Many of you who have been in the hobby/internet/world/universe might be familiar with Derium’s TCG and the Card Shop Life, now (somewhat) defunct, youtube channel that pioneered content creation, live streaming and was effectively reality tv.
I didnt know of this gem until 2018/2019 when the heyday card shop was already closed and Derium was using the channel to open boxes until he sold the channel sometime in/after 2020.
However, I became addicted. I had never been big on MTG but grew up on pokemon since 96’/97’ and the content they captured just resonated so much with me. The carpet clad card shops I frequented in my youth and angst and uncertainty of my highschool years were so palpatable and and nostalgic to me that I have watched the entirety of 500ish episodes twice, plus revisiting the early ones repeatedly.
One thing I find very sad is that many of the greatest moments have been removed or made private, especially the controversiaL, original “flip it or rip it” game - how would that go over now with base set?!
Anyhow, I digress. I bring to you all, the great public of E4 this one grand query: what ever happened to Derium’s and the Card Shop Life?
What was the demise?
What do you remember?
How do you feel about it?
Let this thread be an hommage to all of the joy we experienced living vicariously through some kids at a card shop! I for one think it is one of the greatest time capsules ever and want to work to preserve it, but for now please share all of your thoughts and memories related to one of the most unique/greatest moments in tcg history that existed somewhere in a little strip mall in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio.
Card shop life was a cute idea. I think they pivoted into openings as they were getting more views. In fact I think that is why they did eventually did more pokemon content than mtg. Of course this was just the observers opinion at the time.
As for why it ended, could be a number of reasons. Not to be too much of a downer but every content creator has to end at some point. Either way it was a fun idea and I think Rudy tried doing it for awhile, but it just didn’t earn as much traffic.
Although I don’t know of this channel, I can fully relate to the content. I played and collected MTG around this time and have a lot of really fond memories of these sets. I couldn’t believe that some kids were still playing with Pokemon cards, as the MTG sets were incomprehensibly cool compared to Pokemon XY.
If only I took the hundreds of dollars that I spent at the LGS and bought vintage Pokemon instead.
I remember watching Derium open mass amounts of product back in the day.
I’d go over to a friend’s house in 2016 or so and throw on a 6h opening video while we hung out.
Although I never watched the Card Shop Life show, Derium would often have friends help with openings or have their own segments.
I’d also say, not everyone is set for the part time card shop life, so it’s possible the group just displbanded for life events and career paths.
I used to watch the openings in the background, I don’t remember when though. Sad to see it end, but all things do eventually. Hopefully it was on their terms!
Very poignant Scott and thank you so much for jumping in. I think you are ultimately correct with the macro of shops, but i wonder if anyone out there that was closer to the source might know if there was any specific incident or moment that put the business out. Im familiar with Rudy and his card shop lofe which is also a great series, especially with how he constantly still harps on how brick and mortar is dead and DO NOT OPEN A BRICK AND MORTAR CARD SHOP…
With that in mind i often wonder if the decision to close Deriums was a long drawn out situation or was there a bad set and buying/inventory/overhead that drove them out of business. As the channel tapered off over the years i have not been able to find any content of Mr. Derium elaborating on what was happening at the end of it all, which is largely why I created this thread apart from wanting to just reminisce and see peoples thoughts
I watched most of Rudy’s CSL video series (more for his entertaining personality than anything), and I just got the faint impression that he didn’t truly care whether it succeeded or not. Rudy had the capital to be able to roll the dice on a brick-and-mortar without need for too much hesitation. I think he started it more as a “let’s see where this goes” passion-project. I think the fun probably ended when the numbers and time-input simply didn’t justify it. In Derium’s case, I imagine he/they probably just pivoted to align with newer, lower-effort business models.
Watching CSL used to be a guilty pleasure type thing for me. I only dabbled with Magic myself but still got a kick out of watching them and their antics. It had a good run but it takes a lot of work to consistently put out content like that. I think they’re lives got busier as time went on, along with some changes at the shop with employees etc.
Once Derium really took off with Pokemon he pretty much left Magic behind to my knowledge. I can’t remember everything that happened in the lead up to the sale of the Derium’s YT channel but I do believe he recently got it back.
Derium has videos on this I think, but he was basically bought out my TrollandToad IIRC. He was going to stay on as a content creator, but he kinda went off the rails and got dropped by TnT.
He has a new Twitch channel now, basically just shows reruns of old livestreams
It wasn’t TnT that bought him out, it was to a person that was working with Derium in NC. But Derium was doing some consulting for TnT and the new owner, now call LuxuryBallCollectibles. Due to differences in direction, they parted ways.
Derium has a new twitch channel DeriumAndWifey and recently got their YouTube channel back.
