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Dave Jackley
Hi there, and welcome to another edition of ExactlyAtHome North of Pittsburgh. And today I have the pleasure of speaking with Jeff Patton, owner of Baseball Card Castle right here in the center of Cranberry Township. So taste Stay tuned to find out about the entire world of sports memorabilia and collectibles that you can find right here. So tell me, Jeff, what led you to, to get into this business?
Jeff Patton
I have to tell you, I’ve always loved sports. I been around sports my whole life and what a better way to make a living unless you can play in the NBA or the NHL, or one of the major sports leagues. This is the next best thing. I get to talk about sports all day, every day with people. That’s what I enjoy. That’s fantastic.
Dave Jackley
And I see it’s called baseball card castle, but it’s obviously way more than that.
Jeff Patton
It is in the infancy of this hobby. Baseball cards was a term that enveloped all sports. If you collected you collected baseball cards, and then you may have collected football and basketball, baseball is the granddaddy of them all. Hence the name baseball card Castle, we we predate the surge that has tentacles in all the sports. When we started this in the mid 1980s. It was primarily baseball. That’s why we are Baseball Card Castle. But we enjoy all the sports equally. We have stuff from all the favorite teams.
Dave Jackley
That’s fantastic. I certainly remember the days of the baseball cards. I collected them with a slab of bubblegum in there and and also like naming them and trading with your your friends. I mean that that was the game right?
Jeff Patton
It was and one of the things that’s interesting about how we got started was I literally never dreamed of making any money. i That was the last thought I had. I enjoyed this stuff so much. When I was a teenager, I started to sell things. So I could have more. I thought if I bought 10 of them and sold eight I’d get two. And then the next year I thought if I bought 100 and sold 80 I’d get 20. And then I realized I had to pay the rent.
Dave Jackley
Well, it worked and how long have you been at this location? And what brought you to Cranberry Township?
Jeff Patton
We’ve been in Cranberry for 31 years, we’ve been on this building since 2003. We needed some more space. We originally were in cranmore Plaza, and we moved here in oh three because we needed more space here.
Dave Jackley
Well, what do you like about being in Cranberry?
Jeff Patton
This has always been a growing area. Its I grew up in New Castle and went to school at Robert Morris. So like as a late teenager making the trip south to school all the time you go through Cranberry and think “Man, this is a growing place!” We were here before Walmart was here, right? Like that was a field with grass. But you don’t have to be a genius to figure out 1979 In the turnpike intersect less than a mile from here. So even as a teenager that was what drew us here.
Dave Jackley
Sure. And I imagine you have customers coming coming from quite a distance.
Jeff Patton
Yes, because of the easy proximity to any direction because of the the roadways. We do get customers from Erie, Edinboro, Ohio because you can come right across the turnpike. It is one of the beauties of being here in Cranberry.
Dave Jackley
Well, you know, I’ve been in the area for 30 years too. And I’ve watched the virtual explosion of Cranberry over that time. In fact, when I first moved here, they hadn’t even finished route 279. And what opened this place up?
Jeff Patton
Yes, sir.
Dave Jackley
Well, I look around and I see helmets and jerseys, and I see framed jerseys and signed jerseys in people’s houses, I mean is that relatively new thing and collectibles, right?
Jeff Patton
It is not necessarily new for us the vantage point that it’s difficult to see a two and a half inch by three and a half inch card on the top of your wall. So we started to carry things that were three dimensional: larger items in order to make the atmosphere more attractive and to be honest, back in the day there weren’t that many different cards and we have them all so like after you get them all you go like What else am I gonna do with my space? One of the things that goes along with people that collect cards now is you hear the term a “man cave.” People want to decorate their basement or television room with appropriate sports paraphernalia. That’s what the intrigue is.
Dave Jackley
Now are there some people to get into this as an investment like a big historical game?Like the signed game ball of the big game: baseball and football, I see.
Jeff Patton
Definitely that’s an aspect of it. One of the things I think is enjoyable like if you buy silver, there’s nothing to buy but silver. There’s nothing against it but you buy it, you put it in your safe, and it sits there. Right? However, with this stuff, not only can you enjoy it, but there may be a chance that it’s has value at the end of the day. So it’s a double whammy. That’s what’s enjoyable about it to me.
Dave Jackley
That’s fantastic. As we look around the store, can you describe like just some of the things that you offer here?
Jeff Patton
Well, it changes every day. Our our main focus is cards, we have 15 million cards in this building. Unbelievable. Yeah, we have stuff that dates back to 100 years. Most of the foot traffic comes through the door desires the new things. That’s what’s really intriguing about this hobby. If a player throws five touchdown passes on Sunday, on Monday, his cards will be desirable. So my job is to be organized and prepared where I can get to that stuff quickly. It doesn’t do you any good that 15 million cards, if you can’t find them. One of the things we’re known for is people are looking for a specific card. Come here, knowing that we have a lot of choices. We also have 60,000 autographed items in the building. So that’s an interesting aspect. All certified autographs so people know they’re authentic. And it’s just an interesting thing. We like to sort of consider ourselves like curators of Pittsburgh sports.
Dave Jackley
Yes. Well, as a curator, iis there a network of people that deal in sports memorabilia, and that sort of thing?
Jeff Patton
Yes, I think it’s it’s a small community of everybody who’s in this knows each other. I think, whatever genre you’re in, there’s a networking process.
Dave Jackley
Yes, well,that relates to thereal estate business as well. So Jeff, tell me, what’s one of your favorite aspects of this business?
Jeff Patton
The thing I enjoy the most is when families come in and you have a father and a son or daughter, or a mom and a son or daughter. And they look around and see things from 100 years of Pittsburgh sports. And there’s nothing like grandpa’s saying, “You should have seen how great Mario Lemieux was!” And then the kids perspective is how great Sidney Crosby is and listening to the dynamic comparing eras, players, and having families integrate those conversations. That’s my favorite part of this.
Dave Jackley
So I guess there’s some unusual collectibles or some unusual things that people think are collectibles. Tell me about those.
Jeff Patton
Well, we get 200 people a week who come in to sell shirts, or memorabilia people have that are moving and want to downsize. People that have collected things or people that invested in think that their investment has matured. And we get everything you can imagine. We’ve gotten truckfulls that have come and we get boxfulls that come. Sometimes a child moves out of the house to a different area. And he says get rid of my stuff. Sometimes. People invested in things and it’s it’s became really valuable and they they want to sell it for the money. We have the whole range and we’ve bought truckloads, we’ve bought box loads, we’ve gone to houses, we get almost 200 people weekly that can either call or come through the front door to bring us sports memorabilia.
Dave Jackley
That’s fantastic. Well, I really appreciate you taking the time, Jeff to tell us about your store. And for you people out there: If you like sports, if you want memorabilia to represent what you like about sports. There is a huge variety here. So you should come out and check out Baseball Card Castle right here on Route 19 in the center of Cranberry Township. So tune again next time for another edition of ExactlyAtHome North of Pittsburgh. Thank you.
Jeff Patton
Thank you
