grow there may be, you know, products that look wildly different that ultimately are sold on that site.
- [21:27]
Podcast Host
Great explanation. And I hadn't, I don't know, I'd never, I don't know if you thought I would have like crystallized it. But the single page thing, you know, now that I'm like yeah they do. I bought I don't know how many things. It's one page, it's always. And it's different sellers but it's all on that one page. Versus eBay. The wild wild west of 100,000 listings. But sneakers versus trading cards. Trading cards that get opened out of a pack, they need to be authenticated sometimes. But the variability in the quality versus a new pair of shoes, that's a fascinating thing. Thing that obviously pretty obvious once you talk about it but is actually a very different thing because it's a trading card that's been open of a pack. Is it ever brand new? I mean you can say it's near mint, all those things. But that's kind of a fascinating, I don't know, you know, comparison because they, I almost am convinced they make them factory better at times than others. You know, like there's intentional, I don't know, imperfection in the cards.
- [22:28]
Josh Luber
Well that, that's a, that's a whole nother can of worms. And, and what's interesting is, is obviously most, you know, trading cards that are made through machines and computers and, and everything else that go into it. But if you look at, you know, all the cards, all the vintage cards, they were all hand cut. And so you have, that's why you have just wildly off center cards. You know from the 60s and 70s and, and 80s there really aren't too many centering issues anymore. At least there shouldn't be. One of the reasons why StockX has not been wildly successful in trading cards is that obviously we can't sell raw cards because raw cards have, can Be whatever condition they can be.
- [23:03]
Podcast Host
So never have one page or it'd be very difficult.
- [23:06]
Josh Luber
Right. And, and so it's just like a pair of new, excuse me, a used pair of sneakers. So can't sell raw cards now you can sell graded cards. And that's, that's perfect in theory except for the fact that the overwhelming majority of trading cards have very small number of total population of cards in any one grade. With the exception of like 89 upper deck Griffey and 2018 Prism Luca and maybe two dozen other cards. The pop of any one grade one card is just small. And so with such a small amount of total population, the liquidity for bid ask that happens becomes very small. And so it doesn't work that well. What you need is for any product you need to have some large number of quantity. When Nike drops a pair of sneakers, there's a million pairs or 100,000 pairs or like it's big, it's not 20. And so StockX model works better for unopened wax where you take a box of, you know, car that are still sealed because at least that's fully standardized and the quantity is the same. Now there's other issues because wax generally comes from manufacturer and it goes to a dealer card shops and there's other issues. So you know, this is around the specific nuances of supply and demand for cards and why it works okay, but not great for the StockX model, how.
- [24:31]
Podcast Host
Have they been like I want to transition to ghostwrite but is that been a, is it a growing sector for StockX you think the trading cards.
- [24:39]
Josh Luber
Honestly I'm not really sure. When I left in 20, the trading card industry was in a much different position. Right. This is pre fanatics and that was me obviously leaving StockX to start Fanatics, collectibles. But the amount of cards that were out there and then we also then were right in the middle of the pandemic and then we had 21 and the crazy riot, you know, everything that happened in 21 and the crash afterwards and I think a lot of it there just wasn't a, a prioritization for trading cards because of everything else going on in the economy for the core business. And so when I left, you know, the trading card team got at least one person smaller. And so I honestly, I don't really know. But again if you just go back to the core of how good it is for the model, it's okay, not great. So it makes sense that management wouldn't overly prioritize that versus products that are great.
- [25:29]
Podcast Host
For the model, it's such a rocket ship. We could do a whole show on it. But I want to focus on ghostwrite of both that and fanatics. I mean, talk about that rocketship ride on fanatics and then let's build a ghostwrite. I'm gonna let you kind of take it there.
