Need supplies for your ball cards? Buying ball card supplies for beginner collectors can be daunting. What do you need? How many do you need? Where to buy them? There are several types of supplies that I will cover below. To make things easy for you, BETA Sports Cards – The Shop has ball card collectors starter kits with everything you need to get your card collection hobby started! After reviewing the list below, you will have a better understanding of the types of Ball Card Supplies for Beginner Collectors.
Penny Sleeves
The absolute basic protection for your ball cards are penny sleeves. Why are they called a penny sleeve?…. Well… you can typically get them from your local card shop for $1 for a pack of 100, therefore they are a penny each. Buying penny sleeves online is a little more expensive when compared to an LCS because of shipping, but are still pretty cheap. Overall, they are cheap and protect the card from minor damage. You can say that penny sleeves are the first step in protecting your sports cards. The second is… Toploaders.
Toploaders
For the utmost protection for your cards still on the inexpensive side, slide the penny sleeve into a toploader. Putting the penny sleeve in a toploader will keep the card from moving around and adds an additional layer of protection. Toploaders are the most popular way to protect your collection. They are easy to store and thick enough to protect your card from most types of damage.
Semi-Rigid Sleeves
An alternative to the toploader is a Card Saver, also known as semi-rigid sleeves. There are two types of card savers, Card Saver 1, and 2s. Card Saver 1s are a little wider and need a special storage box, known as a “two-row shoe box”. Card Saver 2s are about the same width as a toploader and can be stored in the same type of storage box as toploaders. In my opinion, they are thinner than toploaders so they take up less space and they don’t provide the same protection as toploader. Still slide a penny sleeve in these just like you do for a toploader. For those more advanced in the card collecting hobby, Card Savers are recommended by grading companies when submitting your cards to be graded. More on grading in future posts.
Magnetic One-Touch Cases
For your more valuable cards, magnetic one-touch cases provide top-notch protection. They are easy to use. The two sides are held together by a magnet. Put your card in the recessed area and close the case, the magnet keeps the case closed. Be careful though, manufacturers make some cards thicker than others, therefore these cases come in different sizes. Here is a thickness gauge.
9-Pocket Pages and Albums
For those cards that are part of your PC, but not as valuable as cards in toploaders or one-touches… People use 9-pocket pages in 3” D ring Albums. Albums or some call them binders are the typical way of storing your collection. You can find 9-Pocket Pages for $20-$25 for a box of 100 pages, and albums run around $10-$20 each. Some people use penny sleeves in each pocket… I only do that for chrome/prizm or easily scratched-type cards.
There are so many supplies that I didn’t cover, for example, storage boxes, grading sleeves, and team bags just to name a few. I hope the above list helps you figure out what you need. You now know, that you can go to BETA Sports Cards for your hobby needs. All the supplies mentioned in this post are all available at our eBay store. BETA Sports Cards. We have a ball card collector’s starter kit, with everything you need to get your collection started!
