Selling sports memorabilia online is a popular hobby nowadays.
Collectors young and old everywhere around the world are constantly looking for ways to sell the best pieces of their collections on the web.
In the decades past, collectors had to be resourceful to sell their collectibles. Having connections was key, as was knowing what sells and for how much.
Today, selling sports memorabilia is made easier by the internet.
You’ll find many sites to sell your memorabilia – but what is the best place to sell sports memorabilia for you? That’s the question we’re going to try and answer in this article.
Best Places to Sell Sports Memorabilia
Selling sports memorabilia is much like selling (or buying) anything else. You want to find a reliable selling medium that doesn’t take too much of your earnings, is quick, and has a large enough database of potential customers.
At the moment, there are a few ideas that spring to mind as to where you could sell sports memorabilia.
Here are some of the best ones that you could currently consider.
eBay
Currently, eBay is perhaps the best option for selling sports memorabilia online.
eBay is an online marketplace with millions of users who check products daily, including sports memorabilia experts and those willing to buy your products.
As an online marketplace, eBay has existed since 1995. While the site’s reputation was a bit dodgy at a certain moment in history, it’s a vastly reliable marketplace that vets its sellers so that you only get to buy and sell from genuine people.
Perhaps the best thing about selling your stuff on eBay is the access to thousands and potentially millions of potential buyers.
You’ll be able to list many different items on this site and potentially sell them – eBay is good for almost any sport, including baseball, basketball, hockey, soccer, racing, wrestling, and even non-sports memorabilia.
In addition, eBay also offers other benefits for sellers, such as:
- Seller protection to protect you from potential scams
- Providing you with several shipping options
- Customizability for your listing (image, description, price)
- The ability to build your reputation as a respectable and reliable seller
If you’re a beginner and you don’t know where to start, then your best bet is eBay.
However, there are also some drawbacks of using eBay as a selling marketplace that you should know about. For starters, eBay will charge you 10-15% of your selling price, depending on the type of product and the price of the product you’ve sold.
Additionally, you’ll compete against hundreds of other sellers and listings – this can be a bit tough in the beginning until you’ve built up your reputation as a reliable seller.
On the whole, though, eBay is the most popular place online to sell sports memorabilia at the moment and one that you should certainly consider.
Pros of this method:
- Great for beginners
- Easy to set up
- Access to thousands of potential customers
- Seller protection
- Shipping took care of (you just pay for it)
Cons:
- You pay a commission to eBay
- Competition from other sellers
- Strict rules and policies set by eBay
Create Your Own Online Store
If you don’t like the idea of paying a commission to the selling medium such as eBay, then your next best option would be to set up your online store.
If you decide to go down this path, you should know that you’re playing a long-term game here.
You won’t be able to build a reputation as a seller in days or even weeks. The process of growing your online store could take months or even years before you start to see the dividends being paid off.
The first reason for this is that you’ll have stiff competition from other online stores. Some of the online sellers have been on the market for many years, and they take up most of the traffic.
You have a few big boys in this industry that you’ll need to compete with.
But if you manage to build a steady base of customers for your products, you’ll have a good chance of growing your store and eventually becoming one of the big players yourself.
That being said, setting up (and maintaining) an online store takes a lot of time, patience, and a bit of technical knowledge to pull off.
This is perhaps the best long-term strategy that you can use to sell your sports memorabilia. It has the highest ceiling out of all methods when it comes to earnings, but it’s also the most demanding in terms of time and resources.
Pros:
- Big potential here
- You can sell your products without having to pay a commission
- Potential to reach millions of customers through the web
- You can grow a big site if you know what you’re doing (especially with marketing)
- You’re the tailor of your destiny (you’re not dependent on strict rules and policies such as with eBay)
Cons:
- Very demanding when it comes to time and resources
- It takes technical knowledge to pull it off
- Competition from other online stores
Selling Through Auction Houses
Another option for selling sports memorabilia online is to sell through auction houses.
Auction houses are popular among sports memorabilia sellers. The first reason for this is that these auction houses do a lot of the work for you – particularly the top ones.
They’ll write your product descriptions, create good photos, and make your product as desirable as possible for potential sellers.
In addition, auctions bring the additional thrill of selling products. They offer you the possibility of earning more than you usually would through online marketplaces or your website since auctions can sometimes get very competitive, especially if you’ve got a good product on your hands.
Like with eBay, you can also expect to pay a commission with auction houses – most take between 10 and 20% of your total earnings.
You’ll have several great options to choose from if you want to sell online through auction houses. These are some of your best options.
Goldin Auctions
Goldin is the leading online auction marketplace for all types of memorabilia, including sports memorabilia.
It’s the go-to auction house for those who want a reliable online auction with a long history of successful transactions.
It’s led by Ken Goldin who has sold over $1 billion worth of sports memorabilia throughout his career (or so they claim on their website).
On this site, you’ll find valuable sports memorabilia pieces to choose from. If you’re a seller here, you can simply fill out a form and enter the details about the product you want to sell, and then you need to wait for their answer and information about your listing.
Invaluable.com
Invaluable is one of the largest online auction houses in the world. It has thousands of users worldwide, so you’ll be able to list your items and sell them to a good number of potential customers.
Compared to Goldin, Invaluable is much larger. That’s because it features many different types of products and not just memorabilia, which is the case with Goldin.
It’s a good option for you if you want to access a large database of potential buyers, although it doesn’t specialize in sports memorabilia as much as Goldin Auctions does.
Pristine Auction
Pristine Auction is popular, particularly for baseball, football, and basketball. You’ll also find other types of memorabilia such as boxing, art, coins, comic books, and other similar types of memorabilia.
This site doesn’t necessarily focus on sports cards as much – rather, it offers various types of memorabilia and products that you might not find elsewhere. One of the best things about this site is the variety that it offers.
Sotheby’s
Last but not least, we should also mention Sotheby’s, the world’s most popular and largest online auction site.
You’ll find almost any type of product here – mainly, it focuses on luxury items. Since it’s the most popular auction house in the world, you might find some expensive pieces of sports memorabilia, too.
This site is great for high-ticket items, so if you’re selling some expensive pieces of memorabilia, it’s worth checking out this site as well.
Facebook Marketplace/Other Marketplaces
Another option for selling sports memorabilia online is to check the various marketplaces that you can choose from.
The first and most notable is Facebook Marketplace.
It’s a popular marketplace for people looking to buy and sell. It’s powered through Facebook, so you interact with potential buyers yourself. This is good news since you can see who the buyer is and learn more about them before you decide to sell.
There are also other online marketplaces that you might want to check out. Shopify springs to mind – but there are others as well.
The most important thing when choosing a marketplace is that it offers some sort of guarantee for the seller.
