UD Series 1 Young Guns Damage?

[spiral8]

I think this is about more than value.

Some 6 year old walks into Game Breakers and buys a pack of UD1 and gets a Tavares YG crushed by rollermarks. After Hans tells him that he can send it back to UD and get a fresh one... what do you think the kid and his father/mother are going to say?

A. Awesome!
B. 6-8 week turnaround, with no guarantees? We'll try.
C. Screw this. Another casual collector lost.

I'd be willing to bet that at least 3/4 of the time, the answer is C.

And THAT is the biggest problem here.

Cards being damaged straight out of packs happens ALL THE TIME, Jai. ALL THE TIME!!! It doesn't matter if the card is from UD, Topps, ITG or whoever. It happens with every single card company on planet Earth.
I am uncertain as to what people are expecting to have UD do that they already aren't already doing to try and rectify this issue?
Personally, if I was the parent of that 6 year old, sure I would be upset, but there's no way I'm going to tell my son/daughter "Screw this" and, conversly, if I'm that 6 year old customer, that 1 negative experience isn't going to change my enjoyment with hockey cards. That's like saying because I had 1 bad date with a woman, I'm never going to date anyone ever again.

C'mon man

 

[cards-gotta-go]

Cards being damaged straight out of packs happens ALL THE TIME, Jai. ALL THE TIME!!! It doesn't matter if the card is from UD, Topps, ITG or whoever. It happens with every single card company on planet Earth.
I am uncertain as to what people are expecting to have UD do that they already aren't already doing to try and rectify this issue?
Personally, if I was the parent of that 6 year old, sure I would be upset, but there's no way I'm going to tell my son/daughter "Screw this" and, conversly, if I'm that 6 year old customer, that 1 negative experience isn't going to change my enjoyment with hockey cards. That's like saying because I had 1 bad date with a woman, I'm never going to date anyone ever again.

C'mon man

Here's the thing: UD is doing everything they can under the circumstances. That's not my issue. It's a crappy situation all around. But we risk losing many casual collectors from this hobby over this.

As a proud parent of a 6 year old, I can say with a great deal of confidence that a bad experience at that age WILL turn them off. If it's not right, they don't want it, no matter what you say to them.

And as for your bad date analogy: I had one truly horrific date in my life. Dinner was bad, movie choice was worse, car broke down on the way back. I ended up marrying her... go figure.

 

[spiral8]

Here's the thing: UD is doing everything they can under the circumstances. That's not my issue. It's a crappy situation all around. But we risk losing many casual collectors from this hobby over this.

Well sir, I respectfully disagree and we'll leave it at that

 

[BigBarracuda]

OK, lets have everyone on this site who thinks Young Guns from any year are SP'd in any way, shape or form...Wait, no one? Maybe it's because there's quite literally tens of thousands of each and every one of them, and that's not even counting the ones inserted into retail packs.
They aren't limited in the least. The only reason they hold any real value is because Joe Public believes that the Young Gun rookies from Series 1 and 2 each year are the gold standard for rookie cards. And because so many people think that way (hard core collector and casual collector alike) that makes it so.
This IS NOT a Black Diamond AO issue again. This is not going to be a case where I trade in my badly damaged Ovechkin Young Gun and get a minty mint Ovechkin Black Diamond rookie. In this situation, if you have a damaged Tavares Young Gun, you get a minty mint Tavares Young Gun back. The end.
As for some dealers getting "sleeves" (ie hundreds) of Tavares Young Guns to distribute to the people who frequent their card stores, that's simply not true. No one was getting hundreds of any one Young Gun without first swapping them out.
People who say that the UD quality control team should've caught it sooner obviously haven't seen the roller damage on these cards. It's quite easy to miss it on your first or even second inspection of the card. Do you want UD to take a magnifying glass to each and every card they make? At that rate NOTHING would be released on time EVER!
Look, the cards got damaged, which is bad. But UD is trying to rectify this issue as best and painlessly as possible, which is good.

Some of you guys need to give your head a shake.

In the interest of allowing this interesting to run it's course, I think I'll start a separate thread about this. I accept that perhaps I don't have the inside info that some hobbyists here have, but I think we should investigate your estimate of "no one" thinking that Young Guns are short printed. I think your incorrect, and will offer my take on it on that other thread.