- [25:42]
Josh Luber
It's all the same story, and not just because it's me. Because all these products, they're all the same, all hype economy products. They're all supply and demand driven. You'll have finite supply. They all sit at the intersection of culture and commerce. They'll have then collectors and resellability and authentication issues and you know, and they're all products that are equal parts, you know, consumer good and financial ass. And for me, I happened to get back into trading cards pretty significantly in 2018, 2019. At summer of 2019, I stepped down as CEO at StockX. And then I was spending a lot more time on trading cards and by then also ramping up the trading card business at StockX. So both personally and at the company, I was spending a lot of time and I got to see what the state of the industry was. And it was very clear that what did happen was going to happen, meaning the trading cards were going to explode or at least significantly grow from where they were in 20, 20, 18, 2019. And that too, that the current companies in the space were pretty much RELICs of the 80s and 90s. It had been the same people, the same team, the same technology, the same structure, and rightfully so. I mean, you know, it had been a call to a sleepy small industry for the, you know, 15 years before that. And so there was just this opportunity that was pretty clear. And so I left for the sole intention of trying to acquire the licenses for trading cards. And I was actually partnered with somebody else for about two months. And then I met Ruben and we sat down and talked through it. And every serious business person I've ever met, we spent six hours. And for six hours he asked me the same question in a million different ways, which is, how big can this be? At some point I finally just said, I don't know, but it's really big. It's way bigger than we think and it's growing. And he's right. And everybody looks at that size. Is it worth my time and effort to go after this? And we left that room that day, which was the Tuesday before Thanksgiving of 2020, and we said, we can do this together. And it was my idea and it was my vision, it was my sort of plan. But at the end of the day, I mean, it's, you know, 95% his relationship with everybody and fanatics and the credibility and support and structure to be able to go out and actually do it. Ideas are worthless, right? Execution is the only thing that matters. And I was fortunate to find the perfect person to partner with to go and do that. And then we able to acquire all the licenses for baseball, basketball, football, cards, you know, over the next year, over 21. And then, as everyone knows, at the end of 21, beginning of 22, acquired tops. And then for me personally, you know, once we realized it was going to be as big as it was, then it was like, great. You don't need me to run this company, and I don't want to run a company this big and this much stuff going on. And so we were fully aligned. We hired Mike Mahan, who's a CEO now. And then I left that summer, and Ruben was the first check in the ghostwright. And it was about as much according to plan as anything can be. It was a great success for me, for us, for the business. But I really, truly believe for the hobby and for the collectors as well, to have a company and the leagues and the PAs became equity partners in fanatics collectibles as part of that all. Forget all the details and which one is which and all that. But. But just having the leagues as equity partners in their own product, that should have been that way for decades. It's their product, it's their business, right? And. And I know why it wasn't. And you know, we thought about things differently and we thought about licenses differently back then, but that's what you want as a collector. You want the NBA to care about NBA cards and you want the NBA players to care about NBA cards. And that is just a net positive for everybody as we continue to grow and build that hobby. And so. But for me, you know, I left that summer with a very specific purpose of creating Ghostwriter because the collectible toy space, it's big enough to matter. It's big enough to work with all the most important brands and artists and companies and. And sit at the same intersection of culture and commerce the same way the rest of the products do. But it's not so big that you have these monoliths in the space that already, you know, dominate. And sneakers, obviously, Nike and Adidas and trading car cards, Fanatics and the NBA. You know, in the collectible toy space, you have Funko, which you're probably familiar with. There's a company called Bear Brick, which is made by a Japanese company called Metacom. Obviously everyone's aware of what's been going on with Pop Mart and Labubu in the last couple of months, but there's not a whole lot of real big companies that dominate the collectible toys space. But at the core the economics of it are the same. And so I wanted to be able to have the chance to create a brand based on all the same economic principles of supply and demand and market based pricing and all the things we learned and created at Stockx and Fanax Collectibles. And as you can see, I mean, literally we're in the process of releasing NBA right now. And the Ghostwright NBA set might as well be a trading card set. It is. In function and form, it is almost identical. The only difference is the canvas that we play with is a 2 inch collectible toy versus a flat piece of paper. But the rest of it is the same. And in fact the collectors are often the same as well. And that's kind of a fun place to be, which is like we get to go after what is, you know, a big market and but doesn't have a lot of big sharks in it yet.
- [31:15]
Podcast Host
Talk to me about the name Ghostwrite Ghost Tell Stories. Hey, I'm a writer myself, so that it immediately resonated with me. And then, you know, there's uniqueness but also, I don't know, some mystery intrigue in the whole thing. Talk to me about the naming and you know, I don't know, some of that organic stuff.
