Consignment is the one part of a card shop where the inventory is not yours. A customer sets nine cards on the counter, you agree a split, and from that minute you are holding somebody else's property you have to find, describe and hand back. The cards go into holders, two go to a show, one goes on a stream, and eleven weeks later the consignor texts about "the second Luka."
Software handles the money side — Ricochet, SimpleConsign, ConsignCloud and SortSwift all keep a consignor ledger, splits and payout runs. None can reach into your display case. The record lives on a screen, the card lives in plastic, and something physical has to carry the ID between them. In most shops that is a number on masking tape.
A numbered seal is the same idea, printed properly: intake, tag, photograph, log. It is bookkeeping, not a lock. For the wider counter view, see the card shops page.
The number is the join key
Borrow the database word, because that is the job. Your record has a row — consignor, date, description, price, split, status. Your holder has nothing written on it. The number joins them, and it is the only part of the system attached to the merchandise. Three consequences:
- The number exists before the card leaves the counter. A number assigned later is assigned from memory.
- The number reads without opening anything. You want to walk the case with a clipboard.
- The number is the same string in both places. What you type into your POS is what is printed on the plastic, character for character.
The tag is a die-cut holographic foil label, 1.77 x 0.75 in (44.96 x 19.05 mm) in the standard size, printed with your artwork and a number from a sequence you set. It goes on the plastic of a holder, case, bag or box — never on the card, never on factory-sealed wax, never on a holder heading to a grader.
The intake bench
- Count the cards in front of the consignor, face up, out loud. This is the last moment you are both looking at the same pile.
- Write the condition note in your own words — "sharp corners, slight edge wear top right." Your description, for your ledger.
- Holder every card. Toploader, one-touch, card saver, or leave the slab as it is.
- Tag it. Land the middle of the seal first, then burnish out to both ends. Placement by format: every card format, top loaders, graded slabs.
- Photograph twice. Card face, then the tagged holder with the number legible. Name both files with the number.
- Log the row. Number, consignor, date, description, condition note, price, split, status.
- Hand over the stub, covered below.
Steps 5, 6 and 7 do the work. Step 4 is a printed label.
Numbering that still makes sense in a year
You choose the numbering at order time: your prefix plus a sequential count from a start number you set, random codes, a batch code plus a number, or no number. For intake, take the sequential option.
-
The prefix is the shop, not the consignor.
RVR-for River Valley Cards, on every seal you buy. Consignor identity belongs in the log, not on the merchandise. - One ascending sequence for everything. Consignment, case stock and show inventory share it, so the sequence doubles as a rough timeline.
- Start each order one past the previous one's last number. Within one order, no two seals share a number, so continuity is arithmetic you do at checkout.
- Batch codes for bulk take-ins. If 400 commons arrive as one lot, a batch code and a number on the box is the right granularity — see serializing storage boxes and show inventory.
The consignor's half: the Duo layout
Layouts include portrait and landscape flat, folded, slab banner, toploader banner, and Duo — two numbered halves on one label that you cut apart, both carrying the same number.
Duo is the consignment tag for trading cards in its plainest form. One half goes on the holder, the other onto the consignor's copy of the agreement beside that line item, so they leave holding the same number sitting in your case and nobody retypes anything.
Making your POS carry the number
You do not need new software, only one free text field. Every consignment system has somewhere to put a string: SKU, alternate lookup code, item note, custom attribute. Put the seal number there and nothing else. A search for RVR-1184 returns the row, the row names the consignor, and the payout report knows what to do.
Running barcodes too? Keep both labels — the barcode is for the register, the number is for the paper trail — and do not cover one with the other. Your copy of every number you have ordered lives in My Seals, and a single number can be looked up on its own page.
What to hand the consignor
The agreement is your business and your lawyer's. Numbering adds a schedule the consignor can read, and wording describing only the number, the photograph and the log. As an intake clause:
Each item accepted on consignment is placed in a holder that carries a numbered store label. The number, the intake date, the agreed price and a photograph of the tagged item are recorded in our consignment log. The number identifies the log entry. It says nothing about the card itself.
