Who is Steve Brooks?
Steve Brooks can best be described as a man who wears many hats, and has a wide range of interests. He makes his living from various sources, including the running of The Magic Cafe, which is arguably the most well-known and highly populated forum for magicians on the internet. Besides that, he's active as a magician performing private shows and restaurant magic, and doing graphic art design work for various projects including the designing of playing cards. He's previously also been involved in creating and publishing his own magic effects, and producing, directing and marketing DVDs for the magic community. In addition to his own artist background, he has a passion for all the arts, including music (playing multiple instruments in various bands) film, and also for history, specifically the American Civil War and WWII.He's also a real thinker an philosopher, who has a lot to say on many subjects, with genuinely thoughtful reflections. With his breadth of knowledge and a wide range of interests, particularly given his background in art and magic, Steve is well placed to have some real insights on the aesthetics of playing cards. He's even writing several books currently, including a couple on magic theory, as well as a huge historical project about the famous Escape Map deck from World War II.
As it turns out, Steve is a very serious and dedicated collector of playing cards. How serious, you ask? Well, right now he owns more than 26,000 decks! Anybody that has a collection so large it would take a truck to begin moving it has some serious credibility as a collector! Steve is also very active in the 52 Plus Joker Club, the prestigious American Playing Card Collectors Club.
Steve kindly agreed to being interviewed about magic and about playing cards, and I'm happy to report that he was not only generous with his time and with the amount of his words, but he's shared some wonderful stories and reflections about both playing cards and magic. There's a great deal we can learn from his passion and experience. So without further ado, here's Steve Brooks!
Interview on Playing Cards
For those who don't know anything about you, what can you tell us about yourself and your background?Well, like my mom used to say, I'm a man of many hats. I have a lot of interests and I've learned how to do a lot of different things. My biggest fear was becoming a Jack of all trades, master of none. So I had to focus on just a few things.
Most people probably know I'm into magic, and I run The Magic Café forum.
I've been drawing and doing art all my life, e.g. painting and illustrating. I grew up drawing, and I worked in a print shop for like four or five years. So I ran Lionel types, learned how to set type and ran Windmill Heidelbergs, and Kluges and Offset presses. And so I learned all about printing, which went along with my graphic art. I still do art.
As I got further in magic, I got into different playing cards. Playing cards fascinated me for just a number of reasons, not just magic purposes, but also because of the art. I was fascinated with the different types of designs and how they were printed. So I got into that, figured out how they printed cards and all the technologies that go with that.
And I've always loved music. So I got in the band when I was in school and I played the trumpet for around four years even though I hated the trumpet. Eventually, I got a guitar and taught myself how to play. And then I started playing keyboards and drums. When I got older, I played in numerous bands, country bands, rock and roll bands, jazz bands. I've done that most of my life. Because of problems with my hands on the advice of my doctor I had to quit drumming. That said, I still play guitar from time to time, just to amuse myself.
I enjoy writing and creating. I'm a history buff, and the American Civil War fascinates me, and World War II as well. I collect hourglasses - I've got tons of them. I'm also a science fiction buff, so I'm a geek.
When did you start collecting playing cards, and what got you started?
I've haphazardly collected them off and on since I was a kid, because of the art. The artwork that was on them seemed pretty cool, and I tried to get different variations. Back in those days I didn't know anything really about playing cards like I do now.
I got more serious about it in the last 15 years or so, because of my interest in the American Civil War, where I started seeking out certain decks that were printed in that era, e.g. Faro decks.
How large is your own collection of decks?
Usually when you get into collecting something, it starts off as a hobby, and then sometimes you can go crazy with this stuff. I've often joked I need to get a cheaper habit than playing cards, something like heroin or something. Plus you have to have a place to put all your cards.
I go to Costco and I buy these bins, black with big yellow lids on them. I've got stacks of these jammed full of decks of cards. What's crazy is when you fill one of those up with decks and bricks, and go ahead and try to lift one of those up. "Oh, I need to move these over here." Decks of cards are paper, and what is paper? – wood. So they're really heavy, and you need a couple of guys.
My card collecting is crazy, it's out of hand. I could not easily move my decks. This would take trucks. I've probably got close to 26,000 decks, last I kind of ran through them. I believe the world record is 25,000 decks – but that is individual decks. My collection thus far isn't individual decks, because in some cases I've got a brick, or two or three of the same deck. Now for a lot of people, that's a huge collection. But I know people that have got way more than that.
Do you have any particular favorite decks in your collection?
That's like asking me what my favorite band is. That's a tough one because I have a lot of favorites and for different reasons, for different things. And if I moved some of my stacks, I'd realize "I forgot about this one, and I really like that one." But I like decks that are different, and I've got so many different ones that have caught my eye.
Some of my favorites are decks that are unique in weird sort of ways. Someone put out a deck designed so that the cards look like wood, and it's a pretty cool looking deck. But I have a deck of 52 cards (in a leather pouch that snaps closed) where the cards are actually made out of wood – real wood, like cherry wood. It's one of my favorite decks because it's just so awesome. I have several decks made out of metal – one of them is copper, some are made out of brass, and one's made out of stainless steel. If I could get into Ricky Jay's Cards as Weapons I'd probably hurt you with one of these. Those are unique…and spendy.