- [31:37]
Josh Luber
Well, first of all, when we created Campless, which was the price guide for sneakers back in 2012, there this was like the blog era. I mean there were, I don't know, 100, 200 sneaker blogs that were out there at the time. I mean this is where all sneaker activity took place. And if there were 200, there was 198 of them that had the name Sneaker or Soul or Kick or Flip in it. You know, it was Sneaker News or you know, Kicks on Fire. Nice kicks. And it was like, if I'm going to build a consumer brand, I either need to build a brand, but I'm not going to try to fight through the noise and like which one am I between all the others. And that kind of stuck with me as we named all the other companies StockX and ZeroCool and GhostWright. Obviously Fanatics. Collectibles is fanatics and Ruben wants everything to be named fanatics. And that's their point of view on it. So that Alone. We knew that was going to be something unique and stand out, but it really is a function of the product itself. So, you know, ghostwrite is a blank canvas collectible. So, you know, this is a ghost, which is this. This 3D printed ghost was the entire business plan in 22. I just walked around with this. And a ghost has no face. It has no gender. The ghost itself is not a character. This is a blank canvas. It can be an NBA player, It can be a pencil. It can be a random design. And that's what trading cards are. Right. The physical form of the trading cards is the same every single time. The value is about who's on it, the condition, the scarcity. But it's a blank canvas product. And so knowing that and the fact that as collectible toys, we just naturally work with, you know, other partners where we create either IP or characters or other things on top of our canvas. This idea that as a blank canvas, we're now telling the stories of other people. The ghost is not a canvas. The ghost's not a character. It's the other person's story. And what's a ghostwriter? Right. As a person. So that's sort of how the ethos of the name came about. And we obviously then, then backed into calling these ghosts, which. I don't know. What's a ghost look like? I don't know. But, like, you know, this is. Let's go. And so it is very much, you know, intentional through. Through all of that. And it makes sense as we continue it through no matter what partner we have for ghostwriter.
- [33:48]
Podcast Host
I'm surrounded here. If you're not watching the YouTube, you have to watch the YouTube. So get over there and check this.
- [33:55]
Josh Luber
You got to see my. My. My co partner who's remarkably silent.
- [33:59]
Podcast Host
Yes. He's sitting there with a. One of one Jokic. Yes. The. Probably the best player in that dude might be top five all time. Like, if you really look at his skill set, he is unbelievable.
- [34:12]
Josh Luber
Best. The best.
- [34:13]
Podcast Host
He is the best. And I've got here on set, Ronald Acuna Jr. We are Atlanta Braves fans. Grew up in the Dale Murphy area. I'm aging myself here, Josh.
- [34:24]
Josh Luber
Bob Horner, Dale Murphy jersey, which I got upstairs. Yeah. I mean, I lived in Atlanta for 15 years, man.
- [34:29]
Podcast Host
I'm all about it. Bob. Bob Horner. Rafael Ramirez. Are you kidding me? Yes. And then. But now Acuna is the guy. I mean, he's. He's kind of gotten universal, but this ghostwright is out of 100. He's. I love what you're doing. I think you nailed it. It crystallized it for me. When you're talking about the toy, there's not. There's no differentiation really in the toy thing. It was kind of a wide open market. There's no, there's no tops, you know. Yeah, it's.
- [34:54]
Josh Luber
Well, and. And the reason why is because almost all collectible toys are characters their IP hardcore collectors will know, like Astro Boy or Cause, but it's just like Spider man, right? As opposed to having a blank canvas where it can be anything. It can be a kuna, it can be Jokic, it can be a basketball, can be a pencil, it can be, you know, whatever it is. And it just gives us more range to be able to create those products, you know, with those people. And you know, that Acuna, by the way, is one of my favorites. What you're holding is. So we did the MLB release in August. We're now in the middle of the NBA release. And for. For both of them, we created a limited number of what we call 400%. So there's three main sizes, the same size as a bear brick, which is kind of the. The leader in the space. So. So this size, which actually hold up, here's a. Here's a Jimmy Butler for the set that's coming up. So we call this 100%, but this is. But basically two and a half inches tall. This is what the primary product is for the sport releases for. We did WNBA in December, Major League Baseball in August, and now doing NBA. And then there's. And they're all sold via blind box. And we can talk more about that. But then there's this size which you have the Cunha, which is we call 400%. These are 11 inches high. This is kind of the flagship product for your like hardcore toy guy, collectible sort of StockX, you know, customer. And most of the ones we sell non sports are this size. And they're in small runs. 150, 75. I mean small runs. And then these we basically don't make. These are more promotional. They're all one of. One of each player. And this happens to be Jokic from the set. And so we do have a bunch of these promotionally at different places, restaurants and events and stuff like that. But we don't sell these near way as much. And so what you have is.
