Selling Baseball Cards in Bulk the Easy Way

I admit, when I first got back into collecting, I did a TON of research into selling my sports cards in bulk…. Unfortunately, it’s a little more complicated than you might think.

You can sell your baseball in bulk on eBay, through COMC, at local card shops (LCS), or local second-hand marketplaces (like Facebook marketplace/groups). However, cards sold in bulk often sell for much lower per-card prices than when sold individually or in smaller lots.

So what do I mean by bulk? There’s obviously a few different levels of “bulk.” I’ve seen collectors in Facebook group post pics of entire rooms full of cards, estimating their collection to contain 500,000 cards or more! However, for other people (who aren’t insane!), that number might be in the 5k – 10k range.

Where Can I Sell My Baseball Cards in Bulk?

When I first jumped back onto collecting (after 20 years of being away), I went through every card in my collection of about 6k. Of course, most were worth pennies, so those just stayed in my big box of commons.

Then I began sorting out cards into 4 categories:

1. My cards that carried value. These were anything $5+, including my Kobe Topps rookie and my Jordan/Kobe Century Legends card. These ones I put into fresh penny sleeves and top loaders because I wanted them to look nice for my collection, and also for pics if I decided to sell any of those.
   
2. My lesser cards that carry some value ($1-$4) that I wanted to keep! These are the ones I’m fond of or think they could go up in value. For example, I have KG and Nash rookies that fall in this category—I wasn’t ready to get rid of those things for a few dollars.
   
3. My lesser value ones ($1-$4) that I didn’t want to keep. These were lower-end rookies, serial-numbered cards of non-stars, common inserts, etc.
   
4. My base cards of hall of famers. These went in a big binder and sealed away in a bin in my basement. Hopefully worth something in 10-15 years, but also not necessarily cards I’ll be excited sorting through every day.

So I took those cards in category #3…cards that carry some value, but not ones I wanted to keep. I had about 500 of these.

Where to Sell Baseball Cards in Bulk

1. Local Card Shop

Another option that didn’t work so well for me. I called every card shop within 45 minutes of my house. One said they weren’t buying anything (LCS have had a difficult time lately with slimmer margins and more people willing to go online), one said they didn’t buy anything from the 90s (which was 90% of my cards), and the other told me to send pics.

After I sent pics, they replied back “Any Kobe or Jordan?” Sure, I have plenty of both, but I wasn’t ready to sell those in bulk because demand for them is so high (and Kobe is my favorite player ever).

So my LCS was a miss for me—and that’s the story I hear online from countless other collectors looking to unload their collection. However, you can still bring your cards in and likely get some money, but we’re talking a tiny fraction of what they’re worth.

2. COMC

Stands for “Check Out My Cards.” They have a pretty cool service in that you can send them as many cards as you want, and they’ll scan them and title them. All you have to do is go into your store and select your price!

But then I started reading the cost to do this…

$.50 per card to be scanned and then 10% to cash out! Oh, and it takes several weeks to get your cards scanned and uploaded.

So…after I researched this a bit, I realized that many of my cards would sell for $1-$2, and I wasn’t ready to have half of that paid to COMC before I even sold the card.

So, it’s an option…but not one I was ready to try out.

3. Sell on Local Marketplaces

I’m referring to Facebook Marketplace, any local classifieds, or other apps where you can connect with people to buy stuff secondhand.

One of the beauties of selling on here is that you don’t have to pay eBay and PayPal’s hefty selling fees, and there’s no shipping for the buyer!

However, I will say that my experience was that it’s very hard to get back any sort of value for cards in bulk! Most casual collectors don’t want to add several hundred or thousands of cards at once to their collection. Card flippers will want to dig through everything first, but since it’s hard to do that when selling in these marketplaces, they won’t be willing to offer much. They’ll just sort through your collection looking for anything worthwhile and not care about the rest—something you should’ve done already anyway!

So…Are You Saying It’s Impossible?

Well, no. You’re just unlikely to get the value you’re hoping to get for them! Here are a few other ideas:

1. Break it up into team lots. Many collectors pick certain teams, and often they’ll get into this with their kids. If their kid really wants Knick cards, perhaps you’ve got a bunch of Sprewell, Houston, Ewing, and Starks cards that you can sell together
   
2. Break it up into player lots. Same idea, but just do for individual players! I recently sold 5 Vince Carters for like $12. Sure, I know you want to unload you’re entire collection and buy a new car, but at least you don’t have to price, list, and ship individually.
   
3. List one by one on eBay. Yes this is tedious, and yes, a lot of them won’t sell. I put several hundred of my lower end cards on eBay. Did I really make enough on these to make it worth the trouble? Not really…but I did have a few reasons:
   
   1. Keep my collection more manageable – I’m doing this to make money, and perhaps keep a few cards along the way. Keeping thousands of cards makes it harder to keep up with my inventory and know when to sell.
      
   2. Get more positive eBay feedback – It’s no secret that buyers like to purchase from reputable sources! So if you have to only take a $.30 profit on a card, just remember that the feedback you’re building up is an investment for later, larger card sales.
      
   3. More card money – Even if it turns out I’m only making $10/hour, that’s money that goes straight back to my card collecting. Perfect for collecting on a tight budget.
      
   4. It’s fun – I don’t mind pricing and listing cards on eBay. I like to stay neck-deep in the industry, and constantly buying and selling is a great way to do that..
      

How to Ship in Bulk

Now that I’ve laid out the difficulties of selling cards in bulk, let’s say that you’ve got a buyer willing to purchase 500 cards from you. Now how do you send it without paying $50 for shipping?

Here’s my trick that works like a CHARM. First, go to USPS and have them send you 10 of these flat rate padded envelopes…it’s completely free—even shipping them to you!

Just make sure to get the padded ones as they are a little more flexible for you to put more in. This won’t work with the regular flat rate envelopes.

Then, go buy a few of these on Amazon:

Two of these 300-count boxes fit PERFECTLY in your flat rate envelope! It’s BY FAR the cheapest way to mail several hundred cards! In fact, it’s less than $9 to do it.