Crypto: OneOf COO details digital sports collection for fans with ‘no blockchain experience’

OneOf Co-Founder & COO Joshua James joins Yahoo Finance Live to discuss combining sports memorabilia collecting with the NFT community, accessibility, partnering with athletes and Sports Illustrated, and pricing.

Video Transcript

- Welcome back, everyone. Sports memorabilia is looking to score through NFTs. OneOf is kicking off collections from football legends like Emmitt Smith, Jerry Rice, and Dick Butkus in the days surrounding the Super Bowl. Joining us now we've got the Co-Founder and COO of OneOf, Joshua James joining us here. JJ, I appreciate the time. First and foremost, the timing here is obvious, but what is the differentiating factor that OneOf offers to the NFL NFT landscape, especially with regard to sports memorabilia?

JOSHUA JAMES: Yeah. We have what we think is sort of the most fan friendly NFT platform. We really built this platform. I think we launched it in music first. And the idea really was to create a platform that people with no crypto experience, no blockchain experience could get excited about low prices-- $10, $15, $20, our NFT start at. And you can sign up in about 60 seconds and purchase with the credit card. You can purchase with crypto. You don't need to form sort of a wallet and all this sort of wild stuff that you see on other platforms. And so we're really we're really a platform built for fans.

- Josh, it's Emily here. Thanks so much for joining us. You've mentioned that one of his mission is to bring the next 100 million non-crypto native fans into web through cultural passion points. I'm wondering, where are you now in that goal? And how is this latest project going to help get you there?

JOSHUA JAMES: Yeah. You're exactly right we really think that people can use things that they love and that they care about as an entry point into crypto. And maybe they bought a $15 Doja Cat NFT from us. And it probably is the first crypto purchase they've ever made. And now, they're in the crypto space. Now, they're a crypto owner. And it sort of creates a whole entryway into the world for them.

So yeah, we launched our platform just in September. We're still relatively new. We're very excited about our user growth. And here we are, moving into sports, which is something we had always really planned on doing. And we had this amazing collection that came to us through Sports Illustrated that we just think is a fabulous first entry jumping into the sports space.

- OK, and so besides the entry point, when you think further out, the vision for sports memorabilia. Because I, as kind of closeted collector I suppose in some sports memorabilia, I think about the jerseys, the signed jerseys. I think about some of the sign or game ball that you might have or even a signed shoe. So when you have, this also attached to an a physical asset that's attached to the blockchain, if you will, and particularly an NFT platform. What's the vision for that for OneOf? And when do you say, OK, now, it's the right time to get into that side of sports memorabilia where it's a physical asset?

JOSHUA JAMES: Yeah. We have some stuff that is going to be coming out, that's a mix of both actually. We were very fortunate. We had a fairly high profile launch a few months back. Quincy Jones is one of our partners and certainly, helped us get a lot of attention. We have a lot of things offered us honestly in the sports space. And the Sports Illustrated covers as collectibles probably something we would have gotten into anyway had it been offered to us.

But what really made this the right launch point for us is it's not just the covers. These athletes are involved in the drop. You're going to see them lean in. You're going to see Emmitt Smith doing press, doing interviews, going on Twitter spaces. And these athletes are all involved in their covers. And we'll be talking about how they felt when the covers came out and what it was like for them in moment in time. And so it's the combination of the two that really made this the thing that we wanted to launch with.

- How do you think customers are thinking about these sports related NFTs? And why they're getting in, in the first place? Are they seeing these more as an investment that might appreciate in value over time? Or is this something more to be enjoyed as a piece of art, for example?

JOSHUA JAMES: Yeah. I think it's a little bit of both know. I'm a '90s kid who bought a whole lot of Michael Jordan cards. And I bought them because of my love for Michael Jordan. That was really the initial reason that I did it, but there certainly was a part of me that knew, wow, you know, if I hang on to these they might be worth something someday. And so I think you can sort of tap into both.

A good NFT collection is one that the people that buy it both enjoy and that they think is going to go up in value. And so we have gamification and scarcity and all of the stuff that you would expect to try to make that happen.

- So you can set the initial prices. But from there, how do you continue to monitor, where some of those transactions actually gravitates and continue to move higher towards as well on NFT exchange and platform like yours?

JOSHUA JAMES: Yeah, for sure. We have our own marketplace right on OneOf.com. And we see a robust trading take place there. And it's always fascinating to see which ones go up a little bit in price, which ones go up significantly in price, which ones actually don't. It's definitely fascinating to see.

- I just want that Michael Jordan Sports Illustrated cover, "A Star is Born." I think that's one of the most iconic ones out there, for sure. Great to have you here with us today.

JOSHUA JAMES: I had that on my wall.

- Here you go. All right. So we got another fan on that one for sure. We appreciate the time here with us today. That's Josh James joining us to discuss OneOf. He's the Co-Founder and COO