The Ornate decks that Randy Butterfield put out are really standout. The Federal 52 decks By Jackson Robinson. There's a really cool looking deck with pinup girls, from the old pinup posters back in the 40s during World War II, where people would paint these girls on the side of their fighter planes. I love transformation decks, because it takes a lot of work to make a transformation and there's not that many of them around.
At one time I had a collection of 3000 different tarot decks. Some of them were handmade and hand painted. I got rid of all of them just because I was focusing more on actual playing card playing cards. But the tarot decks was because of the artwork. The attention to detail is just amazing on some of them. They're like paintings.
What about gilded decks?
I love gilded decks, especially the older gilded decks because they weren't done with computer technology. I remember being inside U.S. Playing Card years ago, and these girls are sitting there with a deck of cards in a vice, and using a paintbrush they were placing gold on them. They handle like crap because they're gilded, and they tend to stick, and they don't fan very well. Modern gilded decks made with computers handle beautifully but the gilding wears off really fast - that's the trade off.
It's like food, and when you were a kid your grandma would be cooking a stew all day long, and you smelled it, and by the time it was done, it was so good. Versus "I'm going to throw everything in there and microwave it, and it's done in 10 minutes". It's good, but it's not as good as grandma's all day stew.
So the old gilded decks. Maybe they didn't have as many colors, and they didn't have green and blue and all this crazy stuff, but the gilding held up. Because I've got decks from the 1920s that are gilded up, and the gilding looks brand new. The decks now that are gilded purple and green and blue, fan beautifully and they look good - as long as you don't handle them. They just don't last if you actually handle the cards.
What's the most valuable deck in your own collection?
My valuable ones are my older decks. I've got Faro decks here that have never been opened. I've got Jerry Nuggets.
How should we judge the value of a deck of playing cards?
I've had people send me notes on Facebook and elsewhere, and they'll say, "Hey Steve, how much do you think this deck's worth? My grandpa had it." I always tell them: whatever the market will bear. A $20 million Picasso is only worth 20 million if somebody's willing to pay you 20 million for it. Will an original unopened, pristine deck of Jerry Nuggets be worth 500 bucks in 30 years? I don't know. It might be worth $5,000, it might not be worth anything.
If people show a demand for it and an interest for it, yes, it has value. But otherwise, it may just have value to you because you liked the design. And that's okay. There's nothing wrong with that.
But when we had these fires a year ago up here where I live, the fire was practically in my backyard. So when that fire was out of control, somebody called me and asked, "What are you going to do with your cards?" And I go, "They're going to burn." You know why? Because the only thing I care about is making sure my wife and my dogs are okay. Things, for the most part, can be replaced – although I do have sheets and decks that could never be replaced. But, I'm worried about my family, I'm not worried about some stupid decks of cards.
What can you tell us about your collection of uncut sheets?
I've got a huge collection, but the biggest part of my collection is the uncut sheets. So I'm not trying to have the largest deck collection in the world, but it's my uncut sheets that I really focus on.
I got interested in the uncut sheets, when I knew that they printed the decks out on these sheets. Somebody had given me a sheet of Bicycle Rider Backs for a birthday present or something. And I was like: "Wow, that's really cool!" The next step was: "If I frame this and hang it on the wall, I can only see one side of it. So I should probably find another sheet so I could hang them both on the wall, so you can see what each side looks like."
That's okay if you only hang up two or three sheets. But when you start getting into sheets, pretty soon you need a museum or a castle, and maybe even then you can't hang them all up. Right now, I've got over 1200 different uncut sheets. That's not counting duplicates, because I've got a few extras of sheets that I'll hold onto, and if somebody has a sheet I want that I don't have, I'll offer to trade.
That's a lot of uncut sheets. I don't have them hanging up. I went down to Home Depot and I bought these big square pieces of quarter inch plywood, and I've got the uncut sheets in these stacks. It's ridiculous, and it's almost insidious really.
For some of the sheets, I'm the only person with that sheet. I've got sheets from a creator who says, "I don't even have one. You've got the only one." So I know I have sheets in my possession that literally no one's seen - they might have the deck, but I've got the only sheet.
How rewarding has it been to be part of the 52 Plus Joker collecting club?
I'm involved in the 52 Plus Joker, the greatest card club in the world. We have a convention every year, and we get together, and those people are family to me. We've got some of the best card creators in the world come there every year. And we have a dealer's room, and people trade decks, and there's uncut sheets, and there's things that you didn't know existed.
When I first went into the club, it was older people mostly, and if a deck was newer than 1929, they weren't interested. "Oh, that's too new." Now we've got so many new people into the club. We've got members that are into the old decks, and also members collecting all the new decks. And the ones who were mostly into the older decks have come to appreciate the newer decks, and the ones who were mostly in the newer decks have come to appreciate the older decks. Much of this is due to the efforts of my good friend Lee Asher who is our current club president.
You're going to see decks of cards there you never saw in your life, and you didn't even know they existed. And it is awesome.
What has your experience with their annual convention been like?
For myself, just personally, it is the most important convention I ever go to. I would rather miss a magic convention. They canceled MAGIC Live this year. That's sucks, but it doesn't break my heart. I would be more broken hearted if they canceled the 52 Plus Joker Convention.
We've got thousands of people in our club, but only a couple of hundred people show up. And they come from all over the place, some even from Europe. We see our friends there, and the conversation starts off where we left it last time. These are the sweetest, nicest people you will ever meet.
