News
The National returning to Cleveland in 2024
As expected, the 2023 National Sports Collectors Convention will return to Chicago, followed by the 2024 show moving to Cleveland.
The NSCC announced Thursday that the 2024 show, which will be under new management, would be held July 24-28 at the I-X Center in Cleveland. The show will return to the Donald E. Stephens Convention Center in the Chicago suburb of Rosemont, Ill in 2023 and 2025.
Sports Collectors Digest reported last month that the 2024 show was likely to return to Cleveland for the first time since 2018. The show, the largest in the sports collectible industry, was also held in Cleveland in 2014, 2009, 2007, 2004, 2001 and 1997.
The event was held in Atlantic City this year to mixed reviews.
SCD reported at the 2022 National that a new management team would take over the show beginning in 2024. The new group, JBJ Corporation, is owned by dealers and show promoters Joe Drelich, Brian Coppola and Jim Ryan.
The National board members hinted in July that the 2024 event was likely headed to Cleveland. The deal was confirmed after a vote by the board of directors.
“I’m confident it’s going to be Chicago ’23, Cleveland ’24, Chicago ’25, and then mystery,” Chip Brady, vice president of the National Board of Directors, said in July.
The show has been held in several different locations over its 42-year history, but most often returns to Chicago every other year. The board and new management team are hoping to host the annual show in different locations going forward.
Also See: History of The National
“Hopefully with the new management, we’ll have an area that maybe we didn’t visit yet,” Brady said. “Just me personally, there’s St. Louis, Indianapolis, Nashville, Orlando, there’s some really good places. I did a show in Nashville two weeks ago and it was really good.”
“I think we need to turn over a few new rocks,” new board President Al Durso said. “It’s not easy just to say, ‘Hey, let’s put it here,’ because they have to have the site available, it has to have so many square feet, we have to have so many hotel rooms.”
The National has attracted two of its largest crowds the past two years, drawing an estimated 80,000-100,000 attendees (the event does not release official attendance figures). The all-time attendance record is believed to be more than 90,000 attendees in Anaheim in 1991.
Jeff Owens is the editor of SCD.
