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Welcome to Upper Deck Store!
The Upper Deck Company, LLC (colloquially as Upper Deck and Upper
Deck Authenticated, Ltd. in the UK), founded in 1988, is a private
company primarily known for producing trading cards.
Paul Sumner, who worked in printing sales, came up with the idea for
a premium card and hired Robert Young Pelton to design and produce a
prototype. Pelton's agencies, Pelton & Associates and Digital
Artists, was replaced by Chiat Day. Paul Sumner resigned with the
understanding that he would be known as the "Co-Founder of Upper
Deck", something that the company's owner and CEO, Richard McWilliam,
recognizes to this day.
The company has exclusive agreements to produce memorabilia (under
the brand name Upper Deck Authenticated) with such sports superstars
as Michael Jordan (who is also on the board of directors), Kobe
Bryant, Tiger Woods, LeBron James, Albert Pujols, Kevin Durant,
Sandy Koufax, and Ken Griffey Jr. Former Major League relief pitcher
De Wayne Buice was a partner, and was instrumental in negotiating
Upper Deck's first license with the Major League Baseball Players
Association.
Company history
On December 23, 1988, Upper Deck was granted a license by Major
League Baseball to produce baseball cards. The first case of Upper
Deck Baseball Cards was delivered February 28, 1989, to George Moore
of Tulsa's Baseball Card Store in Tulsa, OK. The Upper Deck Company
sold out its baseball cards midway through this inaugural year, then
pre-sold its entire 1990 baseball stock before the year began. The
1990 set included the industry's first randomly inserted personally
autographed and numbered cards of sports superstars.
On March 20, 1990, The Upper Deck Company was granted licenses by
the National Hockey League and National Hockey League Players
Association to produce hockey cards. The company also obtained
licenses from the National Football League and the National
Basketball Association in 1990, making the Upper Deck Company the
first trading card company in 10 years to be licensed by all four
leagues. In 1995, the company produced its first racing product. In
1996, it expanded its racing line when it absorbed Maxx. Upper Deck
was also the first to insert swatches of game-used material into
cards when it made jersey cards in 1996 UD Basketball. The insert
set was called Game Jersey and a similar set followed in baseball
the next year, where UD cut up game used jerseys of Ken Griffey Jr.,
Tony Gwynn and Rey Ordonez.
In July 2005, Upper Deck won the liquidation auction of former
competitor Fleer-SkyBox International's brand name, assets, and
business model, as well as the Fleer Collectibles die-cast business
assets.
In March 2007, Upper Deck made an offer to buy competitor Topps
and competes with Madison Dearborn Partners and Tornante Company.
Upper Deck is currently in litigation to stop the sale.
Upper Deck originally included the year of the trading card set's
release on its logo, with the "19" above "Upper" and the last two
digits of the year under "Deck" (but both inside the green diamond).
This was practice was dropped midway through the 1994 season.
NBA Exquisite Collection
Upper Deck premiered its NBA Exquisite Collection line in the
2003-2004 season. Each pack contained five basketball cards; one
veteran base card numbered to 225, one autographed rookie card
featuring a piece of patch worn by the player numbered to 99 or 225,
one game worn jersey card, one autographed/patch insert card, and a
fifth card that was either a low numbered parallel or an additional
autographed patch card. Suggested retail price of the product was
$500, making it the most expensive basketball card product ever
produced at the time. (The few packs that remain unopened now sell
for over $4,000.) Autograph cards include veterans such as Michael
Jordan, Patrick Ewing, Kobe Bryant, Kevin Garnett, LeBron James,
Dwyane Wade, and Carmelo Anthony. The most sought after cards from
the line include the autographed/patch rookie cards numbered to 99 (LeBron
James, Darko Milicic, Carmelo Anthony, Chris Bosh, Dwyane Wade, and
Udonis Haslem), the Limited Logos inserts which feature an extra
large jersey patch piece and autograph, and the autographed/patch
rookie parallels serial numbered to the player's jersey number.
In view of the series' success, the company has released 2004-05 and
2005-06 basketball sets, a 2005 football line, and an analogous
2005-06 hockey line called The Cup.
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