- [36:40]
Podcast Host
But if you want to DM them, you might get in on that. You know, let's just say everything's got a price tag, Josh.
- [36:46]
Josh Luber
Everything has a price tag. We do sell you know, the. The one of ones occasionally, because we can't keep them all right now I'm keeping Jokic and Embiid. We'll see what happens if we let them go. But what you have is we did a limited run of only seven players from the MLB set. There were 20 players total in the set where we made 400% versions of those. There was obviously big demand. And the other players are Ohtani, Judge, Soto, Trout. Excuse me, Bryce Harper, and Paul Skeens. And. And those were. Were set. Were sold separately and at a fixed price. And so you have one of the. You know, the only 400 of it. And I guessed right, being in South Carolina, that you were a Brave fan.
- [37:33]
Podcast Host
So you guessed right. And then Don Staley, that was a lost honesty.
- [37:37]
Josh Luber
That was the other one. I was like, right. I was like, what else do I have in South Carolina? So for wnba, we only did the blind box this size. And for the wnba, because they have so many great players that have already retired, that are part of their collective bargaining, we're able to have Dawn Staley in the set, even though she's no longer an active player. But obviously, you know, maybe already one of the greatest college coaches, you know, And. And I imagine, you know, people around there are probably pretty big Don Staley fans.
- [38:05]
Podcast Host
They're huge. And they. Everyone will die over that. The. And what's cool, though, Josh, is this acuna is probably gonna sit on this desk in this studio on every episode because this looks like the perfect spot. Not only is it cool, it is Ronald Acuna, and it's out of 100. It's already, like, a rarity. I mean, but it ain't going nowhere. This baby ain't for sale. It's staying right there. And look, I'm gonna even open one of these. Josh was so kind to send some of these. You've got the best of, like, pack opening, you know, like, because you have the. You know, you're ripping it. You don't know what you got. You've got the parallels. You never know. This is out of the 2025 MLB season. Game face. While I'm opening this, Josh, talk to me about, you know, how many of each of these, like, for NBA, that release coming up, the dates and everything related to it.
- [38:58]
Josh Luber
So, unfortunately, I couldn't get you early boxes of NBA as that's available shortly. But MLB set, which released in. In August. And so what we have is they come in, you know, a box like this where you have a case that has 12 individually packaged ghosts in there, and then you don't know what player you're going to get. And obviously, you know, you hope that you hit Ohtani or Skeens or Acuner. I mean, they're all stars. There's only 20 players in the set, but really what people are looking for are the rare variants, like in trading cards. So this is one that I actually hit. This is a Juan Soto crown. So this one is number to 10. This is one I bought. This was a SK Gold number to 10 that you bought.
- [39:42]
Podcast Host
You couldn't get a good deal. You had to buy one. Josh, come on.
- [39:45]
Josh Luber
Well, so one sold on eBay for 1200. And so then I convinced somebody I. That pulled another one to sell to me for slightly less. So at least I got a deal versus what eBay was. But, I mean, it's. Talk to me about what's in 10, right? So.
- [40:00]
Podcast Host
Yeah, exactly. That thing's ridiculous. So I've got. I'm holding two things that are. That are still foil or, you know, foiled up here. What am I holding? Once a figurine or the. Is that what you call them? Toys or figurines?
- [40:12]
Josh Luber
Yeah, whatever. Collectibles, toys. It's, you know, so there's a. There's a little card that goes with each ghost, and it'll tell you who the player is if you don't know who the player is, and just a little information about it.
- [40:24]
Podcast Host
So does this give away parallel? If it is a parallel.
- [40:27]
Josh Luber
No, it doesn't. It does have on the back all the parallels that exist. So. But it doesn't give away the power if you. If you have one. And so we start with that to.
- [40:37]
Podcast Host
Know maybe the player. But then the. The real reveal happens on. On the toy.
- [40:42]
Josh Luber
Right. And I'll tell you what, I have an extra box sitting here as well. So I'll open this box while you open that one, and we'll see what we both get.
