Posted By:
Solomon CramerIf GAI is going to continue, I believe, more than anything else, they need to come up with a mission statement.
What is the purpose for their existence? PSA was first to market, perhaps not with the best product or service, but they've established their credibility as clearly the #1 brand. SGC, while it took them a while, established themselves in the vintage niche. Beckett has gained in the mass market that has always been their forte, primarily with modern cards. Most of the minor companies made their market in "grade to order" demand.
I graded thousands of cards with GAI back in the day, and was hoping they would be a viable competitor to PSA. Unfortunately, the ROI was never there for modern cards. It doesn't seem they caught on with vintage, despite the qualified graders they employed. What are they looking to do? Be a better PSA? SGC? BGS? A better PSA/DNA or JSA?
Unfortunately, and personally I've always liked the guys at Global, I've just always felt that the craze was over, and they created the company in a mature marketplace with established competition.
10-12 years ago, no one graded anything besides major vintage star cards, and occasional modern cards that were subjected to counterfeiting (Jordan RC, etc.) The modern card craze generated an amazing new source of cards to be graded, primarily by PSA, and later by SGC, Beckett, and the minor companies. PSA created the registry, which popularized grading of commons, and created a market to grade 600 cards in a vintage set, instead of 5-10.
I'm a believer that in most businesses, you need to be either a premium provider, a Tiffanys/Saks 5th Ave store, or a value store of some sort, whether in a mid level like Macys or Sears, or at the bottom like Wal Mart or KMart. You can't be both. A Tiffany lamp isn't going to sell at Wal Mart, and you won't find 2 for $1 socks at Saks, or it wouldn't be Saks.
Assuming they can get the issues sorted out...what do they want to do?
11-10-2007, 06:41 AM
Need advice for a GAI problem.
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