Tom Wilmes
Jimmy’s Kentucky Roadshow Shop opened in November on Romany Road. The shop buys and sells a variety of collectible cards and features an impressive collection of sports-related memorabilia.
Collecting and trading sports cards has been a hobby of Jimmy Mahan’s since childhood. And, since opening Jimmy’s Kentucky Roadshow Shop on Romany Road in November, it’s his livelihood.
Tom Wilmes
Jimmy Mahan
“We have $5 cards and $10,000 cards,” Mahan said. “Basketball cards are by far the most popular. They have the greatest capacity for high prices, because basketball is such a global sport.”
Those who visit the Chevy Chase shop in person are literally stepping onto a piece of University of Kentucky basketball history. “The original baseline from Rupp Arena is the floor of the shop when you walk in,” Mahan said. “People come in and take pictures of it all the time.”
Some of the items on display include game-worn jerseys and shoes by players such as Tyler Herro and Karl Anthony Towns, and sports memorabilia dating back to the 1957- 58 University of Kentucky NCAA championship team.
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Tom Wilmes
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Tom Wilmes
“It’s half card shop, half museum; all hang out. We want folks of all ages to come enjoy it,” Mahan said. “We are teachers to the people who are getting back in the hobby during this boom, and we are experts for the old pros who come to us looking for specific and high-end cards.”
While the days of buying a pack of baseball cards for 50 cents are long gone, Mahan does stock some more affordable options, as well as a selection of single cards priced with younger collectors in mind. Most collectible sports cards are produced in limited editions these days and command higher prices based on rarity and desirability. During the collecting boom of the 1980s and into the early ’90s, manufacturers mass-produced cards, largely negating their value.
“We are teachers to the people who are getting back in the hobby during this boom, and we are experts for the old pros who come to us looking for specific and high-end cards.”
“The baseball card market tanked in early ’90s when the internet came along,” Mahan said.
Now the cards are produced in numbered, limited editions. There might be only 100 of a certain athlete’s card and 25 of another’s. A more common price for a pack of cards these days is about $45, while an entire case (10 to 12 boxes) can cost upward of $12,000. Sellers like Jimmy’s Kentucky Roadshow Shop will “break” the case for a collector to buy only the Cincinnati Reds or just the New York Yankees, for example.
Prior to online access, card collectors had to find a specific card to buy or trade by attending card shows or through magazine notices. Online sales account for about 60 percent of the shop’s business, Mahan said. He has shipped products to customers in England, France, Switzerland, China, Japan and Australia. Interest in card collecting has increased during the pandemic, Mahan said.
The crew from Jimmy’s Kentucky Roadshow Shop took a cross-country road trip of their own in February. Mahan rented an RV and drove from Kentucky to California, buying and trading cards along the way. In all his haul included six figures’ worth of sports cards, he said, including a 1986-87 Fleer rookie card of Michael Jordan. The same card, one graded a perfect Gem Mint 10 by PSA Authentication and Grading Services, sold for $150,000 at auction this past December.
Tom Wilmes
While the occasional high-value card generates excitement and makes headlines, most collectors are driven by a joy for the hobby that was kindled during childhood. That’s how Mahan, who grew up in Lexington and played Eastern Little League baseball and other sports, got started.
He went to college in Lexington, Virginia, earning a bachelor’s degree in history at Washington and Lee University. He pursued a master’s in history at the University of Kentucky, where Mahan was a grad assistant with the men’s basketball program under Coach Tubby Smith. He completed his master’s degree in secondary school administration at North Carolina State in 2006.
Mahan stayed in North Carolina, and over the next 14 years he worked as a teacher, high school principal, camp director and aftercare coordinator for a foster group home, all the while sharing his enthusiasm and compassion for kids and with kids in academic and athletic settings. At one point he worked in marketing at his dad’s bank in Wilmington, North Carolina, “because if I had done loans, I would have approved everyone,” he said with a grin.
Mahan and his wife, Cathy, moved back to the Bluegrass this past June.
“Kentucky was always the goal, but I didn’t want to come home until I was ready to do something special that filled my days and heart with an authentic joy,” he said. “Lexington is the perfect place for sports cards and a shop that wants to engage.”
Community means everything to Mahan and his four employees. They have created a Women of Sports Cards club and have clubs for kids in the works, as well as plans for events and a partnership with the Lexington Legends involving special jerseys, cards and autographs.
“We want to do it all and use cards as a vehicle for helping people, having a good time, engaging the community and elevating the hobby,” Mahan said. “I also believe in being as much of a force for good in the community and as locally as possible. It’s not always about profit; it can’t be. So, we distribute joy as much as we can while making enough to treat my great staff well.”