Everyone else, carry on debating whether or not UD trying to put the poop back in the horse is a wonderful effort . Try not to ask why they let the poop out in the first place

 

[crjeff]

Well sir, I respectfully disagree and we'll leave it at that

Well Scott ,I would like to give you my situation. I am inclined to agree with Jai ,because i have been collecting cards because i love the hobby since 98/99 and i have every set of series 1 and 2 from that year to now.It is the only set i do every year this is because the Ygs are shorter printed than the rest of the cards and it is the only attainable set i can do(not including short sets with no rc's.)like i said i have all series 1 nad 2 even the lock out year where there was no series 2.My first case i ripped was a big deal and i got two AO but one was damaged roller peel on the bottom.after contacting Ud i got the answer that they had no more replacements and well sorry your stuck with it.I truely think that Ud has a resposability to all hockey collectors to inspect then re inspect the quality of the product, and i do understand that some things can go unnoticed.They have asked for an exclusive where they are the only producers and they have it , so therefor they owe us ther best.Packing out to make the expo was there priority (i feel ) not the qc of the packs but making the deadline.Anywayto sum it up i am seriously considering not taking the risk on damaged cards (up to 50 yg's) while i try to complete the set.I agree with jai because i think shipping replacement YGS to the expo was self serving because they are saving the hardcore dealers,rippers,stores. and the rest of us casual maybe not so casual non expo goers can roll the dice on the 50 ygs we need to finish our set.I have to say for more than one reason i am done ripping boxes and building sets.

 

[cjkuehn]

don't quote me on this either....but I believe I was told that UD was going
to try to arrange something with the LCS and themselves, as to having
the LCS handle the swap of the guns.....LCS collects them, sends them
in, gets the good ones back and returns them to customers.

more work on lcs as they would have to keep records, not a real tough
thing, but prone to errors and mismanagement....

 

[jdg573]

I just got off the phone with UD customer service and the wait was only 10 minutes but I was told to send them back for replacement............

 

[MMarch]

I am hardly the one person anyone would expect to come to UD's defense here, but.... Come on folks, for once UD identified an issue and did what they could in a very timely manner to try and help everyone the best they could. Not only that, everyone is blaming QC when no one here even knows when/how the damage occurred. Knowing how items get packaged, it would not surprise me one bit if they were damaged by the sorting machines that load the cards into the packs AFTER they have already gone through QC. My understanding of how most large scale packaging works, including UD's process, is they go through QC, get sorted and loaded by MACHINES and then heat sealed. This is not the Cup where every card is hand packed. We could very easily be dealing with a situation where the damage occurred after they did everything correctly, and the only way they would ever find out is after the packs were opened and the damage identified.

Anyone who lived through the SPGU debacle a couple years ago can attest to the fact that UD is going above and beyond on this one compared to what they have done in the past. Frankly, I'm surprised they are replacing them at all. This is not a case where the cutting machines were dull and all the cards are chipped on the edges and the corners damaged. Sure, they may have an indention but most people admit you can only see them if held at a certain angle. A lot of people wouldn't even notice. Not to mention this will certainly affect the value of these cards, if every one of them is gradeable a 9 or higher now because they are all replaced, the value of the cards decreases. I know everyone wants a mint card, but come on, this is borderline ridiculous.

 

[dahabsfan]

Cards being damaged straight out of packs happens ALL THE TIME, Jai. ALL THE TIME!!! It doesn't matter if the card is from UD, Topps, ITG or whoever. It happens with every single card company on planet Earth.
I am uncertain as to what people are expecting to have UD do that they already aren't already doing to try and rectify this issue?
Personally, if I was the parent of that 6 year old, sure I would be upset, but there's no way I'm going to tell my son/daughter "Screw this" and, conversly, if I'm that 6 year old customer, that 1 negative experience isn't going to change my enjoyment with hockey cards. That's like saying because I had 1 bad date with a woman, I'm never going to date anyone ever again.

C'mon man

Here's a novel idea - instead of always having to react to their own disinterest in QC how about being pro-active for a change and making sure that damn stuff doesn't get packed out in the first place? That is the bigger issue here.

Darren

 

[spiral8]

Here's a novel idea - instead of always having to react to their own disinterest in QC how about being pro-active for a change and making sure that damn stuff doesn't get packed out in the first place? That is the bigger issue here.

Darren

Darren, from what I was hearing from Karvin, UD wasn't aware of the damage until people had started ripping the product. That's when they found out.
I don't think they saw the cards were damaged, said "oh well" and shipped them out anyway

 

[dahabsfan]

Darren, from what I was hearing from Karvin, UD wasn't aware of the damage until people had started ripping the product. That's when they found out.
I don't think they saw the cards were damaged, said "oh well" and shipped them out anyway

So, in that case there's absolutely no QC going on. That's even worse than poor quality control. Someone has to have a look at this stuff somewhere along the way and say "hey wait a sec" rather than just pushing everything out in the hopes of getting it to market in time for Expo. This isn't rocket science and is an easily preventable issue. They're trying to rectify the issue but it's going to cost them to do it and eventually guess who foots the bill? Costs always get passed on to the consumer.

