A weekend card show, by the numbers
Shows feel chaotic from behind the table, but the maths of one is simple. Here's the framework we run every show through — before, during and after — so the day ends with real numbers instead of a heavy cash box and a guess.
Written by Ben and Tom, Cardinal
Before the doors open
- Set the float. Decide the cash float before you leave, count it, and write it down. Every show calculation starts here — if the float is a guess, the day's profit is a guess.
- Know your stock's floor. We price everything before the show, from recent sold data. A price decided under pressure, with a queue forming, is almost always a worse price.
- Decide your buy rules. Our percentages are set before the first binder lands on the table. The middle of a busy show is the worst time to invent policy.
During: track three streams
A show table has money and cards moving in three directions at once: sales going out, buys coming in, and trades doing both. Losing track of any one of them is how a "great day" turns out to be a quiet one.
This is exactly why we built show mode into Cardinal: every sale, buy and trade is tagged to the show as it happens, cash and card payments are split, and the float is adjusted automatically when we buy across the table.
Sales
Cash and card recorded separately. Card payments have fees; the day's real takings need them netted out.
Buys
Every purchase is stock gained and cash spent. Tagged to the show, so the day's cost basis is exact.
Trades
Value in against value out, with any cash top-up recorded. A trade that feels even often isn't.
The close-out
When the hall empties: count the cash, subtract the float, add the card takings net of fees, subtract the table cost and anything you spent on buys. What's left is the day's trading result — and the stock you bought carries its cost basis into inventory, so it shows up again as margin when it sells.
Do this the same way every show and patterns appear quickly: which venues are worth the table fee, which stock actually moves at shows versus online, and whether the day paid for your time. None of that is visible from a cash box alone.
Run your next show on real numbers
Try the demo and see how sales, buys and trades are tracked as they happen — and how the day closes out on its own.
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Make better deals with your own stock.
Know what you own, what it's worth and what you're making on it.