One of our customers, Rob, wanted to write a review of our service following his first submission with us. We were thrilled to hear of his experience so far. He’s kindly agreed to let us share his experience on our blog… so here it is….
“With the increase in popularity in Pokémon recently, the demand for graded cards has been extremely high.
If you are a long-term collector, flipper or just your casual ‘pack opener’ – then who and how to grade your cards is a hot topic right now.
Having scoured the internet, doing hours of research on this subject, I decided that my first submission was going to be sent to Beckett. This was mainly for the pull of the elusive black label, the slabs I saw looked high grade, the sub grades are cool, and it seemed like they valued the Pokémon sector a little more than some of their competitors.
After then doing some more research I found a relatively new company called Black Label Grading who act as a middleman for Beckett Grading Services.
I decided to give them a try, they only had a couple of posts on Instagram at the time but it seemed like they had the infrastructure and resources in place to supply a good quality service.
Black Label Grading are the only company in the UK that have this service for Beckett, they are a small company so I wanted to give you an idea of my experience so far…”
The Introduction & My Submission
“So I sent 11 cards on the 4th of January, filled out the submission form from the extremely simple to use website and packaged my cards up to send. With it being my first submission, the packaging was ridiculously over the top, I’m talking ridiculous… they were in sleeves, toploaders, bubble wrap, a small plastic box filled with packing wrapped in bubble wrap in a bigger box taped with Gaffer tape.
I sent a message on Instagram apologising for the OTT packaging which was replied to instantly and then on the 5th of January (yes the next day) I was responded to as soon as my cards arrived.
The exact message read – “your cards have arrived, two words… Bomb proof” – haha!”
The Second Stage
“By the 5th of January, my cards were on their internal database. I had also forgotten what cards I had sent so they sent me a list of the cards I had submitted by email.
These are the cards:
Oranguru –Vivid Voltage
Charizard Vmax – Darkness Ablaze
Snorlax Vmax RR – Sword & Shield
Garddevoir Vmax RR – Champions Path
Charizard V promo – Champions Path
Moltres Zapdos Articuno RR – Hidden Fates
Celebi Amazing Rare – Vivid Voltage
Pikachu Vmax – Vivid Voltage
Kanazawa’s Pikachu Promo – Promo
I had already specified on the form which service I would like to use which in this case was the Ruby service. This service was the Standard service (4-5 month turnaround) with Beckett.
By the 6th of January they had sent me an invoice to pay the total amount which I paid instantly.
The receipt of this was then sent to me instantly.”
The Third Stage
“As I was quite early with my submission and it being my first one I was extremely inpatient and probably quite annoying asking questions on Instagram and wondering what the next stage would be when it came to the date of the submission to Beckett.
Black Label Grading responded to any question I had within 1 HOUR of me sending the message either on Instagram or via email 1 HOUR! Other companies I have used recently have been sometimes up to 2 weeks!!
The submission date was towards the end of the month and I was expecting to hear from them early Feb but I had an email from them in my inbox by the 27th of January stating my cards had been sent to Beckett!
I then had an email 5 days later stating they had arrived in TEXAS in the BGS facility and where ready to take their next steps in the grading process.“
The Conclusion
“Negatives:
- Price… This is very dictated by Beckett who have also now decided to up their price structure to deter submissions at the lower service and middle service levels to ease pressure.
Positives:
- Black Label Grading have been phenomenal! Their customer service has been second to none and personal approach is outstanding. They posted on their Instagram page with one of my cards tagging my Instagram, they have responded to questions instantly and their updates on the process have been top notch.
- Website is clear and concise, the payment process has been smooth, the information for newbies is easy to understand and the send address is clearly stated.
I also asked them how they plan to keep up with the customer service level they currently provide which they have assured me they will be able to keep up even when they inevitably get a lot bigger as a company.
I honestly cannot recommend them enough. The experience has been far better than any other companies that I have used recently.
The constant updates on their Instagram page, live videos to explain what is happening, the personal approach pretty much answering every question on the live video also great.”
We thank Rob for this review and hope it helps enlighten others to the BLG process. If you have any questions, please get in touch.
