CULLMAN, Ala. – Cullman Sportscards & Fun Shop officially opened the doors of its new location in downtown Cullman Wednesday morning and owner Johnny Kampis is excited to welcome everyone to the new space. Kampis first opened the store in April 2021 near East Point Shopping Center but as the business continued to grow, it became clear he would need some more space.
“I outgrew that space fairly quickly. That building is just a little over 500 square feet, so I’ve needed more space for a while. We were looking at two options, either expanding that building or moving downtown and it just happened that Greg at (Camelot Books and Comics) had rented this space for a little while to expand his store and then he decided to move all his comics back over there and it became available,” Kampis said. “I talked to Wayne Roberts who owns the building, and the rent was certainly affordable, so we decided to move here into town. And you can’t beat the location, we’re 30 feet from Hwy. 31 and Hwy. 278 so it seemed like a no-brainer.”
Kampis was a big card collector in the ‘90s and after taking some time away from the hobby, he found an opportunity to dive back in 20 years later.
“I collected cards like a lot of people back in the ‘90s. There was a big boom in the market, and they also just printed stuff to the moon. A lot of that stuff isn’t worth as much now unfortunately but like a lot of people I kind of got out of it when I got out of college and had to pay my own way. That was expendable income that I didn’t want to expend,” Kampis joked. “So, I got out of it for about 20 years and what got me back into it was I bought a collection from Moulton on Facebook Marketplace, and it was a guy’s stuff from a card store over there in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s. I really bought it just to kind of liquidate it but once I started sorting through them it really rekindled my love of cards and then I realized that the market had gone nuts. In 2020 when Covid first hit all the collectibles markets went up because people were stuck at home and getting back into their old hobbies. So, that was really the emphasis behind it and things just kind of moved quickly from there until we opened the store in April 2021.”
Now that he has more space to play with, Kampis looking forward to hosting regular events like trade nights, tournaments and more. Keep an eye on the Cullman Sportscards & Fun Shop’s Facebook page for announcements about upcoming events.
“Now that we have a bigger space, I have this second room back here and we’ve got some tables set up for about 14 people and we’re definitely planning to start having regular trade nights,” Kampis said. “Possibly breaks where people buy in to like a team or a division or something and you open up a box or a case and they get all the players so that’s a good way to maybe hit some big cards for a lower price. We’re also looking at maybe hosting some Pokémon tournaments or stuff like that, so I love having this space to be able to do those kinds of things. We’ve got a couple arcade machines too that can be entertainment for kids that want to come and play those. We’d love to start having regular events like that.”
Cullman Sportscards & Fun Shop is located at 207A Third St. SW between MarMac Real Estate and Camelot Books and Comics. Everyone who visits the store this week will have a chance to enter for a $100 cash prize.
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