- [40:48]
Podcast Host
Yeah, let's do it. The. And then, you know, you know, late's better than never on those NBA ones. If you just want to send.
- [40:59]
Josh Luber
I got you the.
- [41:01]
Podcast Host
I have Mr. Skeens.
- [41:04]
Josh Luber
Nice. I. I think basically, I think Ohtani's probably the best hit. And then Skeens and Judge look like they're selling second best. And then actually, after those two, who did I just hit? I just hit Verlander. So we also have one famous fan in the set, also something we took from trading cards, if, you know, you're familiar with, like, Kobe's FIFA card. And so in the WNBA set Which came out in December. The famous fan was Aubrey Plaza, the actress and comedian. And then in the NBA set. Excuse me, in the MLB set is Mark Wahlberg. Mark Wahlberg's wearing a socks jersey. Again, this is the intersection of culture and commerce and sports and. And then the NBA set. The famous fan is Eminem wearing a Pistons jersey. So kind of like full circle on all that.
- [41:46]
Podcast Host
So, yeah. Very cool. Mr. I got Mr. Paul Skeins out the.
- [41:51]
Josh Luber
Base, I think, but he's cool.
- [41:53]
Podcast Host
That is awesome. Head spins. Very cool. It does it. The hat is kind of the ghost look, I guess, like you said, like the crown or.
- [42:02]
Josh Luber
That's right.
- [42:02]
Podcast Host
Kind of the calling card.
- [42:03]
Josh Luber
Right, exactly. And, you know, we spent a lot of time. Real. Real number. We spent eight months, and we worked with 14 different toy designers until we got to a shape that we liked. And what was interesting about the crown was we wanted something that was noticeable, that was identifiable. And say, okay, we know that's a ghost, but something that can disappear in the design if it needs to be and doesn't stand out. And so, you know, sometimes, like, you don't even notice. Like, this one has been one of the most popular. This is actually a 3D printed NBA basketball. And you can actually see, like, sort of made it pebbled. But, like, the crown is almost irrelevant to the design of this. Obviously, when we do the. The blind boxes, you know, the gold stands out, and the parallels are very clear. But otherwise, I mean, this is kind of just Jimmy Butler wearing a blue headband or. Right. It's just like. Just. It is who it is. It's Jimmy Butler. So.
- [42:55]
Podcast Host
Yeah, exactly. And that's kind of how it blends in with Skeens here with the black uniform and everything.
- [43:00]
Josh Luber
Right.
- [43:00]
Podcast Host
Kind of see him. You got the custom mustache that is gains.
- [43:04]
Josh Luber
Well, by the way, the mustache. I'm glad you pointed that out because, you know, again, business is just people. And we got so lucky in that. One of the few people who works with us who I didn't know before starting this company, our designer Pedro, is unbelievable. And the details, like, look at the back of a kuni. Look at his hair. Right? Like, how cool is the back of his hair?
- [43:26]
Podcast Host
He's got the color dreads or whatever you call that. I'm probably not doing justice to what something stylish is these days, but his hair is ridiculous.
- [43:35]
Josh Luber
Right, right. And so, like, that level of detail and design is fantastic. And so, like, in the NBA set, like, them and M1 has all of his tattoos. And so, yeah, that's Kind of the fun part about this, of being able to create our interpretation of the player as a ghost, but also, obviously, very clearly taking Acuna's real hair and the real way he wears it and pulling it into it.
- [43:57]
Podcast Host
I mean, these guys, the culture, the intersection of culture and commerce is. Is so obvious because that's it right there. Like, these guys, the players have their own Personas. And, you know, Acuna's got this. These braids that anyone, you know, like, that's a cultural and just, I don't know, part of his overall, like, zoo exuding his star power, you know, and you're bringing that to life on the collectible in a 3D way. And that's what really stands out with these. And how's it going? Like, how's the business?
- [44:34]
Josh Luber
We've only been selling Ghosts for a year. We started the company in 22. We started making ghosts in 23, but we didn't sell our first ghost till August 24. Making physical products and dealing with factories and tariffs and all the other stuff is, you know, it's a joy. But. So we've only been selling for a year, and we're only now ramping up and getting to the first seasons of the big IP. We've done maybe 10, 12 releases, but the MLB set, which just came out, was only the second, and now NBA is the third. And so we've now gone through one season of our big three IP, WNBA, NBA, Major League Baseball. We also have WWE and UFC, and they'll come a little bit later, but now we get to go, like, in season two. And the WNBA season two will come out in December. We'll have a different design and what you see and you're holding just the. Well, actually, you can see in Dawn Staley and the MLB players. They have the same eyes. They have the same look. For this set. We call that game face. The idea sort of like the elevated intensity of athletes. But you can think of that as like, Panini Prism, right? Of, like, that's 2018 prism, and then next year will be 2019 prism or whatever, right? So think about the app you've been.
