Published February 22, 2026 | By Erik L, Collectors MD Community Member
I operate in one of the fastest, loudest corners of the hobby.Very fast. Live streams. Countdown timers. Sudden death auctions. Speed. Hype. Urgency. Volume. All rewarded by the system. If you even hesitate, you risk getting buried.
I know that environment all too well – because I was absolutely crushed by it.
There was a stretch where I blew through my entire life savings. All of it gone in about a month. Breaks. Boxes. Chasing the next hit. Convincing myself the next rip would fix the last one. I wasn’t reckless because I didn’t care. I was reckless because I cared too much and didn’t know how to stop.
At some point, I ran out of runway. I had no choice but to stop and reassess. I didn’t walk away from the hobby, I changed how I participated in it.
I ended up going back to Whatnot, not to rip, but to sell singles. It wasn’t glamorous. It wasn’t flashy. But it was real. Selling singles meant people could buy the hits instead of the rips. Spend $100 on a card you actually want instead of $800 on a box you hope saves you. That shift changed everything for me.
In a space built on speed and spectacle, choosing to slow down can feel like swimming against the current, but it’s often where clarity begins.
Selling intentionally is much harder in today’s fast-paced environment. It doesn’t lean on adrenaline. It doesn’t promise miracles. It asks people to slow down and choose intentionally. But it also respects them.
I take requests. I run cards at a buck. I hand out deals. I even get killed on some sales. But at the end of the day, I try to create space where collectors can actually add something meaningful to their personal collecting without feeling the overwhelming pressure to overspend and chase something they don’t want or need. And the wild part is that it works. Even in a frictionless system built for speed and spectacle, there are collectors who want to slow down – who choose value, transparency, and control over hype and chaos.
Outside of the hobby, I also manage a pizza business in California. That world is brutal too. Thin margins. Long, thankless hours. Constant pressure. No shortcuts. Both spaces taught me the same lesson; well-intended, sustainable businesses are built on trust and patience, not urgency and churn.
I’m not anti-breaking. I’m not anti-hype. I just know what unchecked momentum did to me and what changed when I chose intention over impulse. This is why I aligned with Collectors MD from day one and continue to support the movement and the mantra, on and off the live streams; Collect With Intention. Not Compulsion.
The hobby doesn’t need everyone to collect the same way. It just needs space for smarter, healthier choices to exist.
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Intentionality is how you stay in the hobby long enough to enjoy it.
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