It's got a different vibe than a magic convention. At a magic convention, you show up, you hang out with your magic buddies, you go to the dealer's room, and you sit around doing tricks for each other. You want to come up with a trick to fool all your buddies, or you want to be the first one who did this or that. Everybody's drinking beer, smoking cigarettes, and telling lies. And you stay up all night. And that's a magic convention.
Whereas at the card convention, nobody sits around talking about others, and says things like "That guy stole his trick" or "Did you see what he put on Facebook?" Instead they're all sitting around, saying "Hi, how are you doing? Did you ever find that deck you were looking for?" Or they'll come up and say, "Hey, I think I found that deck you told me about last year. Let me show you." They are all trying to help each other. If there's some nasty people there, I've never met them. And everybody goes to the lectures and we hang out.
It's a different vibe altogether, it's almost like a vacation. I go to three or four magic conventions every year, but when I go to the card convention, I actually relax more. It's just a night and day difference, it really is. That's not to say I don't like my magic conventions. I do. But it is not the same thing.
Does everyone have the same goal in collecting?
There's different types of collectors. There's people that collect decks because they just love playing cards. And they don't care if they're used, or new, or old, or puppy dog cards, or cat cards. Then there's the people who collect cards, and they collect mostly the new decks. "I've got to get every new deck that comes out." (Well, good luck!)
And then there's the ones who I don't really consider actual card collectors, they're speculators. What they do is they buy decks that they think might be worth money later. So they'll go out and buy a couple of bricks, and they wait, hoping that they have the next Jerry Nugget. People who buy decks just wanting to make money with it, that's a whole different mindset and its certainly not mine.
What other kinds of specialized types of collecting are there?
Some people don't collect decks, but they only collect singles. So they'll have these notebooks, these three ring binders you would have in school, with plastic sheets inside. One guy might have four or five binders sitting on his table, and you'll open one of them, and it's nothing but Ace of Spades. This Ace of Spades, and that Ace of Spades. He might have gotten the Ace of Spades out of six different colored decks. They're the same deck, but they're different colored backs, and he's got all the Ace of Spades. Other people collect nothing but Jokers. Others the Suicide Kings. It's amazing, the different possibilities. Singles are a big deal for a lot of folks.
There are people that do nothing but collect tax stamps that were attached to decks of cards for many years. That's what they collect, and they got quite the collection, with more different tax stamps than you can imagine. Some only collect German playing cards, some only French playing cards, you get the idea.
The hobby is so versatile. If you get into it, eventually you're going to spend money, whether you like it or not. And once you go down the rabbit hole, there's just no way of getting out. It's crazy. And then you start making friends and you start learning things. It's the greatest hobby ever.
What kind of dedication can being a collector involve?
I triy to get decks that have relationships. I'm trying to get sets of certain types of decks from certain companies in certain eras, and then complete those sets. And that's what I work on.
For a while it was all the Apollo decks, and then the older the deck is, the tougher it is to find it intact. Because maybe it's missing a Joker, or maybe it's missing the Ace of Spades, or maybe it doesn't have the original box the cards came in. So you wait, and you wait, till maybe five years down the road you find the deck. Now you've got all the cards, but you don't have the box. But then you find a deck that's missing half the deck, but the box is there, and it's almost brand new, so now you've got the box. That's how adamant you have to be if you're a real collector.
What can you tell us about the book you're writing about the famous Escape Map deck?
As for my own projects, I'm working on decks myself that I want to do, some for other people, some for myself. I'm writing some books on magic. I'm doing some graphic novels on the side. And I'm working on my World War II book, about the history of the escape map deck.
As far as projects go, the map deck book is the most important thing I've ever done in my life. Because it is history and it is things that have happened with real people. And it's the truth versus what's on the internet, like what's on the USPCC website. Because people have got it all wrong and I'm correcting that.
But it's taken me most of my life to do that. And I've had to travel around the world and spend lots of money to gather all the things necessary. One of my inspirations is Howard Carter, the archaeologist who was looking for the boy king. All his peers laughed at him, "You're an idiot," they said, "There is no boy king, and you have no evidence that's worth anything." But he spent most of his life on it. And guess what? He found a British Lord who had lots of money and said, "I believe you, how much money do you need to continue your digs?" He started funding him, and guess what? Not only does he find the boy king, but it is the only tomb in the history of archaeology that had all its treasures intact, and that’s a fact. I find that very inspirational.
That has always been the thing that kept me going on the map deck research. Because whenever I would come to a wall, and say "I can't find any more evidence" or "I can't find this or that", then suddenly a year would go by and I'd get a clue. For example, I would read through dozens of old German magazines that were put out after the war, where they're talking to German prison guards, and when translating these interviews from German I would come across something a guard would say in passing, and it would be a clue to what I'm looking for.
I found the things that I've been needing to find in the places that nobody's looking. In the first Indiana Jones movie Raiders of the Lost Ark, where he's looking for the ark, there's a scene where the Germans are digging in the desert, and Indiana Jones realizes that the staff they're using is too short or it's too tall, and they're digging in the wrong place.
That's what all the historians who write books on escape and evasion do. They only mention the map cards in passing, because they don't know the story. People that did have an interest in it, have been looking in the wrong places.
Who are some of your favorite playing card designers?