- [45:47]
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- [46:17]
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- [46:44]
Podcast Host
Paid for by Electronic Payments Coalition.
- [46:46]
Josh Luber
We'll have one design that goes across all of the leagues of all the sets. So we've now had one that has all three for game face. And then there's a new look that will come out for WNBA and that and each set will make a little bit more. There'll be, you know, different parallels, different chase elements in, in September, you know, the NBA one, you know, Cooper flags in the set. Wnba, Caitlin was obviously the huge chase last year. Literally. The Caitlin Clark has a an R on her shoulder, meaning that this is a rookie ghost. This actually is a Caitlin Clark gold, which is probably the most expensive one in the set, by the way. The Caitlin Clark one of one sold for $30,000 this size, right? And there's a bounty. There's a $30,000 bounty on the Ohtani one of one this size. Also the one of one has a fire crown, which I don't think I even have any of them because they're, they're in packs and you have to find them. And so, yeah, I mean, it's like it's going great, but it's early. What matters more than anything is the long term value of the ghost, right? Like there's a Caitlyn gold on ebay right now for like five grand. No one's hit it. But also, you know, one sold for like 2500, 3000 last month. So what is this in a year? Is this 2000? Is it 500? Is it 5000? Right. Like that's the real measuring stick of the success of ghostwright long term. Same thing with the larger ones, but the blind boxes because you can also have them graded. So this is a company called afa, which is the leading grading company for collectible toys. They primarily do Star Wars, GI Joe, Transformers, he man sort of vintage toys. But we had them make slabs for ghostwrite. And so in the same way that PSA changed the value of trading cards, you know, this is a sort of a, an ante to play. We have to be able to grade ghosts, have them, you know, authenticated, created, etc. And also just an easier thing to display and sort of look cool on there. This is Diana Taurasi gold number to 10. And so all that to say is like, it's early, it seems great so far, but like, like it's all about the long term value and the sort of continued collectability about it. Because as you know, collectors collect like they want to collect the same thing every year, every season, every. And one or two times is okay. It's interesting. But what's really interesting is like, who's buying the third year? And like I got to collect them all this, you know, so that's the idea. This is built as a long term collectible. It is not a sort of flash in the pan or one off thing for us to sell. Like this is about long term.
- [49:29]
Podcast Host
You're taking everything that has cooked on, you know, trading cards with parallels and the numbers. You've taken all the, the things that create that sizzle and create the hype. But then you've added the spin and found sort of this blue ocean with the toys because there's just nothing like this out there. It's super smart, man. And it's. I don't see any reason that this won't be, you know, a rocket ship itself in its own way, you know, to, you know, what people want to collect.
- [50:06]
Josh Luber
It's.
- [50:06]
Podcast Host
It's right in there. And I'm. And you brought it up because I was where I was going to go next. So congratulations on all this.
- [50:13]
Josh Luber
Thank you.
- [50:13]
Podcast Host
It's really cool. And. But what makes people want to collect is that just a. It's like everybody's just a natural collector, you know, it's like, I don't know, it's like, I mean, I'm a dude hanging out with guys. I got four boys, you know, like, but guys just like to collect shit, you know. I don't know, man.
- [50:32]
Josh Luber
They do, man. If I could answer that, I don't know, I'd be the world's richest psychologist or something.
- [50:37]
Podcast Host
I don't know.
- [50:38]
Josh Luber
That Gary Vaynerchuk is a friend and investor and I've known him for a long time and I also think he's one of the smartest people I know, particularly in this area. He said something. Usually the things he says doesn't surprise me because we think the same way. But he said something that I caught last week about that. He thinks that collectors are going to be a new pillar of culture next to music, art, fashion, sport. That is a big statement, you know. That is a really big statement. And like, to really understand what that means. And I don't know if I fully buy into it, but I understand why. And I certainly think that there's some, like, real potential that it becomes that. I mean, you know, it's never going to be as music and sport, right. Or just music, film and sport. It's just, you know, dominate culture for forever. But it's interesting, right, like to think about the importance and the again, sort of like it matters because of its intersection with culture. And these things were all cultural assets. So I don't know, maybe we get to that point, then it's. It's a whole different ball game.
