Season 2 of ‘King of Collectibles’
If an item — literally, any item — is highly collectible, Ken Goldin wants it in his possession.
The founder and CEO of mega auction house Goldin drives home this fact in Season 2 of his Netflix hit “King of Collectibles: The Goldin Touch.” Goldin’s desire is to be a one-stop shop for anyone looking to consign and buy valuable items from any genre.
On the heels of a successful Season 1 that captivated viewers with some of the best sports memorabilia and cards in the space, Goldin is wowing the audience on the second go-around by expanding his collectible palate.
Now streaming, Season 2 features Goldin and his staff handling everything from comic books to a signed, rare record from Eminem to a book owned and signed by drug kingpin Pablo Escobar to the mummified hand of historical legend Cleopatra. Expanding the auction house’s offers attracts a whole new clientele to watch the show.
“It hits a wide spectrum,” Goldin said. “It’s also not so U.S.A./North America centric. Eminem is everybody, right? Batman is everybody, right? The Avengers are everybody. Certainly, it reaches a wider population. But also, this show is about Goldin. So, if you look at Goldin, we’ve hired comic book consignment directors, we’ve started running high-end comic book auctions. We’ve sold multiple comic books for millions and millions of dollars.
“We’re doing auctions like the Goldin 100 where it’s not just sports. In the Goldin 100, I try to take the absolute best of everything. In the first Goldin 100, we actually had a triceratops fossil of the head and a horn. I am trying to reach a wider audience because this is a competitive market. We may always be known as primarily a sports auction house, but we do so much business. If 10 percent of my business is pop culture, that means we do $30 million dollars a year pop culture, which is probably more than almost every other auction house in the world for pop culture.”
Brent Montgomery, who is one of the show’s executive producers along with Peyton Manning, made it clear to Goldin that if wanted the widest reach possible, there was the need for a wider canvas.
“We want to bring in a young audience. We want to bring in diversity. We want to bring in females, and tap into pop culture,” Montgomery said. “For Ken, who runs an auction house, to be diversified as everything kind of ebbs and flows up and down with pricing, I think it’s been really fun for him to expand.”
More Rare, Mind-Blowing Items
“King of Collectibles” Season 1 was chock full of rare, mind-blowing cards and sports memorabilia. Season 2 isn’t any different. Goldin gets the opportunity to consign some of the top items from the personal collections of sports legends Barry Bonds, Joe Montana, and Reggie Jackson.
“I think people will buy that Ken really has known these household names for decades and is contemporary with them, whether it would be Reggie Jackson or Joe Montana or Barry Bonds, Eli Manning,” Montgomery said. “He’s really got relationships and they’re calling him when they’re looking to make their critical decisions for their most prized possessions. I think you see that in this season.”
The auction house also fetches top dollar for the first autographed card of NBA phenom Victor Wembanyama — his 2022 Bowman University Best Superfractor.
Season 2 also features Goldin getting his hands on a pair of rare T206 Honus Wagner cards. In an attempt to get the rights to cosign a Wagner SGC 5 valued at over $25 million, Goldin takes a private jet from Goldin headquarters in New Jersey to Miami with $10 million in cash. Even being as persuasive as ever, Goldin and the card owner couldn’t settle on a deal.
The most memorable moment of Season 2 for Goldin occurred during a special chat with a close friend.
“Tops for me had to be me pulling out that Babe Ruth, Hank Aaron signed ball and going to my good friend Barry Bonds and telling him I wanted him to add his name to that baseball,” Goldin said. “First of all, Aaron/Ruth balls, especially in that condition, are really, really rare. For me to get that for Paul, my son, is incredible.”
Montgomery — who is a reality TV mastermind, creating “Pawn Stars” in 2008 — feels Season 2 captures some unique moments in the hobby.
“Getting to pull out a ball that’s signed by Babe Ruth and Hank Aaron and have Barry Bonds sign it on camera, that doesn’t happen every day,” Montgomery said.
Set Up For More Success
Season 2 of “King of Collectibles: The Goldin Touch” came out of the gate fast. In its first week streaming, the show ranked No. 4 in the United States and No. 20 worldwide. The show’s tremendous success has picked up right where it left off in the opening season.
“I think it’s different from a lot of other reality shows, especially reality shows that might be somewhat based on collectibles,” Goldin said. “We get 5,000 items a week at Goldin, and it’s so easy for us to pick out items. You hear stories about a show like ‘Storage Wars’ in the past where they said they planted stuff. At Goldin, we have so many items every week, you should see what’s on the cutting room floor, because it’s hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of stuff that didn’t make it into a Netflix episode.”
“King of Collectibles” seems to be taking a similar path to Montgomery’s blockbuster hit “Pawn Stars,” which marks its 15-year anniversary of its first episode next month. Taking baby steps, Montgomery has a good feeling that his latest venture will get renewed for a third season.
“We always think with a show like this based on past experience, it can have a very long life because the stories are endless,” Montgomery said.
