for

Six months in, strangers are paying about 4× retail for your sealed boxes.

You've made the rare thing: a card people resell, not just buy once. Self-funded, and we know the next print run is the scary bet. So before we pitch you anything, here's a straight look at the market you've already built.

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The open market, on your cards

Sealed boxes are changing hands at about four times retail. These are completed sales, not asking prices.

Median resale ~US$325 on an ~US$80 box. The top complete sets and lots clear up to ~US$2,150. Completed sales, not asking prices, as of the last scan.

Where sales land, by price
How reliably it sells
Median resale, by format
Top lots that actually cleared

Single Jesus of Nazareth full-art promos have cleared past US$1,000, the top at US$1,350: a single card worth more than most sealed boxes. Complete sets and full-art lots run higher still, up to US$2,150.

Strangers pay four times retail, and the boxes clear fast.

Currently listed

T1eBay completed (sold) sales, not asking prices · every page: 961 completed sales + 714 active listings · US eBay, pulled 22 Jun 2026

The market you're actually in

75 million Americans can buy your cards. You've reached about 3,000.

Here's who you can actually reach, where the number comes from, and exactly where you sit in it today. Built from real population data, not one percent of a big round number.

120MUS card collectorsindustry estimate
×
62%are Christian-affiliatedPew, n=36,908
=
~75Mpeople you can reachyour serviceable market

One thing we won't do: add the card market to the faith market. A Christian card-buyer sits in both, so summing them double-counts. The card market is the category you're in. The faith side is the demand around it. What matters is the overlap.

Even if only a fraction ever buys a faith card
Share of the 75M who ever buyPeopleYearly category-spend pool
8% (committed faith collectors + gifters)~6M~US$400–650M
25% (faith, faith-curious + crossover)~19M~US$1.1–2.0B
62% ceiling (every Christian collector)~75M~US$4.5–8.2B

Two caveats. The spend-per-person band (US$60–110 a year) is the market's rough average, wide variance, not a precise figure. And the 120M collector count is itself worked back from card spend divided by that same average, so read it as a method we've sense-checked with the 8% and 25% filters, not two numbers proving each other. Even the bottom filter is a pool north of US$400M a year.

Three numbers, in order

Every percentage here is a share of the 75 million you can serve, not the whole card market. The card market's just context.

The card market~US$13–15B · context only
What you can serve~75M people · the north star
What you've reached~3,000 · 0.004%
0.004% About 3,000 collectors so far, one for every 25,000 people you can reach. You've barely scratched a market this size, so almost all of it is still in front of you.
The evidence behind the two markets ↓
1The card market~$13–15B, growing toward ~$24B by the early 2030s

A large, durable category, with ~46% of it in North America, where ~87% of your sales already are. You launched into the post-correction baseline, not a bubble.

  • Live-commerce is now a standing channel: Whatnot did ~$8B GMV in 2025; cards are its top two US categories.
  • 26M+ cards graded in 2025, the infrastructure of a real asset class, not a hype cycle.
  • GameStop: collectibles were 29% of Q1-2025 sales, outselling video-game software.
  • The buyers are young: ~49% of non-sports-card collectors are under 25.
Your North American core, by share of buyers
2The faith world210M US Christians · a ~$1.9B faith-gift segment

The demand and the distribution no card brand has tapped: a ~$1.9B faith-gift segment inside a 210M-person US faith economy, with gift occasions on a calendar (baptism, Christmas, Easter, church camp) and a megachurch B2B channel (~1,800 US megachurches) no card brand serves.