We have so many talented people in the 52 Plus Joker Club. All the guys are good at what they do, whether it's Lance Miller, Jackson Robinson, Paul Carpenter, Alex Chin, or Randy Butterfield. My two favorites would have to be Randy Butterfield and Alex Chin.
Alex Chin is insanely crazy. I love him crazy, as an artist myself. He doesn't just design a deck of cards or a pair of decks. He'll show something every year to the club, and he'll say, "We're working on these, and there's seven decks. And they all go together, and if you put them side by side they do this, but if you turn them to the left a little bit, and poke through this hole…" He's insane, but I love that kid. He's just an awesome sweet guy.
I consider Randy Butterfield one of my closest buddies. He is like a chameleon, a master of disguises. He can do one set of decks, with a particular style, and then do another set of deck that looks like a whole different person designed them. Most designers kind of have a style, and when you see it, you immediately know who it is.
They're all nice guys, and they're all good at what they do, like Paul Carpenter, and Lance Miller (who I consider like my nephew). All these people are family to me. But Alex Chin and Randy Butterfield, they're off the wall.
How have custom playing cards changed in the modern crowdfunding era?
Those guys I just mentioned have raised the bar. When playing cards really started taking off a few years ago, kids would go on Shutterstock and find some stupid generic design. And they'd go to US Playing Card, put those backs on them with standard faces, and they would run Kickstarters. But once Jackson Robinson hit town with his Federal 52 deck, that was a game changer for everybody. There were kids throwing up generic designs, and Jackson basically said, "Okay, look at this then."
Now the people who were supporting Kickstarter projects have to say, "Look, I've only got so much money. If I really like a project, I want the complete set of decks. And maybe there's four different decks, and one was gilded. And I want at least one or two of each of those, and I want the uncut sheet. Oh, it's got a coin. I want the coin. Well, I'm going to be spending 200 or 300 bucks. But I can't spend 200-300 bucks on a dozen Kickstarters this month."
So now the market has changed because now people are making decisions. "I want to support all these guys because I like all these cards. But financially speaking, I can only support so many. Which ones do I support?" It's good for the card community, now it's a competition. Because not only does it raise the bar, it encourages innovation. This is what's great about capitalism. In capitalism, people don't make a new product out of the kindness of their heart, but they do it because they think they can make money. So every year, every company's got to have a better phone, or a better tablet, or a better computer, or a better game system. And so it makes people have to innovate and make better technologies.
So in the card world, if you want your Kickstarter to fund, and if you want a following, and if you want to get people that support you as an artist, then you better show that you're an artist. You better do something that's more than just "I'm going to use standard faces." For example, these so-called minimalist decks annoy me. Say somebody puts a deck out, it's a white back with a tiny black dot in the center. You can say "minimalist" to me all day long, but I call bullshit, and I say you're lazy.
Are there any other types of playing cards you personally prefer?
Art and food and movies and books are subjective. One man's trash is another man's treasure. As for different styles of decks, I'm more into classic scroll work and that sort of thing. I like the Victorian style.
It's not that I don't like some of the modern decks. Companies like Theory 11 put out some very impressive cards. For instance, foil can look nice, but just because you put lots of silver and gold on the box doesn't mean it's a great deck for me. Sometimes it can be overdone and it becomes too gaudy, and I don't like it.
I've noticed that with a lot of decks most of the effort goes on the box. And often when you get the deck out of the box it is pretty blasé. Maybe it's got a custom Ace of Spades and a Joker, but for the most part it's just standard faces and an okay back. It's just the box that's awesome. I don't know if that's a bad thing or good thing, I just think it's a different thing. Like I said, cards are subjective. If you think the box is awesome, collect it for the box, it's not wrong to do that.
How do you view decks which are printed with a missing card or a misspelling?
I'm the kind of guy that for the most part doesn't open my decks up ever. Somebody could put thousand dollar bills in certain decks, I'd never know it.
One of the things the 52 Plus Joker club does every year is put out a club deck. There's usually a version only the club members can grab right away. One year there was a screw up somewhere. I think we had two of the same card (e.g. two Six of Clubs, and a Seven of Clubs was missing, something to that effect). What they did is reprinted some cards and said, "Here's the missing card." But some people were mad.
I've seen this happen with other projects, and a lot of people get upset. I say, "Why are you mad? That is a screw up, which makes that deck actually more valuable." It'd be like having the upside down airplane postage stamp. Or if they printed a $20 bill and forgot to put the president's face in the center - that would make that bill very valuable.
There's all kinds of decks I try to grab that have problems, like a missing card, or misspellings. And I can understand how a card might get missed. If you're sitting there designing the deck and you're staring at all these Hearts or all these Clubs, I could see that you missed something somehow at the end before you print them. It happens. Sometimes the mistakes that happen have nothing to do with the artist but the company printing the decks.
How do you decide what new decks to add to your collection?
I decide on a case by case basis. I've already realized a long time ago that I cannot get every deck there is. It's just not possible. So what I try to do is grab decks that stand out for me for some reason, and there's something really unique about them.
So not something that is just "another Bicycle branded deck". There's a zillion decks that have the Bicycle logo on them, and some are very pretty, some are very striking, others are blasé. If I miss some Bicycle decks, I'm not going to worry about it. As far as I’m concerned US Playing card has significantly diminished the Bicycle brand by letting so many people use it. True or not, that’s just my personal opinion.
