When perusing eBay you might notice some great deals on “Beckett” 9 and 10-grade cards with the “BCCG” label. What was BCCG grading service and what do you need to know before buying a BCCG graded card? There are some important differences between BCCG and regular Beckett grading services, so let’s review.

History and Purpose

BCCG was established around 2006 as a more affordable and accessible grading service for collectors who wanted to get their cards graded without paying the higher prices of Beckett’s main service, BGS. Beckett Grading Services already had a reputation for high-quality grading with their regular BGS service. But BGS was more expensive and catered to higher-end cards.

For newer collectors, you may not be familiar with Beckett’s prior dominance in card grading. If you are interested in the history and troubled present of Beckett in particular, Cardhound has written about that here.

BCCG was marketed as a service intended for more basic grading purposes—often for common cards, raw collections, or cards with less value than those graded through the BGS service. They also bulk-graded for retailers for around $2 / card, and cards were sold in some of those cheesy Wal-Mart mystery boxes. BCCG was discontinued around 2020 but due to the ultra low price of grading, many still exist on the card market.

Understanding the BCCG Grading Scale

Anyone shopping for graded cards first needs to understand BCCG’s wacky grading scale. Whereas most companies feature a more intuitive 10-point scale, the BCCG system was basically a 5-10 scale.

BCCG vs. Traditional PSA / SGC Grading Scales

BCCG Scale PSA / SGC Equivalent
BCCG 10 “Mint or better” 9
BCCG 9 “Near mint of better” 7
BCCG 8 “Excellent or better” 5
BCCG 7 “Very good or better” 3
BCCG 6 “Good or better” 2
BCCG 5 “Poor or better” 1

As you can see, the gap gets progressively wider as you move “down” from 10. And even this assessment assumes consistency and quality of BCCG grades that do not reliably exist in practice.

BCCG Buying Tips

Tip 1: Avoid

The #1 Cardhound buying tip for BCCG is just not to. There is no value added over a raw card, and for many collectors the slab would actually detract from value.

Tip 2: Don’t Overpay

But if you insist, just know what you are buying and don’t overpay. Recently, I saw a BCCG 10 1983 Topps Tony Gwynn rookie sell for 2.5x the value of a PSA 9. This is lunacy. Are these buyers gambling on the “…or better” and hoping for crossing to a gem with PSA or SGC? You would have much better odds at much lower prices shopping for raw cards or crack / resubmitting PSA 9’s.

I think more often, the buyers of these cards are just inexperienced and think that “a 10 is a 10.” I have seen many BCCG cards cross over to their lower-numbered equivalent with PSA or SGC. For example, a BCCG 7 (“very good or better”) might cross to a 3+. But in general I think even that expectation is optimistic.

Tip 3: Treat BCCG as Raw

The final analysis: if shopping BCCG, just evaluate as a raw card.