- [51:51]
Podcast Host
I love it. And where can everybody buy what's going to be coming out, Keep up with everything going on and try to get in early before, you know, like, it just goes like everything else, it goes haywire bonkers. The values go up and you become richer than you already are.
- [52:07]
Josh Luber
I gotta tell you, the way the trading card market is right now, Ghostwriter is a steal. And if the trading car market keeps going where it's at, I'm selling my cars and just buying more ghosts.
- [52:17]
Podcast Host
Yeah. So do you think that market is going to come down?
- [52:21]
Josh Luber
I've been listening to everything I can of all the smart people talking about the market right now. Chris McGill, Chris Hoge had a really good pod about the bull market. I want to say that one thing everybody needs to understand is that the last run saw a lot of base cards and things that had huge populations go crazy, right? The Luca 2018 Prism PSA10 hit like fourteen hundred dollars. And now what we're seeing is only the really True scarce Luca PSA 10 was $110, you know, six months ago. It's still $110 or whatever it is, right? Like, that stuff's not moving marketing. It's about the true scarce products. And that's a much, much, much different scenario than what happened in 21, where the whole market, including all of these. And then what happened is, because then those people that held that had that Luca and sold it for 14 hours, then they had money to go back and buy it. So you just don't have that same like full market thing happening. And so I think if there's any indication that this won't end the exact same way, that's it. But, you know, cycles, things go up, things go down. And, you know, if some of this stuff goes up a little too much more, then I'll definitely sell out of some cards. But actually, the best point that anyone I heard so far Is Cage said, and I listened to this yesterday, that one of the best things about bull markets is it brings cards out of hiding that maybe the seller wasn't willing to sell before they were tucked away in the collection and he didn't know. And that is awesome to see some cards that you never thought you'd see or never have a shot to get that pop up. And maybe they're a little more expensive than you want, but that is truly I think one of the best parts about it. And then if the market's hot enough then you can flip some other cards that you don't want as much to go after that grail that you always wanted that you never even knew where it was. So that's a great part of this as well.
- [54:32]
Podcast Host
Who do you collect?
- [54:33]
Josh Luber
I collect a lot. Most of sort of my like primary goal on a day to day basis is I collect Black Prism NBA Black prism from 2013 to 2021 true Black 101, basically any. Any players. And actually here's like I just got a package back from from alt that was in the vault. So nothing really special about this other than it's a 2015 black prison Pau Gasol in a Bulls uniform. So not as you know. But I just think that Prism is the most important brand of the last, you know, 15 years and they're going away or at least NBA prisms going away. And then after that it's all where they go away.
- [55:12]
Podcast Host
You think this is the end.
- [55:15]
Josh Luber
For, for basketball, right? Yeah, it's the end for basketball and football.
- [55:18]
Podcast Host
Whatever. Non licensed.
- [55:23]
Josh Luber
Well, they would still have to get the player's license, the PA license to turn around and make that. Which maybe they do, maybe they don't. I don't know. I don't have any insight.
- [55:31]
Podcast Host
That's a whole another episode of just madness.
- [55:34]
Josh Luber
Totally in a super interesting one. But.
- [55:37]
Podcast Host
But yeah it is. Maybe I'll get you on for that.
- [55:40]
Josh Luber
Yeah. A round table of I I sold and left fanatics collectibles in the summer of 22 but I still buy trading cards almost every day.
- [55:51]
Podcast Host
Right.
- [55:52]
Josh Luber
Like I am non stop. I'm still, you know, I was at the National. I'm actually taking my son to the Dallas card show in a couple weeks. The first time that he's ever been to a card show. So I'm excited about that and stuff like that.
- [56:06]
Podcast Host
The Nationals, the fire hose. We went for five, I mean all four or five days. Dude, that is a freaking. I mean it was awesome and overwhelming at the same time.
- [56:16]
Josh Luber
Were you spending most of the time creating content.