There's other decks that come out which wow me. For instance, last year at the 52 Plus Joker Club convention, I saw two wooden boxes that were sealed with wax. Just the box alone caught my eye - it looked like something out of the 16th century. They immediately stood out for me: "What is this?" It turned out they were two decks from Russia, and I grabbed both of them. When I got home I learned from the internet that the people that made these decks made another version that was just in a standard box, so I'm glad I grabbed these.
I do prefer more classic designs because somebody spent more time with it, I think. But that's not to say I haven't seen some modern designs that were a lot simpler, and that I liked them.
How important is color to you in deciding whether you like a deck?
I think one of the secrets to a modern design that I like - and I'm saying this as an artist - is understanding color.
For instance, Paul Carpenter understands color. I don't look at him as an artist like I do with Randy Butterfield or Alex Chin. I look at Paul Carpenter like an interior decorator who would come into your home and say, "Let's put this type of wallpaper up, and we'll trim it with this, and we're going to put that color carpeting. It'll make this pop and make this room look bigger, and then we can do this." Paul understands color, and if you look at all his decks, his decks pop because he understands the color spectrum, the color wheel, and how to take one color and make it contrast very well with another.
For instance, here's a very simple example that has nothing to do with Paul. If you have black and you were to put orange on it, it pops. Or if you have orange and you put some black on it, it pops. More so that if you put just black on white, or white on black. So Paul Carpenter understands color, and his decks are awesome; they're pretty, and they look good.
Should we just be focusing on new and innovative decks?
I used to say that magicians are like birds - they like shiny things. Make some little gizmo that looks cool, and they'll buy it. They might not ever use it, but they'll buy it because it's cool. With playing cards, cards are like sugar and card collectors are like ants. We're drawn to it because it's sugar, but often too much sugar sometimes is not a good thing.
As far as playing cards go, I look for innovation and new things. But I think a lot of the kids that buy the new decks will start discovering the old decks. It's like the kids at first get into magic who watch all the YouTube videos and buy all the new tricks that Ellusionist puts out. Then they're at a convention and somebody does a trick for them and fools them badly, and they say, "I have got to know how this is done. Is there a YouTube video?" And the guy shakes his head and says, "No, it's in this book here that was written in 1937, chapter four." And the kid goes home and he reads it and he begins to realize that he's looking for stuff that's already there, it's in the books that he's been ignoring. There's also magic to be found in the old decks.
Do you collect any decks that don't fit your personal taste?
I try to get a variety of different decks because of some card books I'm working on writing. So I had to ask myself, "Are these books just written for me, or are they written for everybody?" So I may see a Kickstarter project where as far as I'm concerned the deck is just horrible. But the deck brings in 30 grand and meets its goal. I think the deck sucks, but apparently there's a lot of people out there that like it. So I grab one or two to feature in my book, because other people like it.
It is similar to paintings. I'm not a big Picasso fan. I liked his early illustrations because they're awesome. But once he started getting into the weird shapes and stuff, which made him famous of course, I could not care less. I'm more of a Leonardo da Vinci or Rembrandt fan. But there are people out there who will pay millions of dollars for a Picasso, and not because they want to resell it, but because they like Picasso, and they're genuine fans. And that's okay. So I'm trying to get a variety of things.
But someday I'll die and my kids will look at all these cards and say, "What the hell was dad thinking?" And they'll have no clue because they have no interest in it. That's going to present a problem eventually. They don't know, they're just ignorant. I'm sure they'd walk in and they could pick up a deck of cards that's worth $2,000, but they don’t have a clue. They’ll say; "That's a deck of cards, who cares?" And they would never understand that it's worth $2,000. But it's like that with anything really.
What are some of the factors behind the explosion of the custom playing card decks in recent years?
Ellusionist, like Jason Brumbalow and his Black Tiger design, has helped get it going. They're not the first people ever to print a deck of cards with black faces. That was done back in the 1920s, and I have a deck that has yellow clubs and green diamonds, and was printed on an old Heidelberg when it was really tough to do color. So Ellusionist wasn't the first, but they helped get that whole custom playing cards going. They were a beginning, and the seeds that got the vines growing, you might say.
Crowdfunding has also helped. For crowdfunding, it's mainly Kickstarter of course. Indiegogo does a few card projects, but not many. Most people go to Kickstarter because there's more of an audience and people understand Kickstarter a little better.
Crowdfunding helps because when I was a young man, if you were to go to USPCC and you said, "I want to make a custom deck of cards", you had to get 25,000 decks done, and that was a lot of money. And so most people said "Oh, forget that," and it was just out of their means to do it. But crowdfunding suddenly opened up the door, so they could say "Hey, I could maybe do this." And over the years, places like USPCC have lowered the minimum orders, and have made it a lot easier.
So I think it's a combination of crowdfunding, the trend that started with Ellusionist, and the cardistry movement, that have helped - all of it.
But not magicians. Most magicians do not collect decks of cards. They just don't. They like Bicycle Rider Backs and Tally-Ho's, and that's about it. Card collectors are a whole different animal.
What are some common mistakes that creators of custom decks make on Kickstarter?
SSome of them don't understand anything to do with business. They've never owned a business, and they've never created a product and tried to market it, so they make really, really bad business decisions. For instance, they'll start a Kickstarter project and say, "I'm printing 5,000 of these decks, and my goal is whatever amount of money, say $12,000. And I'm going to offer a t-shirt and whatever.