  • Secular crossover expands reach beyond the churched: Hallow raised $105M with 40% non-Catholic users; The Chosen reached ~280M viewers, about a third non-religious.
  • A non-denominational, enjoyable-without-belief product reaches the ~43% of 18-24s who are unaffiliated but still engage with faith content.
How you grow into it
FloorUS faith collectorsthe base you already hold, the starting line, not the growth story
Wedgethe faith gifteryour existing Booster Box, given as a gift, on the calendar. The near-term unlock, no new SKU. ~210M US Christians and a ~$1.9B gift segment behind it
Optionalitychurch B2B + internationalring-fenced upside, sized off one real church pilot, not 1,800 churches times a guess

These stack, they don't add. Each rung is a different way to reach more people, not three numbers we sum into one. The wedge is the one we'd turn on first, because the box already exists.

You've proven the one thing nobody can copy. What's left is reach, and reach scales faster with help than alone, especially before someone bigger moves into the lane you opened.

T1–T2120M collectors: market-derived · 62% affiliation: Pew (n=36,908) · card market: Mordor, Custom Market Insights · spend band: market-derived, ranged · 2026

Who is actually in the lane

We went and checked all four. Not one passes the resale test.

Real collectibles get resold above retail. You mentioned the copycats, so we went deep on all four: their pricing, their following, their own resale. Tap any to see how it stacks up.

The one thing none of them have

Of every rival we found, not one has third-party resale above retail. Sacred Legacy is the only one, on eBay today, with the collector infrastructure still to be built. That's the hardest thing to fake, and right now you're the only one who has it.

And the wave behind them →

New entrants keep appearing, and they keep making the same mistakes: AI-generated art, denominational narrowness, no drop model, game-shelf or gift positioning. A sample:

You're the only one with the demand. But here is the harder question: is it trading as a real collectible yet?

T1each rival's own site, eBay and Kickstarter · verified Jun 2026

Where it actually trades

Your cards sell hard. You're just not on the platforms that price them yet.

Your cards sell, and they sell hard: 87% sell-through on the stained-glass singles, four of them cleared over US$1,000 each. So we checked the platforms that turn demand like that into a serious asset class: TCGplayer, PSA, CGC. You're not on them yet. Not because the demand isn't there, but because you shipped in December and the infrastructure hasn't caught up. And there's nothing to undo: no bad price comps on TCGplayer, no low-grade slabs dragging a pop report.

eBayTrading now
TCGplayerOpen · price discovery
PSA / CGCOpen · grading pop
CardmarketOpen
PriceChartingOpen
COMCOpen
WhatnotOpen
PWCC / GoldinOpen

US$1,350 for one numbered card is not fan pricing. It is the market pricing a scarce asset.

Pokemon trades on TCGplayer and is graded by PSA. The path from Pokemon-like sales to a Pokemon-like asset class runs through those exact platforms.

The demand's proven, the platforms are wide open, and that gap is exactly what someone needs to be watching for you.

T1presence scan across 12 marketplaces and the three major graders · Jun 2026

The whole board

Running this is fifteen jobs, not one.

Here is the whole surface on one page, and where the risk sits for you today. Tap any facet. Most of these are operational. One of them is not.

Fourteen of these you can systemise. The fifteenth is the one that keeps you up.

The one that isn't operational

The thing that should worry you isn't any one job.
It's a bigger player moving in while you're heads-down.

A bigger player clocks what you've proven and moves in. The copycats keep coming. And the next print run is still a solo bet against your own cash. That's a timing problem. So the real question is who's watching the lane while you build, and who's in it with you when the big bet lands.

The same fifteen, from our side

Most agencies have run one of these fifteen. Between us, we've worked across all fifteen.

The same board you just saw as risk, with the lever marked on each. Our team executes the ones that are ER services; the rest, we advise on directly, because the two of us have worked across every one of them. Resale-above-retail, the one nobody's replicated, is just one line on a board this wide.

The real question isn't whether you could learn any one of these. It's whether you want to learn all fifteen at once, on the clock, while the lane's still open, when you could hand them to two people who already have.

You've been inside it

You've just spent twenty minutes watching us work.

Nobody walked you through a deck. This whole thing ran on your real data, monitoring your market, pricing your resale, naming your rivals, mapping your risks, the entire time you were scrolling. That wasn't a description of what we do. It's what we do, and we'd keep it running for you.

