If you had a halfway decent childhood, you collected baseball cards. Maybe you preferred basketball or football, but cards are cards. You collected them, you traded them and you probably bent some of them. If you're like me, now you've got a wife and kids and storing your collection has become an issue -- my attic has at least five boxes weighed down by binders. That's where Topps BUNT comes in. You can collect, trade and chase cards with the swipe of a finger and without worrying about where to store them. They are always right in your pocket!

I recently sat down with Jon Hanford, the associate producer for Topps BUNT, to learn more about the popular app.

We here at RealGM are huge fans of the Topps BUNT app. Can you explain the history of the app and how you got involved?

Topps BUNT was first introduced in 2012 as part of the major influx of mobile gaming. It's pretty funny how I got involved, really. Chris Vaccaro, our editor-in-chief and director of app operations, was a professor of mine at Hofstra University, where I majored in journalism. At that time, I had just been hired part-time out of an internship with MLB Advanced Media, which impressed Chris. We naturally bonded over our love of baseball and pursuit of our passions in the professional world.

Soon after I graduated, he reached out to me and asked if I'd be interested in writing editorial articles for BUNT, which at that point was still in its infancy. So I did that for the 2013 and 2014 seasons to supplement my income while working internships in baseball operations and player development. That's how I first got involved with BUNT.

Then last winter Chris reached out again asking if I'd be interested in a full-time position, as the digital department began expanding.

One of the many advantages of digital cards is that you can release new inserts and series quickly. What is the process for creating a new card from the formation of the idea to the release?

This is perhaps the most fun part of the job! It combines my adolescent passion for card collecting with my journalism background since we can get creative and timely whenever something big happens in baseball. We did some extensive planning with our design team before the season began, so we have our templates for Milestones and Headlines for such events. If something happens that intrigues me or Mike (@TOPPSMIKE) and we can get an image for it, then we'll put it in the template and release it as soon as we can.

What percentage of the cards released on the app are also available to collect in physical packs?

I don't have the exact numbers on that, but we'll borrow somewhat frequently from past or present physical card designs -- they've been around for 64 years; this is only our fourth year -- but I am absolutely thrilled with the original designs that our designers Dan Polito and Alfred Tam have come up with. In fact, one of those designs is available in Topps Series 2 as an insert with a promo code for a 5x-boosted scoring card in BUNT.

Have you ever considered offering fans a real-life card as a reward for collecting a digital set?

Currently our primary concern is to firmly establish our digital presence in the baseball collectors market. However, our soccer app, KICK, has done something along those lines, so it is something that we could consider in BUNT.

Have you gotten any input or suggestions from players on designs? Do you know of any Major Leaguers that collect BUNT cards?

From Major Leaguers, not really. I have tweeted back and forth some with Pat Neshek, since he's a noted baseball card and memorabilia collector. We also got a retweet from Frank Viola when we released his "Sweet Music" Nicknames card, but most of my interactions are with minor league guys.

Last year I was a player development intern with the Mets and spent the season with their Low-A affiliate in Savannah, so I got to know a bunch of their prospects. Whenever I get the chance, I try to work them into some rookie/prospect sets — I know Amed Rosario loved his Future of the Franchise card!

What's the office atmosphere like? How many people does TOPPS employ to work exclusively on BUNT?

It's a pretty weird hybrid of a startup and stereotypical office in downtown Manhattan. For BUNT, it's Mike and me running the daily operations side while our two product managers serve as the bridge between our content and tech/development team. Last, but not least, Chris oversees all and maintains all relationships within the company and with potential outside partners for cross-branding, as we saw with Louisville Slugger on Mother's Day.

What sort of releases can fans look forward to as the season progresses?

One of the biggest themes of 2015 is the influx of all these top prospects making their big league debuts and contributing effectively despite their relative inexperience. I can't help but think of the 2006 season, when you had such rookies as Hanley Ramirez, Dustin Pedroia, Prince Fielder,  Justin Verlander, Jon Lester, Ryan Zimmerman, Anibal Sanchez, Matt Kemp, Russell Martin, Andre Ethier, Francisco Liriano, Howie Kendrick, etc. helping their clubs tremendously.

What's funny is those names I just dropped were all in the 2006 Topps '52 Rookies set (physical, obviously), which I collected in its entirety as a 16-year-old. Check it out if you haven't heard of it before. Now that I work for Topps and the 2015 rookie class is what it is, I think we could do something similar.

 

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