Paul Rouse: Everyone a winner when GAA stars become a collector's item
There are things in the GAA that are unique and things that become unique by the way they happen in the GAA.
One of those things relates to trading cards. There is nothing new about such cards. For example, the idea of trading cards first emerged in late 19th-century America. The tobacco company Allen and Ginter put baseball players and boxers and actresses on cards and put those cards into packs of cigarettes. Celebrity sold, even then, and so successful was the gambit that it was immediately followed by other companies. The idea spread from America to Europe and soon hurlers and footballers found their photos emblazoned on cards which were pushed into the packets of cigarettes sold in Ireland.
Later, in the 1960s, the Italian company Panini produced cards with soccer players from Serie A. By the time of the World Cup in Mexico in 1970, it had launched its revered World Cup sticker album and created an instant trading craze.
A new variation of this idea was remade in Ireland in this new millennium. For a decade now, Cúl Heroes cards have been printed and traded in Ireland by a thriving company (Cúl Heroes), led by managing director Matt McCormack.
McCormack tells the story of its origins: “In 2012, I was helping out with an Under 8 team in Tullamore. It looked to me like there was a lack of connection between the senior players and the underage ones and those in the nursery. This can easily happen in an urban club, where people just don’t really know each other. I came up with the idea of printing cards with the Tullamore senior players on them, for when they would come and help with a training session with the underage teams.
“The player would come to training to talk to the kids and at the end hand out his signed card. The Under 8s got to know and look up to the seniors and the seniors became interested in what was happening at underage in the club. Our numbers dramatically increased at the Under 8s because the players’ friends wanted to come, meet the players and collect the cards. Basically, everyone was a winner from it.”
The next step was to test it as a business idea: “In 2013 we created an “Offaly Collection” based on the full hurling and football panels. We sold them on match days in O'Connor Park and at a selection of shops throughout the county. It was basically a trial run for a national collection. And it worked incredibly well – there was massive interest. We found more children were attending matches and they knew all the players on both the panels. The players would be signing cards after matches and really enjoyed it, too.”
The new ‘Cúl Heroes’ company then worked closely with the GAA and GPA to create the first licence deal of its kind in Ireland. It involved players and county boards buying into it, and led to the launch of the first national collection in 2015. Trading cards for GAA players were now on shop counters all over Ireland, beside the soccer stickers that were traded year after year.
Every year since then, the collection has evolved. The design is modernised, the players change every year – and so do their stats. These stats are a unique selling point and a great source of argument. They are set down by an anonymous independent journalist who ranks the players in various categories from skills to athleticism. Needless to say, not everyone agrees with the rankings given.
A new development this year is the special dual cards, where kids can get Tony Kelly and Cian Lynch on one shining card. And it's not just children that collect; there are avid older collectors, and – in the way of these things – parents of children can get really into it and knock great fun from it.
Matt McCormack has a very special example of this: “At the All-Ireland football semi-final in 2016, we had a card-swap area in front of the Cusack Stand. The brilliant Kerry forward Declan O'Sullivan happened to come with his young son to swap cards and he spent 30 minutes swapping with other parents and children. I remember thinking to myself, how lucky we are to have the GAA: here was a real legend of the game just trying to help his son grow his interest in it, while swapping Cùl Heroes with all the other supporters there.”
But why exactly do people buy the cards: “I find the interest in the cards is vast for all sorts of reasons. Parents buy them as healthy treats and love to see their children interested in hurling and football. Children get them signed by players and enjoy the jeopardy of opening a pack and trying to fill their collection. They will watch a match and tell you the names of players from all over Ireland, tell you what position they play in and how fast they are.”
So who is the most popular player? “Over the years different players have been the hottest cards. Sometimes it depends on the county being successful, other times it depends on what part of a county a player is from. Sometimes a player just defies all geography and is loved everywhere. Nash, Callanan, Canning, Keegan, Gooch, Clifford and Connolly have all been really popular at different times. The ones that have been consistently popular from the start are TJ Reid, Tony Kelly, Michael Murphy, Cian Lynch and James McCarthy. These players are respected all over the country.
"We get lots of requests by players for their own card and are always happy to oblige. We find their families and clubs are always proud they are in the collection.
“We are asked a lot if we make some cards rare. But we don't: we print and package every card the same amount of times. We want to reward our customers for collecting, not punish them.”
And it is also the case that some counties buy into the idea more than others: “The county that buys most Cùl Heroes per population is Monaghan. They love football in Monaghan and the players really get behind us there as well.”
The thing is: this is not just something that is the preserve of counties. It is also available for clubs and even for individual families: “We have always enjoyed visiting clubs. We bring our mascots and lots of goodies to promote. I always find it’s the real progressive and successful clubs that will ask you to come. We've been up to Kilcoo, for example, and in the last couple of seasons they asked us to print a Kilcoo collection. The kids and families love to collect them.”
And a brilliant feature of the company is that people can order their own faces and details onto the cards. As Matt McCormack said: “The personalised cards are great. We started doing them when we featured on the ‘Toy Show’ one year. We needed something for the show and came up with the idea of being your own Cùl Hero. When it went out we were out the door busy for the Christmas getting them ready. We got multiple emails – and still do – on Christmas mornings saying the greatest excitement for any Christmas was a child opening their stocking and finding their personalised Cúl Hero card, with their photo and other details. That is special when you get that feedback. Best of all though, I consider myself lucky to be able to promote the games I love so much and bring a small bit of joy to people.”
