Hobby Musings: Panini’s Father’s Day Pack Excitement Hobby Musings: Panini’s Father’s Day Pack Excitement – With Father’s Day quickly approaching, a lot of eyes in the collecting world will be centered on Panini’s pack promotion geared towards the big day.  For those of you who unfamiliar with it, Panini’s Father’s Day promotion provides collectors with FREE  packs of trading cards with a qualifying purchase of select Panini products.

Offering cards from a wide variety of sports, there are randomly inserted autograph and memorabilia cards among the pack’s contents.  This year’s checklist has been generating some buzz as it will be the first Panini product with cards utilizing their NASCAR license.  I had the chance to catch up with Panini’s Scott Prusha, who was kind enough to tell me some more about this year’s release.  The following interview was conducted via email.

KS: You’ve been at this now for a couple of years.  For our readers who don’t know, why did Panini decide to start the Father’s Day promotion?

SP: Our goal was to bring the excitement collectors were getting at the National Sports Collectors Convention to brick-and-motor hobby shops. Our wrapper redemption has become the marquee draw of the National and we just had to find a way to create that same excitement at the shop level. Father’s Day was a natural fit, a day families could collect together. Let’s replace that tie or package of socks for dad with some cardboard!

KS: How long does it typically take you to plan and put together the product?

SP:  It’s a year-round process, always listening to collector’s feedback and making changes to improve the product. I usually start to roll up my sleeves on this one in January.

KS: I’ve only seen some of the promotional pictures released, but they’re fairly impressive with a wide array of Hobby Musings: Panini’s Father’s Day Pack Excitement cards, including even a Steph Curry auto I believe.  What are some of the other highlights people can expect from this year’s Father’s Day promotion?

SP:  The main highlight is being able to pull from all our licenses and include some really unique cards you just don’t see in our main releases. The Panini Collection will be a sweet little set to chase. The NFL Rookies have images from the NFL Combine. You’ll also see the first memorabilia cards from some of these guys from stuff we secured at the Draft. You have a shot at some big names for auto’s too.  Along with the mentioned Curry, I’d love to add a Messi or Ronaldo to my collection.

KS: How do fans and collectors go about participating in the day Father’s Day promo? Is there any place/link online readers can find a list of participating hobby shops in case they want to go and get some?

SP: We posted a link on the Knight’s Lance listing the participating hobby shops. Make sure to visit your local shop and see if and  how they are running the program.

KS: In case one doesn’t have a local participating shop, is there any other way you can go about getting the packs?

SP: We will have a limited amount available on iCollectPanini.com.

KS: Just between you, me and the readers, is there any inside information or any other hidden secrets about the Father’s Day cards this year that hasn’t been released yet?

SP: The secrets are hidden in the packs, the only way to unlock them is to open and found out…

KS: I’ll get you out of here on this.  You do a similar promotion on Black Friday.  Do you think Panini will ever expand this type of release to another day?

SP: Just have to wait and see. The overwhelming request over the years has been to do more, so we’ll see what we can do…

2016 Panini Father’s Day Cards Image Gallery


Kelsey’s ability to bring hobby coverage to the mainstream sports fan has been a true asset. GTS is happy to feature his thoughts on collecting in Hobby Musings. The opinions expressed are his and do not necessarily reflect those of GTS Distribution.
Kelsey Schroyer

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