Know your true cost base and your margins stop being a guess.
Quick answer. Beyond stock, budget for platform commission, payment processing, postage and packaging, POS and software subscriptions, storage and insurance, grading fees, trade-show costs and — as you scale — staff. Lots of small percentage-and-per-item costs quietly compress margin, so measure your true cost per sale.
Card businesses can look deceptively profitable until you add up everything that sits between the sale price and the money you keep. Here are the running costs to plan for.
Cost of stock
Your biggest line by far. What you pay for sealed product, singles, collections and bulk — plus the costs of getting it saleable, such as inbound shipping, import duty and grading fees.
Selling and platform costs
- Platform commission: live and marketplace platforms take a cut of every sale (Whatnot, eBay, TCGplayer, Cardmarket and so on).
- Payment processing: card and gateway fees on top of, or within, platform charges.
- Postage and packaging: sleeves, toploaders, mailers, boxes and courier costs — small per order, large in aggregate.
Systems and overheads
- Stock/POS platform and website subscriptions.
- Accounting software and professional fees.
- Storage, and insurance for high-value inventory.
- Grading and authentication fees where you slab cards.
Growth and people
- Marketing and content — though much of this is your own time on stream.
- Travel, stand fees and stock for trade shows and conventions.
- Staff wages as you scale beyond a solo operation.
The pattern to watch is that a card business has lots of small, percentage-and-per-item costs that quietly compress margin. The businesses that thrive are the ones that measure their true cost per sale — after fees, postage and packaging — rather than flattering themselves with the headline price. Build that discipline in early and every pricing and channel decision gets sharper.
For more on this read our blog on ‘How to calculate the VAT payable under the global VAT margin scheme’ HERE.