But here's what happens in real life. Firstly, in the printing industry, in the old days if you were printing, a thousand of something, you stopped the press about when you thought you were hitting a thousand, and you could get pretty good at it. But sometimes you'd go over a little bit and sometimes you'd go under a little bit, so there's an overage or an underage. So if you go to USPCC and say "I want 2,500 decks," you may end up with 2,800 or you may end up with 1,800. And so what happens is they run these Kickstarters, and say they're going to do 5,000 decks and they get all these people pledging. And say they get lucky and they actually get 5,000 decks from USPC. But they don't take into account decks that are going to get lost in the mail, damaged decks, things like this. And so what happens is they get backers saying "Hey man, I didn't get my cards," or "They were torn up", or "They were damaged," and they have no way to make good on that. And they've already spent all their money.
And they don't take into account: how are you going to ship all these decks? Where are you going to put them? The truck's going to show up, so where are you going to put all these – in your garage, or your mommy and daddy's garage? Is there room? Or you're going to stick them by the washing machine or something? Then how are you going to sort through all these? Are you going to do it yourself, or are you going to have your school mates come, and you're going to buy them pizza and help unpack? Where are you going to buy all this packing material? Did you take into account how much that would cost? And did you understand how much it's going to cost to ship these to Europe or someplace else?
They don't think about any of this stuff and they get themselves in over their heads. And so there have been - at least to my knowledge, and they're probably more - eight or nine Kickstarter projects that took the people's money and never delivered the goods. In one project I supported, when everyone asked "Where's my stuff?" the guy says, "Well we reached our goal, but it really didn't make the money we thought it would. So my wife and I went to Europe, and I replaced my computer, and we did this and that, and we really appreciate it. Maybe someday we'll print these." So basically they took everybody's money and went to Europe. How nice of them.
That's the reality of crowd funding. You're taking a chance. It's nothing but a pre order. It's like Xbox Live saying, "The new Call of Duty game is going to be out in November, and if you pre order now you get $10 off and something for free." And so you order it sight unseen, and you hope that Activision is going to deliver the game in November.
What have creators of custom decks learned from this in how they approach crowdfunding?
Kickstarter went through this crazy moment where sometimes a project would have eight different versions of decks, and tee shirts, and bumper stickers, and coins, and a statue, and all this more. Then they realized this was a pain to ship all this stuff, and to have it made. Maybe the fulfillment guy that makes the statute didn't come through for you, so it is three months late and people were getting upset. So most creators have toned it down, and say "I'm making these decks, and these are the colored versions, and here's an uncut sheet."
They've really toned it down, because when you do that, it's not just grabbing a couple of decks, dropping them into the bubble wrap and envelope, and shipping them out. Instead it is like: "So this backer has got a coin, okay, I can slide in there. But oh, he's got a tee shirt, now that's a whole separate thing." So it gets more complicated. For creators it's about crunching the numbers and figuring out how to do it economically in the best way.
And creators will learn real quick that a lot of collectors are very particular. So if they get their two decks in the mail and it's got a little tiny dent in the corner, they're not happy. Because in their mind, they're thinking "You just devalued the deck! It's got a little nick in the corner. And I know technically the cards are probably in mint condition inside, and there's nothing wrong with them. But there is this little dent, and if I were to sell it later, someone's going to say, It's got a dent so it's not worth $50." So you've got to replace those or something, and you've got to make good on it because they're not happy.
Which means the only way to get around that is more packing. And hope that the post office or UPS or FedEx or whoever you're using doesn't demolish your product when you're shipping it to them. Not everybody is in a situation like you [Will Roya] where you have turned this into an exact science. Most of the guys I know who are creating cards are creating on an iPad, or they're in their living room watching TV, and they're designing a deck of cards and they don't have a good setup.
What should backers look for to avoid having an experience with a creator who doesn't deliver their project?
One that always raises a red flag for me is somebody who has never run a project at all. That doesn't mean that they're a bad person, but it does mean that this is their first project, and for everything there's a first time. If you look at their profile, and they have launched a Kickstarter project, but they've never supported a card project in their life, that makes me leery. "Wait a minute, you want me to buy your deck, but you've never supported a Kickstarter project at all?"
Compare that with somebody who has never run a Kickstarter project, but when you look at their profile you see they have backed 87 projects in the past. That's someone who's obviously seriously into cards, because they've backed 87 projects. So you're probably a little safer going with them because this is the first one, versus someone who just comes out of nowhere and he lives in China or wherever. You don't know anything about the guy. I've easily backed over 100 Kickstarters, so if I ever launched a deck, people would say "Oh, it's Steve Brooks. Okay, yeah, I'm going to get my cards."
What I'm saying is it makes it tough though. Maybe the kid who's never backed a project only because he's never thought about it, has got a really awesome looking deck. And you're thinking "It's a really awesome looking deck, and I wouldn't mind getting these." But still, you're kind of leery. Because Kickstarter says "We're the middle man, we have nothing to do with this." I understand Kickstarter's position. It's like with the Magic Café: "I just present the meeting place. It's not my fault if the two of you are screaming at each other. I didn't cause that."