- [56:18]
Podcast Host
Yeah. I was shooting, doing behind the scenes. Like man, man on the floor. I walked around asking people what's in their case and stuff. Getting content for SI and. But then hanging out with the sports car nonsense guys. It's Geo and some of the. Yeah. So it's. It was a little bit of both. But my boy, I had two of my boys there. So I mean we got. Yeah, I was work. It was work and play and I think I got some national cases here somewhere. This is international now. I've got some. But I picked up some. Some good cards. I was like. It was like a kid in a candy store. But it was like so much candy, you know, it's like over. Holy.
- [56:57]
Josh Luber
Yeah, it's the best. I. I honestly like I was there at the national and most of the time I was doing breaks for ghost. Right. But I like to be able to just put my hat down and go and just shop and I just like bouncing from table to table and fight my way in there and see what's going on. That's the fun part.
- [57:16]
Podcast Host
It is. Where can everybody buy some ghost? Right? I don't know what price points, if you want to talk about that or what's, you know, anything you want to do, but let's tell people how to get them.
- [57:25]
Josh Luber
Well, this is a good place to end for a couple reasons. One, most ghosts are sold direct on ghost rate as what we call a blind Dutch auction. And we don't need to go again. Like I said, I'm an economist now. But we don't set the price for most of the products. It is an auction in which it ends up setting a fair market price where everybody pays the same amount and you can learn all about it. And we've been doing this. We did this at StockX. We did this with fanatics, collectibles. I think this is the most fair way to release a product where everybody pays a fair price. And the NBA release is going on. NBA release starts September 16th. But other than the releases that happen on Ghostwrite, a lot of the sport boxes are sold through breakers and all the big trading card breakers break this Blaz and DACA and Cherry and Pac man and everyone else. And so there's an opportunity to buy into breaks and buy it that way. And then otherwise every now and then we do have a few fixed price products that will show up on GhostWrite. And so as we continue to grow the catalog. But, but. And we're not going to go down this path, but I will say that the Blind Dutch auction, the pricing mechanism at Ghostwright, that's the real business. In the same way that StockX, the real business was about bid ask and single product page and all the other stuff we talk about is important and it matters. And for a collector, that's what's most important. But for us as a company, as we evolve, that idea of how to bring valuable products to market, like, that's a really important key point.
- [59:11]
Podcast Host
It's smart, man. And you got to get the RAD Collective, you know, our ebay live. We need to be breaking some ghost, right? You know, me and the four boys. You kidding? Let's go.
- [59:22]
Josh Luber
That's right.
- [59:22]
Podcast Host
I'm talking about. I love this stuff, man. I want to like when we hang up and we open all these boxes, I can't. I gotta save some for the boys. But, you know, I'm gonna go hide this acuna and I'm gonna take it home just to bring it right back to the studio.
- [59:38]
Josh Luber
Hell yeah.
- [59:38]
Podcast Host
Really appreciate you, brother. Love. Let's stay connected, man. We got a lot in common and I love hearing your stories and what you've done, the success you've had and your wisdom in the collectible space. I know you'd have a lot to share with our audience. And love what you're doing with ghost. Right?
- [59:54]
Josh Luber
Thanks, man. Listen, I. We need more people like you in the hobby. Like, there's so that the ratio of smart people talking about collectibles in the hobby to the hobby, it's got to be one of the smallest of any industry ever. And so the more people that like. So this is great. And so however I can do to help as you guys grow, you know, please let me know.
- [60:13]
Podcast Host
I appreciate you, brother. Hey, guys. You know, to find us collectibles show, that's the website. You can link to all the social media content we'll have, of course, in the show. Notes, links to ghostwrite. All of Josh's stuff and the stuff that's not for sale, this Acuna Jr never for sale. That was. This is NFS model Acuna always here on collectibles on SI. We appreciate you for tuning in here in the early stages. What are you collecting out there? We want to know. Send us what you're collecting, talk about it online, drop some comments in the youtubes and of course, go give Josh a follow along with ghostwrite. We appreciate you for listening. See you next time on collectibles and si.
- [60:59]
Ryan Alford
Thanks for tuning in to the show. Don't forget to follow us on your favorite podcast platform. And don't miss the full video version on YouTube. You can find us at www.collectibles.show or follow Ryan on Instagram ryanolford. Now get out there and collect yours.
- [61:22]
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- [61:54]
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