The Break Time Card Show takes over the McCook Athletic & Exposition Center area in La Grange on Saturday, June 27, 2026 for a focused one-day Saturday card show that anchors the late-June Chicagoland calendar. Break Time has built a steady following among western and southwest-suburb collectors with a no-nonsense format — strong dealer pool, clean ballroom space, fair admission, and a single-Saturday window that lets you work the entire room without committing a whole weekend. The June 27 date positions the show as the immediate weekend warm-up to the National Sports Collectors Convention five weeks later, and dealers historically arrive with inventory they are deliberately working through before locking down their National tables.
Vendor coverage runs across the full hobby. Sports tables cover MLB, NBA, NFL, NHL, UFC, boxing, and soccer across vintage and modern, with rows of Topps Chrome, Bowman Chrome rookies and prospects, Panini Prizm, Donruss Optic, Select, Mosaic, and vintage Topps, Bowman, and Fleer. Chicago-team inventory — Cubs, White Sox, Bears, Bulls, Blackhawks, Sky, and Fire — and Notre Dame, Northwestern, and Illinois college coverage moves consistently. Trading card games are well represented — Pokemon singles and sealed product across the Scarlet & Violet era, Magic: The Gathering, Yu-Gi-Oh!, One Piece TCG, Disney Lorcana, and Dragon Ball Z Fusion World — with the occasional Flesh and Blood and Star Wars Unlimited dealer. Graded PSA, BGS, SGC, and CGC slabs fill locked cases at the higher-end tables. Memorabilia, autographs, sealed wax, comics, Funko Pops, and supplies like sleeves, top loaders, and binders round out the room.
Show hours typically run 9:00 AM CDT to 3:00 PM CDT on Saturday, June 27 — a six-hour Saturday window built around a single-day attendance pattern. General admission is typically a modest door fee (recently in the $5 range) with VIP early-entry available for collectors who want first-pick of the dealer floor before general admission opens. Kids 12 and under are typically free with a paying adult. The fair admission plus the modest VIP upgrade make this one of the more accessible mid-tier Chicagoland shows.
La Grange sits in the southwest suburbs accessible from I-294 and I-55, pulling collectors from La Grange, La Grange Park, Western Springs, Brookfield, Riverside, Countryside, Hinsdale, Burr Ridge, Westmont, Lyons, McCook, and the southwest suburbs broadly. The venue is air-conditioned, has on-site parking, and offers easy lunch options at the nearby La Grange Avenue retail strip.
Who should attend? Break Time is a strong fit for southwest-suburb collectors who do not want to drive into the city or out to Schaumburg, families with kids opening their first packs, set builders, vintage diggers, modern flippers, slab hunters, prospect chasers, and Pokemon and TCG fans. The single-Saturday format makes the show easy to plan around — drive in, work the room, drive home in time for dinner.
To get the most out of the day, plan for the VIP early-entry window if you have a specific chase, walk the full room once before pulling the trigger on big buys, and carry a sorted want list with target prices. Bring cash for the quickest transactions (Venmo and Zelle as backups), pack a slab case and a few extra top loaders for pickups, and bring a trade binder if you like to deal. For the latest schedule, admission, and vendor list, check cardshowdex.com and the operator's social channels.