Elephant Room, since 2014: ~35 specialists, 60+ brands (Bassike, Shona Joy, AJE, Vida Glow, Emma Lewisham, Ksubi, KHY), ~$100M in annual media spend, ~$1B in GMV, all running on Jumbo, our own AI operating system.

Who you'd work with

You'd work with the two of us, directly.

Not an account manager, the two principals, in the same building as you. We wouldn't sell you a number, we'd run the engine you just watched, alongside you, for as long as it takes.

Adam Sharon-Zipser

Director, Elephant Room

Founded and has run Elephant Room for more than a decade, leading acquisition and performance across roughly sixty brands. Now building Jumbo, the agency's own AI operating system.

Matt Ding

Director, Elephant Room

Drives the agency's data and AI capability, and builds the agentic systems that now run parts of the business. The monitoring and automation you have seen here is work he does every day.

Twenty-plus years in e-commerce between us. We've grown real brands and we build the AI tooling ourselves. That's the offer: the two of us and this engine, pointed at your business.
So, two ways in

Same team. Two ways to work with us.

It comes down to one rule: more drops, never bigger drops. That's how you grow fast and still be standing in ten years.

Cadence rises across the year, but each drop stays capped and sells out. More volume overall, scarcity kept for collectors.

The lighter option first

Two ways in. Neither is the consolation prize.

Path One A standard growth partnership
  • Acquisition across Meta, Google, TikTok and Snapchat, run to a cost-of-sale target around your drops.
  • Retention via Klaviyo: the flows that turn one-time collectors into a returning base.
  • Creative & organic direction and testing, so paid is not carrying the whole load.
  • Measurement that makes every dollar accountable.

Enough on its own. More than most brands ever have.

Path Two A deeper partnership

Pure advisory across every domain on the board, from Adam and Matt directly. Our team executes the services we offer. You own the company, full stop.

  • Everything in Path One, with our team executing the growth services we run.
  • Advisory across all fifteen from Adam and Matt directly, including the domains no agency touches, so nothing on the board goes unwatched.
  • Agentic enablement you own: monitoring, research, automation. The machine reports; you decide.
  • Aligned for the long run, so the advice you get is the advice we would give ourselves.

We only offer this where the fit's genuine.

The deeper door, in motion

Every risk on the board has a move we already know how to make.

Here's the move for each one.

The riskWhat we would do about it
Import duty eating US marginBuild the real landed-cost model, HTS classification included, so pricing rests on accurate cost.
Brand & IP exposureEngage the right IP specialists to secure protection in the markets that matter, before a copycat forces it.
Copycats moving fastContinuous monitoring of new entrants, so you out-execute rather than react late.
One-time buyersBuild the retention engine that compounds every drop instead of restarting it.
The weight of the next print runPartners whose alignment is built for the long run, so the reorder is a planned move, not a solo gamble against your own cash.
Running the businessStand up the operating systems, hiring playbook and AI automation, without us ever taking the wheel.
The forecast

You've reached about one in twenty-five thousand of the people you can sell to.

Here's the honest read on your own engine. We took the people your model can actually reach in the US, lined up what you've sold against it, and modelled how that could compound over three years, at three levels depending on how hard the catalysts get pushed. It's a read on your engine and the levers we'd pull, not a promise of a number.

0.004% About 3,000 collectors so far, which is 0.004% of the people you can reach in the US. One customer for every 25,000. The room above you is the entire opportunity.
Show the working ↓
If you reachCustomersvs today
0.004% (today)~3,0001.0x
0.01%~7,4002.5x
0.02%~15,0005x
0.05%~37,00012x
0.1%~74,00025x
0.2%~150,00050x
0.5%~370,000125x

Reach two-tenths of one percent of them and that's a fifty-times business. And you'd still have left ninety-nine point eight percent of the market untouched.