And on the listing:
Sold in a store-numbered holder. The number shown in the photograph is the number on the item you receive and the number in our records.
That is the whole claim, and every word of it is something you did at the bench.
What a seal will not do
Say this to consignors plainly.
- It peels. A seal can be peeled off and a different seal applied. It is a printed label with adhesive.
- It says nothing about the card. A number on a holder cannot describe what is inside, what condition it is in, or who owns it.
- It has no standing with any marketplace or grading company. No platform treats a numbered holder differently, and no grader cares.
- It does not decide a return. A case opened by a buyer is settled by that marketplace's own process, on its terms.
What it does is make a record: it helps document what was shipped, gives your log a physical anchor, and helps deter swaps and return fraud by making the item you photographed easy to compare with the item that comes back. The return fraud page covers how sellers use that record. The optional QR can point at a page you choose, or at the seal record — showing the design, the number and the date it was logged. It says nothing about the card.
What a run costs
Standard seals are $6.00 per pack of 12, with a 60-seal minimum at $30.00 — 50 cents each — and the rate steps down on quantity alone: 45 cents at 120, 40 cents at 600, 36 cents at 1,200, 33 cents at 2,400, 30 cents at 4,200. Self-serve tops out at 10,008; larger runs are quoted. Foils are Shattered Prism and Aurora.
The large seal is 2.5 x 1 in (63.5 x 25.4 mm), $9.00 per pack of 12 with a 60-seal minimum at $45.00 — 75 cents each — then 10% off at 120, 20% at 600, 30% at 1,200 and 40% at 4,200, which works out to 45 cents. Use it on boxes and slab banners.
For the display case rather than the bench, custom grading stickers are a separate product for top loaders and slabs: packs of 12 at $6.00 down to 40 cents each at 600 and above, five layouts, ten holographic backgrounds, your own displayed grade. They carry the line: Custom collector display sticker. Not affiliated with or certified by any third-party grading company. Matching their artwork to the seals makes a case read as one shop — see the counter branding guide.
A 40-cent seal on a $40 card is one percent of the sale: intake overhead, like the holder.
Frequently asked questions
Can I keep numbering where my current log left off?
Yes. You set the prefix and the start number for every run, so a shop whose log ends at RVR-1183 orders the next run starting at 1184 and the sequence continues without a gap. Within one order, no two seals share a number, so all you carry between orders is the last number used.
Do I need a different seal for slabs and toploaders?
Not necessarily. The standard seal works on both, and the slab banner and toploader banner layouts are shaped for those formats. Shops with a lot of graded material sometimes order the large size so the number reads across the counter. Never put one on a holder going out for grading.
What do I tell a consignor who asks what the seal is for?
That it is a store number and its job is bookkeeping: it ties their card to a row in your log and a photograph taken at intake, so when the card sells or comes back you can match it against that row and that photograph. It is a printed label that can be peeled off, and it makes no statement about the card.
How many seals does a shop go through?
Count intake, not sales. Accepting 30 to 40 items a week is roughly 1,800 a year before you tag case stock, putting a normal shop between the 1,200 and 2,400 rungs. Most order a quarter at a time so artwork can change without stranding inventory.
Does this replace my consignment POS?
No. Ricochet, SimpleConsign, ConsignCloud and SortSwift handle splits, payouts and reporting far better than a spreadsheet. The numbering sits underneath them as the physical half of the record — the half software cannot hold.
Pick a prefix, pick the number your log is up to, and put your shop's logo on the face: the seal builder prices a run against your real intake volume, and the large size is one click away. Sixty seals is the smallest order, and each arrives carrying a number that already matches a row you are about to write.
Serial Seal is an independent printer, not affiliated with, endorsed by or sponsored by PSA, Beckett, CGC, SGC, eBay, Whatnot, TCGplayer, Ricochet, SimpleConsign, ConsignCloud, SortSwift or any card manufacturer. Brand names describe only the products they make. Nothing here is legal advice.