LAS VEGAS (FOX5) — Tom Brady is expanding his CardVault trading card business to the Las Vegas Strip with a new location at The Shoppes at Mandalay Bay Place.
The seven-time Super Bowl champion and Fox NFL analyst, who has ties to Las Vegas as a minority owner of the Raiders and Aces, spoke with FOX5 about the venture ahead of its opening later this month. The Las Vegas location will be the 10th CardVault store.
Brady said his competitive drive extends beyond football into his business ventures.
“I don’t think you can turn it off. It’s a blessing and a curse because every day I wake up thinking, how can I do a little bit better today? How can I bring a little more energy and enthusiasm to what I’m doing?” Brady said.
Business mission and expansion
CardVault, founded in 2020, aims to connect fans with collecting opportunities. Co-founder Chris Costa said the company identified a gap in the sports memorabilia market.
“Our mission has been to connect the fan with the collector, or to turn the fan into a collector, or give the fan an opportunity to collect,” Costa said. “There’s so many fans that are going to games every year, but not enough of them are able or know how to collect their favorite team, their favorite player, and where to even look.”
The company is placing stores near sports venues across the United States. Brady said the team has maintained a rapid pace of expansion.
“This post-career, finishing what I love to do for 23 seasons and then now my third year out, I couldn’t have imagined a better three-year journey,” Brady said. “Just so excited to work with Chris, our entire team at Card Vault. We’ve been on a kind of a torrid pace, and we just want to continue to deliver for our customer.”
Brady’s hands-on involvement
Costa, a New England native and longtime Patriots fan, said Brady remains actively involved in daily business operations.
“Tom has been so involved and so dialed in and such a big part of what we’re doing on a day-to-day basis,” Costa said. “He’s so involved in the decisions that we’re making, helping us get into here in Las Vegas, helping us get into all these other markets.”
Costa said working with Brady has become routine despite his fan background.
“Although the Patriots fan, the 12, the 16, the 18-year-old Patriots fan in me — his heart is racing, it has become just kind of part of life, which is the craziest thing I’ve actually ever said,” Costa said.
Personal connection to collecting
Brady traced his interest in trading cards to his childhood academic achievements.
“Whenever I got good grades, I’d always ask my mom, Mom, can we go down to the hobby shop, it was called What’s On Second Sports Cards, and buy some packs of cards. It was the first thing I ever really valued,” Brady said.
He said he was primarily a baseball card collector who organized his cards by his favorite players, with Don Mattingly being his favorite.
“All my afternoons were spent around looking at the cards, organizing them by my favorite player, top to bottom,” Brady said. “I just have so many great memories from my childhood growing up and trading cards with all my friends on the street. It was all about trading and collecting when I was a kid.”
Brady said he still owns his childhood card collection and maintains his enthusiasm for the hobby.
“Now that I get to be a bigger kid, I’ve never outgrown that childhood youth and enthusiasm,” Brady said.
The CardVault location at Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino will offer sports cards, trading cards and memorabilia when it opens later in December.