There's a guy whose Kickstarter project I supported who hasn't made good on his project, although he has always delivered before. I don't go on the forums and complain because everybody already knows and everybody's unhappy. And whatever might've happened to him in his life, maybe he should have handled it better and he didn't. But people make mistakes and I'm just going to blow it off. It's a chance you take. Out of all the Kickstarter projects, I've only been screwed on a couple of them and I'll take my chances. But I kind of use my own judgment on that kind of stuff. If a red flag pops up in my head, I just don't.
What other advice do you have about this for creators of a Kickstarter project for a custom deck?
As long as there's good people like you [Will Roya], Randy Butterfield, Jackson Robinson, and other people, and as long as people run Kickstarter projects and they deliver, that's fine. If they don't deliver, word gets around. It's a small community. People will call each other up, so-and-so screwed me, man. And other people are like, yeah man, he screwed me too. And pretty soon it will affect him because word gets around.
It is the same way in the magic world. You can go around stealing other people's tricks, but word gets around, and pretty soon nobody trusts you anymore. It takes years to build up customers, even in a grocery store. If you screw one or two of them, those people will go around and they will tell everybody that you screwed them.
People generally don't say something when they're happy. If someone goes to a restaurant and they're really happy, they may not necessarily even mention it. Unless someone asks "Have you ever eaten there?" then they might say "Yeah, they've got really good food." But otherwise they never say anything. But if they get screwed and get food poisoning, they're telling everybody, "Don't eat at Bill's Cafe, it's horrible."
So, I would say to anybody contemplating doing a Kickstarter for a card project, do yourself a favor, support some other projects first, get to be known a little bit in the community to establish a little bit of trust. And if you do promise something, deliver what you promised. If something unexpected happens and there is a delay or you can’t deliver as expected – Be honest with your backers.
What should creators do if they can't deliver their project?
Say something bad does happen, because disaster can happen to the best of us. If something horrible happens, say maybe you got the cards and your house burned down for real, and you lost everything and you didn't have any insurance or whatever, then be honest with people. Just tell them, "This is what happened. By the way, here's the link to the article in my local paper and I'm going to do my very best as soon as I can to make good on this somehow." People may not be happy with that, but they will at least understand that you were honest with them and hopefully you'll make good on it.
Years ago I produced a lot of magic DVDs. I spent a lot of money on my own cameras and editing, and I did good on them, and I'm proud of them, they're awesome. But then the DVD market died out and there was no money in it, and I was getting screwed. So I was losing money on every project. There were times that I would ship DVDs to England, or Japan, or Canada, and somebody might not get it. They'd send me a note, "Steve, it's broken, or it doesn't play right, or it never got here." I never told them, "Well send it back to me or prove it to me." I would just replace it and I would always drop in another DVD or two and say, "I am really sorry about that. Here, have a couple of these titles as well." It doesn't cost you that much money to make good on something for somebody.
Where do you see playing cards going in the future?
I can only speculate. It's like music, which goes through stages. And so do movies and TV. For a while, it is sci-fi movies/TV shows, and medical shows, then there's detective shows, and it's martial arts films, and eventually it goes back to this. It goes through cycles and music does the same thing.
When I was a kid, my grandparents would sit around and play Cribbage and there was always decks of cards in the house. Times change. With the advent of video games and everything, playing cards and board games were not so popular. Before everything went crazy about 8 or 10 years ago, I would do shows and sometimes people didn't know what their chosen card was. They would say, "It's a little guy holding a sword" or "It's a puppy dog" and I would say "Are you seeing Clubs?" They didn't even know what they were.
Then when World Series of Poker, Texas Hold’em and other shows came on TV, playing cards became popular again. And you've got small companies making board games and card games, whether it's Cards Against Humanity, or Dungeons and Dragons and different fantasy games. And that's good.
Do you expect the current boom in custom playing cards to continue?
It used to be that magicians would always say with an odd looking deck, "I can't use that in my show because people will think it's a trick deck even though it's not, so I only want to use red or blacks Bicycle branded cards. " But nowadays you're seeing custom decks appearing in Walmart and Barnes & Noble and Walgreens and all over the place. So the general public is starting to see decks other than Hoyle decks and Bicycle decks, and the different crazy decks.
I don't see the card industry disappearing. I hear people all the time – not serious card collectors – who say, "It's a phase, a fad, and it's going to die off, it's going to go. My sales have dropped in the magic shop, and I don't sell that many." I say: maybe in your shop, but what are you choosing to sell? I don't see the enthusiasm dropping in the 52 Plus Joker club. And there are several new Kickstarters every week with playing cards. Not all of them make it, and I've seen ones that were unfunded - somebody tries six times, but on the seventh time he finally makes it.
And the market will decide the fate of playing cards. It depends on the economy, and how much extra spending money people have. Do I put milk in the refrigerator, or do I buy a new deck of cards? That in some cases might be what it comes down to. For kids living at home who have no expenses, this doesn't seem to be a problem. There will be a few people that get out of it. They just lose interest, maybe because they discover girls and they get away from it. But even some of them will come back to it.
As long as there's this interest, and the interest is partially the economy, and as long as the artists themselves try to innovate. I don't see it ending anytime soon.
How is the market going to play a role in whether new custom decks keep appearing?
There are going to be producers who were making decks by hiring artists, when their sales aren't what they were, they might drop out. They may say, "Well, I'm only making a $3000, $4,000 a project now and it's not worth my time." The guys that are in it for the quick bucks and for the short term, they might stop. They'll stop and it's a money issue.
