Trying out a Football Loot Locker

After seeing other people buy and share their purchases from The Loot Locker, I figured that I might as well give it a try.


I didn't know too much about it other than the basics that I read on other blogs, and frankly not being on social media sites such as Twitter, Facebook or Instagram, I didn't really follow to see exactly what I would get for my $20.00, or when it would ship.


I decided to purchase a locker on September 9th since I really had an urge to see and open some current football packs. However, on the site, for shipping, all it says is that they will only ship to Canada and the US. So, first thing first, I had to decide where I wanted the cards sent. I chose my home in Ottawa, and entered in the information. Finally, at that point I saw what the shipping would be - $10.00 to Canada, which sounds about right, but I don't know what the shipping inside the US is if I ever want to order again. I wish that information was posted on their website.


Then came the waiting. Now, not knowing when they ship things out, whether or not they ship out new orders as they come in, or whether they wait to ship out new orders with the subscriptions that they have on file, I think that I would have liked to have an estimated shipping date on the confirmation e-mail that they sent me with the purchase. I knew that I hadn't seen anyone posting anything about receiving a new locker so I eventually guessed that they would all be sent together.


In any event, as I travelled to British Columbia for a funeral, I found a good deal on the box of 2016 Panini Classic that I opened yesterday, and that satisfied an urge to open something. So that might have lessened my enthusiasm a bit for waiting for my locker.


However, yesterday I got home to a box waiting for me.

Yay!

I opened it up to see inside.

Contents

So, inside, I find:


1 pack of 2015 Panini Contenders Football
1 pack of 2016 Panini Certified Football
1 pack of 2016 Donruss Elite Football
1 coupon card for Sportsboxbreaks.com
1 baggie of card supplies


Awww, no candy like I've seen other people open. Ah, that's probably for the best.


First impressions on looking at the packs was that I'm getting 15 cards for the US$30 (which was just over CDN$40 with exchange) that I spent when you include shipping. Frankly, I have a lot of card supplies so they are pretty irrelevant to the package, and I have no idea if I'll use the coupon or not so it is all about the cards. Sadly, I've already opened some of last year's Contenders and a pack of this year's Donruss Elite so they were not completely new to me, but I was looking forward to the Certified.


I started with last year's pack.

2015 Panini Contenders

17 Anquan Boldin - 49ers
48 Joe Flacco - Ravens
52 Jeremy Hill - Bengals
7 Derek Carr - Raiders
97 Jordan Matthews - Eagles


Pretty boring pack. At least there is a Raiders card in there that I can give to my friend that gets all of my Raiders cards.


Well, I opened a pack of Donruss Elite earlier this summer so I figured that I might as well stay with the cards that I have seen already. And here they are...

2016 Donruss Elite

55 Sammy Watkins - Bills
53 Matt Ryan - Falcons
Green Parallel 17 Jordan Matthews - Eagles (#/99)
40 Bo Jackson - Raiders
33 Greg Olsen - Panthers


Well, the cards scan nicely, and there is a cool Bo card to give to my friend, but nothing really grabbed me from this pack either.


On to the last pack.

2016 Panini Contenders

57 Eli Manning - Giants
Gold Team 19 Jared Goff - Rams
Skills 16 Richard Sherman - Seahawks
151 Kevin Dodd - Titans (#/999)
9 Amari Cooper - Raiders


At least I got a couple of insert cards, a rookie card, and another Raider to give to my friend, but there is nothing in there that excited me, especially when it says on the back of the pack in the small print that on average each pack will have approximately two non-base cards per pack so it isn't as though it was anything special.


For fun, I thought I would count the supplies.


The bag contained 5 team bags, 9 plastic card sleeves, and a sixth team bag that contained 10 penny sleeves. As I said before, it is pretty irrelevant to the package but they'll get used as I ship things out to friends.


So, obviously my opinion might be better if there was a hit in the package, but I've bought plenty of packs before at stores without getting hits and usually still enjoyed the purchase. This? Well, I don't know if the waiting took away the pleasure of the impulsive buy in a store or at a show. It really didn't do anything for me.


Will I buy again? Perhaps. Maybe. I would have to actually search out to see what packs are coming before placing an order. And I would definitely want to know ahead of time what the US shipping would be compared to shipping to Canada. Although it was nice to have something delivered right to me, and I know shipping to Canada is expensive, I don't think that adding 50% to the cost of the package really helped.


I hope that others did better on their lockers.