Darren

 

[spiral8]

So, in that case there's absolutely no QC going on. That's even worse than poor quality control. Someone has to have a look at this stuff somewhere along the way and say "hey wait a sec" rather than just pushing everything out in the hopes of getting it to market in time for Expo. This isn't rocket science and is an easily preventable issue. They're trying to rectify the issue but it's going to cost them to do it and eventually guess who foots the bill? Costs always get passed on to the consumer.

Darren

Darren, like I said earlier, at a first and even sometimes a second glance it's pretty hard to tell that these Young Guns are damaged at all. It's not something obvious like they're majorly off centre, or have smashed corners. I can totally see how the UD quality control could miss it.

 

[leafschik1967]

For those not at the expo, I understand where you're coming from. Riddle me this though, please - barring unrealistic statements like "they should have prevented this from happening", what would have been the right solution in your eyes? Genuine question. I'm interested what folks think SHOULD be done - and please, be realistic.

They should have had one solution, rather than panicking to appease the people who were in their face on the weekend, and then providing other collectors with a half-assed solution. And yes, I classify their reaction as panicked, knee-jerk whatever you want to call it.

They should be keeping all their Young Guns (over-valued or not, they are important cards each year in the hobby) in their hands, not running the presses and handing them out to distributors.

They screwed up, and if they are going to fix it, they should fix it as fairly as possible for all collectors. Not just the ones they had to look in the eye.

 

[sharks4life12]

card manufactures AND shops have one chance to secure that customer the first time (if they are new and never ventured into the hobby) if they fail, there is a bigger chance that they lost that collector as a customer. It will all depend on how the manufacture and/or shop handles the situation. Thats where the customer service aspect comes into play. So since we are talking about UD, it wil be up to the shop owner to convince that new kid/customer that it will be straightend out, and if the owner comes thru in whatever capacity, they will and the hobby will have a customer for life,or near life.

 

[jonpop]

Its 2010 coming up. Can we give the "The kids collecting" "its about the kids" "The kids are alright" crap a break already. No kids collect this junk anymore.

 

[cjkuehn]

Its 2010 coming up. Can we give the "The kids collecting" "its about the kids" "The kids are alright" crap a break already. No kids collect this junk anymore.

kind of strikes a note, though I believe there is a place to keep the
kids interested, while near the line sunday at the UD booth for
the redemption, karvin had posted himself at the end and stated anyone
after him, may not get a card. a father with a 5-6 yr old started complaining
loudly, 'hey, take care of the kids first....' , well he just happened to be
holding 2 boxes and the kid was not at all interested......good job Dad,
way to pimp your kid.......

 

[quincy]

Its 2010 coming up. Can we give the "The kids collecting" "its about the kids" "The kids are alright" crap a break already. No kids collect this junk anymore.

You're more correct than you realize, which is the major reason why we tried hard for the last several Expos to give interesting cards to kids - those Crosby/Ovechkin rookie showdowns, the Crosby "#1 Draft Pick" cards, Victory Rookies of Crosby and Ovechkin, Mini Jerseys, jersey cards, you name it. We gave a lot of cards to kids, as we felt it was important to pique their interest and give them a positive memory.

 

[slappy69]

Its 2010 coming up. Can we give the "The kids collecting" "its about the kids" "The kids are alright" crap a break already. No kids collect this junk anymore.

best quote I've read in a long time - just judging from my kids teams out of the 30 kids maybe 2 collect the rest seem to have very little interest

 

[gomaz]

Its 2010 coming up. Can we give the "The kids collecting" "its about the kids" "The kids are alright" crap a break already. No kids collect this junk anymore.

I asked at least 25 kids what they collect at Expo this weekend. Each one of them had an answer. The cool thing is that they don't care if what they collect, us "adults" refer to as "low-end".

Most of them don't care if they pull a card that has track marks either.

 

[Kenny Hall]

They should have had one solution, rather than panicking to appease the people who were in their face on the weekend, and then providing other collectors with a half-assed solution. And yes, I classify their reaction as panicked, knee-jerk whatever you want to call it.

They screwed up, and if they are going to fix it, they should fix it as fairly as possible for all collectors. Not just the ones they had to look in the eye.

THIS.

Kenny