What each band means, in collectors
BandWhat changesYr 1Yr 2Yr 3Y3 vs today
ConservativeYour base keeps compounding~5,000~8,800~13,0004.4x
BaseThe gift wedge fires plus first church pilots~13,000~34,000~70,00023x
StretchChurch at scale, crossover, the resale flywheel~32,000~107,000~280,00093x
Show the full working, the levers and the revenue model ↓ Every band is a lever, not a guess
ConservativeHold your returning base, keep dropping at today's cadence, and add the gift buyer on the box you already sell. Modest, steady acquisition, with the category's own growth on top.
BaseThe gift occasion kicks in, the first church pilots land, you extend the range, and a trickle of non-faith collectors start buying.
StretchChurch at scale, crossover buyers, and the resale market itself becomes a growth engine. This one only happens if the US flywheel proves first.
The four levers we'd actually pull
Demand infrastructureThe paid and retention engine that turns each drop into more returning collectors, not a one-off spike. And the two moves that close the open lane from earlier: a TCGplayer catalog page and a PSA submission on the chase cards, the steps from selling above retail to trading as an asset class. The grades come from PSA, not us.
ChannelThe shelf you're not on yet: hobby distributors and game stores for the collector, plus the church and faith-retail channel for the gifter. Pull, not push, and it smooths the between-drops troughs because wholesale reorders on a cycle, not a drop.
OccasionThe faith gifter: baptism, Christmas, camp. Your existing Booster Box on the calendar, no new SKU.
GeographicThe same model, run into the Global South, where we've taken brands before.
Illustrative model, not a promise
BandYear 1Year 2Year 3
ConservativeUS$0.3M–1.5MUS$0.5M–2.6MUS$0.8M–3.9M
BaseUS$0.8M–4.0MUS$2.0M–10.1MUS$4.2M–21.0M
StretchUS$1.9M–9.4MUS$6.4M–32.0MUS$16.7M–83.2M

The range is just the customer numbers above times a spend-per-collector band. The low end is the market's roughly US$60–110 category average; the high end runs nearer US$300, because a committed collector stacks a box, chase singles and a set, not a single card. It's a model to show the shape, not a forecast of your revenue. What you actually sold in your first six months lands right inside the "today" band, so this builds off a real base, not a guess.

The market doesn't just grow by itself, you earn a slice of it. Even the explosive year-three case is about a fifth of the smallest spend pool we sized, and under 5% of the people in it. The category grows on its own; this is you capturing a slice of it.

The down years are real, and we're not hiding them. Cards corrected 50 to 80 percent in 2020-22 and the market didn't die, it settled higher. You launched into that floor, not the bubble.

Every jump is tied to a lever, never "and then it goes viral." Each new-customer number traces to a named move: the gift buyer, the church channel, the range, the crossover collector.

The honest caveat. We've modelled forward yearly retention at 35 / 45 / 55% across the three bands. You're early days, so these are assumptions to prove, not history. The 55% Stretch number is the one we'd most want a proper accountant to firm up before anyone signs anything. The rest is deliberately conservative against a market this size.

It's a straight read on your engine and the levers we'd pull. The US on its own is years of room. The rest of the world sits on top, and we come to that next.

T1–T2eBay completed sales + your Shopify data + Pew, Mordor, Custom Market Insights · the model is ours, ranged and sourced · pulled 22 Jun 2026

The choice

Two doors.

Door oneA best-in-class growth team. Paid media and retention, run properly, accountable to the numbers.
Door twoEverything in door one, plus Adam and Matt in your corner: advisory, the AI edge, and an alignment built to move faster now and still be standing in ten years.

Happy to grab a coffee this week if you want to move on it. No pressure at all if you'd rather sit with it. Either way, we're literally upstairs.

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Elephant Room · Private & confidential · Prepared for Joey and Jack · Market data is a cached snapshot, shown with its date.