General Forum

Just finished reviewing my goals for 2023, and wanted to say THANK YOU to 
all the great traders that I traded with this year!  We have a great trading 
community here!  I set several goals in January of last year and was able to 
achieve all but one goal. 
Goals
#1-Make 400 trades!  Ended the year with 478 completed trades=goal met!
     Top Traders for the year--  schwefumbler       10
                                                   gorrister                 8
                                                  drew_engquist        7
                                                  GoldenEagles555   6
                                                   jamc2330               6
                                                   PIANELLI                6
                                                  Stevie Jay               6

#2-Trade with 25 members that I haven't traded with before.  Thankfully, that 
number was blown away.  I was able to trade with 120 members that were 
new traders for me.  Those 120 new traders accounted for 208 trades!  A lot 
of these traders were real new to the site, so reach out to new folks, a lot of 
them want to trade!  Goal met!

#3-Trade with all 50 states. Missed this by 3, Louisiana, New Mexico, Vermont. 
 La 15 members, most inactive. NM 1 inactive member. Vt 5 members, 1 active.
Goal not made!

#4-Trade with at least 15,000 cards swapped both ways and my total sent to 
be 500-1000 more than what my trade partners sent.
Swapped-18,415  Received-8,951  Sent-9,464  Difference-513  Goal Met!  
These numbers dont include any extra cards that I may have shipped with 
trades or PIFs, but I hope to get closer to 1,000 more shipped this year.  

Here's some other info regarding my tracking a full year of trading.  

Top States to trade with=Texas 48, Illinois 30, Michigan 25, North Carolina 24, 
California 23.
Bubble Mailer Trades-32  PWE Trades-446 
Postage for 475 Trades-$722.85
USPS system is very unpredictable, some PWEs beat Bubble mailers, some 
take forever.  
Longest PWE shipment was 24 days.  I am currently awaiting 2 PWEs, one 
was shipped on 12/14, the other 12/16-25 days and 23 days.  I don't consider 
anything lost before 30 days.
I had 3 Trades become Problem trades, no cards received and one never completed.

Almost forgot, the 475 trades helped me complete 51 sets in 2023!!!

Looking forward to trading more in '24!!!

BobbyL

Congratulations!  Always a pleasure trading with you and glad we're off to a good start in 2024 as well. 

Awesome stats! I’ve always wanted to do something like this but just never have the time. 

I could never keep up with all those stats. Congratulations 

Congrats! Glad I could be a part of the 478 trades.

Excellent! I know we did one recently so happy to help out. I know you were one of my first trades on this site when I joined in 2021.

Always a pleasure to trade with you Bobby and glad I could cross Alaska off your list.  

Bobby I'm impressed with the effort to keep those stats. Congrats. We need to awaken those Louisiana and NM natives.

Everyone I appreciate all the kind words. 

Joshua, after starting the spread sheet project, it really was enjoyable.  Since I trade a lot, I  needed to track trades better, and I wanted to learn more of my trade partner names-not just usernames.  I had all the info on one sheet, so I could see dates that I mailed, cost of postage, real names, user names, addresses,  date received, and I put an x  when feedback was left completing the trade.  When I started here it was a little rocky, but I have made a lot of great trade partners and enjoy helping others build their sets and team sets.  I'm doing the spreadsheet again this year, hope to make a lot of new trade partners and ship out a bunch of cards this year. 

Impressive that you have taken all that time to compile the data.  After sitting all day in an office looking at data, I just couldn't bring myself to do something similar, but the thought did cross my mind a few times.  I also thought about opening a separate account at my bank so I could easily keep track of how much I am spending on postage. I didn't do this as I try to justify the cost of postage against the cost of what I would have to pay for the cards I am receiving at a card show. Anyway...congrats on all the trades...I know we have several...maybe we can get a few more in so I can get on the all-star list next year!!