But plenty of other producers won't stop. Murphy's Magic isn't going to stop. The Buck Twins, Ellusionist, Theory 11 - they are not going to stop. And they're selling decks outside of the magic community. They'll produce decks where they run off 100,000 decks at a time. That's a lot of cards, versus little Joey who ran his little Kickstarter with his spotted owl deck, and he ran off a thousand of them. Maybe he had fun and that's great, and maybe he'll go on to do better things, but he'll probably be a one hit wonder and you'll never see him again.
So it's combination of the designers and the economy – that's just the facts. Because I don't care how much you love cards and love designing them, you can't do it for free. The reality is you have to at least be able to pay for the cards you're producing.
What role do artists play in keeping people interested in custom decks in coming years?
Do they want to get lazy? Because if they get lazy and they produce crap, I'm not going to buy crap. I refuse to. It's like in the retail market for anything - if you put out a crappy product, word gets out and people quit buying. If it's a video game and it sucks, nobody wants it. Even if the graphics are really awesome, if it's got a lot of problems and bugs and doesn't work the way it's supposed to, then nobody wants it.
Some people think "It's the magic community that collects playing cards", but it's not the magic community that is the cards community. With playing cards it's all about the art. So it's up to the artists – including any up and coming artists that maybe nobody knows about yet. As long as there's innovation in the art. I have noticed cards went through this weird thing where everyone's doing cards about Vikings, and then pirates, and then something else. So they're using easy themes. It's like movies that keep doing remakes. There's millions of books out here, but you've got to make a movie that's a remake, really? So if the artists themselves keep coming up with unique things, there'll be that interest. If it becomes where all the decks just look the same, you might have a problem.
And I don't see these creators stopping anytime soon. And I don't see their imaginations ending anytime soon. Let's say someone wants to make a deck based on Vikings but there has already been two or three different Viking decks out there. That doesn't mean another one can't be done differently. How many people have painted paintings of the ocean, of the beach and the rocks and the waves? There's thousands and people keep buying them.
I don't see real artists following trends. Designers like Lance Miller don't say, "This is popular right now, so I'm going to do a deck on the Coronavirus because everybody's talking about it." I don't see these guys doing that. Maybe some opportunist from China might try to cash in on it and make Coronavirus decks. But the serious designers and the people that buy decks think that's stupid. If it's in a dollar store, maybe I might grab one just to throw it in there because it's stupid.
How can artists keep innovating?
Not everybody is Alex Chin, who's the Einstein of playing cards. But even Alex Chin, in my opinion, has to be careful, and here's why. It's like being David Copperfield. Once upon a time he had a new special every year, "I'm going to vanish a jet" and "I'm going to walk through the Great Wall of China" and "I'm going to float over the Grand Canyon" and "I'm going to vanish the Statue of Liberty." In each special he attempted to outdo himself, "I did that last time, so now I'm going to do this." Much of this is pressure from the television networks, But it gets to a point, how do you outdo yourself now? "I'm going to vanish the moon." Okay, now what?
Alex never ceases to amaze me - he's out of control! But I think even at some point Alex will change direction a little bit. So it won't be seven or eight decks each time, but it might just be two decks, and it goes a different direction.
It's like writers who write certain books. Most people think of Stephen King as the guy who writes creepy stories. But he's also written stories like Shawshank Redemption, which is a prison story, and has nothing to do with monsters or creepy things in the hallway at night. So he's able - as a writer - to go into a different direction. Most of these artists that I know personally have the ability to go off into whatever direction they want to go off.
Conclusion
Steve Brooks is certainly a fascinating individual, with a wide range of interests and abilities, and he's has definitely immersed himself deeply into the world of collecting playing cards. Being able to take a look into his life as a collector has been a very interesting exercise to say the least, and he's also shared many valuable perspectives about the playing card industry and the hobby of collecting. His project on the Escape Map deck is going to be well worth looking out for when he finally completes and publishes it.But the above interview only captures one of Steve's many passions, and there's a whole other side to his life, as a magician and as owner of The Magic Café forum. So we have another treat in store for you, with a follow-up interview that focuses on that - look for that to appear shortly!
Where to learn more? Check out the official website: The Magic Cafe
- Learn more about the Magic Cafe: Welcome Message, FAQ, Rules & Etiquette, Forums
- The Magic Cafe on social media: Twitter, Facebook
- Steve Brooks on social media: Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn
About the writer: EndersGame is a well-known and respected reviewer of board games and playing cards. He loves card games, card magic, cardistry, and card collecting, and has reviewed several hundred boardgames and hundreds of different decks of playing cards. You can see a complete list of his game reviews here, and his playing card reviews here. He is considered an authority on playing cards and has written extensively about their design, history, and function, and has many contacts within the playing card and board game industries. You can view his previous articles about playing cards here. In his spare time he also volunteers with local youth to teach them the art of cardistry and card magic.
Last update date: 09/16/20
2 comments
What a wonderful interview. Steve is one cool cat.
Excellent interview, Ender’s Game! Thank you. I really like the history and Steve’s perspective. I’m not really a collector — though my office is starting to look pretty full with decks stacked on the floor and desk! I look for decks to add mystique to card magic, especially those with some good gaffs. Steve’s remarks on Kickstarter campaigns are very useful. Sounds like my ideas to reissue some vintage and authentic style USPCC decks with extras for magicians would be a tough exercise to embark on. Probably not a huge market for them????