Wednesday, April 29, 2015

The PWE Bandit Strikes Again

I wish I could teach a course on trading baseball cards.  So many people ship cards unprotected, or with minimal protection, that it gets really old, really fast.  My latest run-in with poorly packaged items comes from an Instagram trade with a kid who's handle is ipautos100.  I'm sure he is a young kid and didn't really have an idea that the card couple be damaged in a PWE, but nonetheless, the main piece I traded for in our deal was creased badly.

The above manufactured hat logo relic was part of a two-for-one deal I made with him that also got me the below Bowman Sterling Hunter Harvey auto in exchange for a 2015 Museum Collection Dalton Pompey auto.  His Pompey got to him unscathed, mainly because I always securely ship my items in bubble mailers.  My Harvey patch got wrecked and when I sent him a pic of it, I got no response whatsoever.  So, lesson learned, I won't be trading with this kid anymore.
I can understand kids not having a lot on money to spend on shipping, but if you are going to be sending higher end, or thicker cards via USPS, they HAVE to be sent in a bubble mailer.  Something smart that these guys can do is save every bubble mailer they have sent to them, and re-use those so they can cut down on supply costs.  I haven't had to buy a bubble mailer in years due to this very reason.  Not only is it a cost-saving method, it is also good for the environment.

I was just really disappointed to get the Harvey patch in, only to see that it was damaged in shipping, and the fact that the kid didn't really seem to care.  He also didn't comment when I posted that it was damaged on Instagram and tagged him in the photo.  He did "like" the photo, though.  At least I have that going for me.

No comments: