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State of The Monster
01-03-2014

"Kind of makes me feel sometimes, didn't have to grow
But as the eagle leaves the nest, it's got so far to go..."

-Ten Years Gone, Zep

Oh, hi there! Welcome. Feel free to read along, but be warned: This is less of a column, and more of a shareholders' report. Except I don't have stock available for public or private trading. Hmmm. So it's more like a state of the union. ...If those speeches were given every 11 years. Hmmm, again. Thus, I'm not really sure what this is, except some inner-thoughts and ramblings and me messing around with Excel a little.

Wait, now I remember. I quit my real job this year with real benefits and a real paycheck twice a month. Boy, was that stupid! Or was it? To answer that, I thought I'd take a look at how this whole card venture is going. And while there is much more to consider, like expenses and the size of my inventory and if I'm embezzling from myself, I just want a quick and dirty look to see if the business is growing. So with 11 years of data, let's see:



Things are going up. Cool! All right, I've seen enough. I'm gonna make a Beam and Coke as big as my head and camp out on the couch with some Cosmic Brownies.

Oh wait...there's more we should dig into. Quick, it's time for a press conference.

Thing 1: Shit really took off there the past couple years, eh?
Damn straight. Why else do you think I felt comfortable enough to quit my full-time gig?

Thing 2: Why not graph inventory and expenses?
Security purposes and because they get too darn messy, respectively. I can tell you I'm becoming a mini-giant on eBay though. (Check it out: im-a-monster) Of the $13K I gave them in fees in 2013, over $9K of that was in the final half of the year. And I switched over to selling cards full-time on June 4, just for reference.

Thing 3: The buys and sells are always, like, really close to each other.
Right-o. I'm an aggressive buyer. I can't help it. In addition to pizza, Dr. Pepper, Cosmic Brownies, and speeding, I have a nearly insatiable appetite for cards too. Cash sits around. An inventory works for you. However, in the last three months, my buying has gotten a little out of hand, thus the gap in the 2013 totals. With no other income, that is a trend that cannot logically continue.

Thing 4: Why did your sales drop in both 2008 and 2009? (*cough* You suck! *cough*)
Yeah, that's the anomaly on the board. It would be cooler to have nothing but increasing data, but I point to one and a half reasons why that happened. Reason 1: 2007's sales numbers were inflated because I sold out my entire inventory early in the year. Topping that number in 2008 would have been tough to the point of being unrealistic. However, I will mention that I sold out my entire ungraded inventory in 2012 - if I remember, that was about half the total value of my inventory - and kept on plugging away just fine. There's a testament to having more contacts and buying opportunities, and just being better at the business in general. Reason 1/2: Maybe the economy sucked in 2008/2009. Well, it did, for sure, but I just hate using that as an excuse.

Well, that was fun. Thanks for joining me in this exercise. It's nice to know that not only is Monster Cards going well, and headed in the right direction, but also that having more time to put into the business is paying off. I was afraid that going from part-time to full-time would lead to diminishing returns, and I'm glad to say that that hasn't been the case. While there are headaches that come with handling every aspect of a business, I'm very very proud to see it thrive. Thank you to everyone out there who has bought from or sold to me over the years!

Have fun!
-T

You can now find me all over the web:
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tony@monstercards.net