Business Community
Big Nate’s Trading Cards trades up to a bigger space across Judson Street, at Peninsula Shopping Center
The retail space that Big Nate’s Trading Cards will soon occupy in the Peninsula Shopping Center is recessed from the main sidewalk, lending it the feel of a quiet courtyard.
But when owner Nate Ullevig envisions that outside area, it’s anything but empty or silent.
He sees people there, spilling out from the crowd inside the store at gatherings such as Pokémon and The Topps Company official trading card release events. At such meetups, the excitement is audible as customers rip wrappers from factory-sealed packs of the latest cards, challenge each other to games, propose trades or just kick back and compare what they got in their purchases.
A better space
Peninsula Shopping Center is a short-distance move for Big Nate’s Trading Cards. For a little over four years, the shop has done business from an attic space in a commercial building that sits just across Judson Street in downtown Gig Harbor.
But for Ullevig, it’s decidedly a move forward. The new space is bigger and the layout more advantageous for displaying an expanded product line and for hosting events. At 1,500 square feet, the new shop has twice his old store’s floor space, but with higher ceilings and interior walls no longer sloping to follow the roofline, it feels three times as big, he said.
Nate Ullveig with some of the merchandise for sale at Big Nate’s Trading Cards. Photo by Ted Kenney
The new Big Nate’s Trading Cards will have twice as much cabinet space as the old one, and much more wall display. The bigger size will enable it to host events and even become official Pokémon Play Network and Wizards Play Network hosts, Ullevig said. (Wizards of the Coast is publisher of the popular Magic: The Gathering trading card game.)
The new store is a milestone, maybe comparable in importance to the partnership Big Nate’s Trading Cards entered into three years ago with industry giant Topps. That relationship boosted the amount of new product Big Nate’s Trading Cards can get at wholesale prices. The increased volume enabled Ullevig to quit his day job and focus on the trading cards business full-time.
Peninsula Shopping Center getting busier
For Peninsula Shopping Center, the trading card shop’s opening is important too, because every new tenant moving in creates more distance from the under-utilized state of the facility in recent years.
For decades, grocery stores anchored the complex, but the last of these, QFC, departed in 2011. During the 2010s, Gig Harbor Rexall pharmacy and Ace Hardware also departed. Another major tenant, 7 Seas Brewing, moved in and took up some of the slack, but it left in 2021.
In 2022, regional grocer Town & Country Markets considered leasing the anchor space at Peninsula Shopping Center. But a few months later, the Poulsbo-based chain backed away from the deal, citing concerns over the economy, supply chain issues, and cost escalation.
Over the years, ideas to transform the facility have been floated, including concepts with townhouses, underground parking and even a five-story luxury apartment building. But none of these materialized.
Five-year lease
The lease terms offered to Big Nate’s Trading Cards and to other new tenants in the complex suggest Peninsula Shopping Center has grown more motivated to work with smaller-scale, locally grown tenants.
Both Ullevig and the owners of Club Pilates Gig Harbor, another recent arrival, said they obtained five-year leases, with options to renew at the end of the period. In contrast, Ullevig said Peninsula Shopping Center was only willing to lease for a one-year period when he previously contacted the owner to inquire about moving there.
The 5.6-acre complex is owned jointly by a limited liability company controlled by developer Rush Companies and another LLC connected to members of the Milgard family of Tacoma’s Milgard Manufacturing, Inc. Rush handles day-to-day management of the center.
The new store at Peninsula Shopping Center will be Big Nate’s third successive retail location in Gig Harbor. The first was in a shopping center just west of Highway 16 near The Inn at Gig Harbor. Among its early misadventures, the first shop had to shut down due to Covid just seven weeks after it opened, and it experienced two burglaries.
(Thieves might think twice about targeting Big Nate’s Trading Cards if Ullevig is on-premise. He’s held a black belt in jiu-jitsu for three years; earlier, as a blue belt, he won the International Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Federation world championship, and he’s fought two professional mixed martial arts bouts. Ullevig still trains daily at Gig Harbor Mixed Martial Arts. “I will compete in jiu jitsu again, hopefully this winter,” he said.)
Liquor license application
Ullevig signed his lease with Peninsula Shopping Center in early June and expects the new store to open by mid-August, he said.
Visitors passing the space now will see a sign on the door announcing its liquor license application. The old Big Nate’s Trading Cards on Judson sells beer only, and the new one will do the same, Ullevig said. The beer is sold in bottles or cans (no tap) and Ullevig characterizes its consumers as guys who want to drop by on a Friday evening, buy and open a few packs or a box of cards, have a beer and move on; they don’t really have people drinking multiple beers in the shop, he said.
A notification at the Peninsula Shopping Center that Big Nate’s Trading Cards applied for a liquor license.
The liquor license and on-premises beer consumption do not restrict minors’ access to the shop, he said.
Cross-generational customer base
It might seem surprising that the majority of Big Nate’s customers are grown-ups — Ullevig pegs the split at about 70/30 percent. But it’s more understandable when considering that adults have much more disposable income and may view the cards as investment assets, and that when seeking to harness kids’ passion, it’s hard to compete with video games.
But the merchandise at Big Nate’s crosses generational lines. While adults make up most of the market for Magic: The Gathering products, all ages are into Pokémon and sports trading cards, Ullevig said. The shop targets many different sports but is particularly focused on baseball because of the community’s strong interest in it, he said. Up-and-coming products include Star Wars: Unlimited and Disney Lorcana card games.
Ullevig wants his new store to stock more sports memorabilia. He now carries four or five items, all from the Under Wraps product line provided by sports gear powerhouse Fanatics, Inc. (which also owns Topps). Customers buy a wrapped mystery item (baseball, football, puck, etc.) and discover which player (hopefully a star) autographed it only after unwrapping. He’d like to add more 20 by 22 inch, framed autographed images of well-known players, and to stock up on memorabilia connected to Seattle’s pro sports teams.
“We are a Topps MVP direct hobby shop” and also a Diamond Direct dealer for Upper Deck, another major sports cards name, Ullevig said. These ties enable him to get more product, and on favorable terms.
Nate Ullveig is moving his Big Nate’s Trading Cards across Judson Street to space in the Peninsula Shopping Center. Photo by Ted Kenney
Small business, big industry
It’s a far cry from older days when, as a small hobby shop, he had to buy boxes of card packs from stores like Wal-Mart, break them up, and resell the packs above their manufacturer’s suggested retail price, he said.
The relationships Ullevig has built with manufacturers also enable him to get product on or before its release date, when demand is strongest. Card companies are getting better about feeding smaller retailers enough inventory to grow, and rewarding that growth with even more inventory, he said.
Still, “demand far exceeds what we get sometimes.” A case in point was Pokémon’s July 18 release of its Black Bolt & White Flare products. Big Nate’s allocation sold out in an hour, with a line of about 100 people at the store, Ullevig said.
But surging demand indicates what a good business he’s in. “The hobby is the hottest it’s ever been right now,” Ullevig said.