The Derby City Card Show takes over the Kentucky Exposition Center's South Wing C on Thursday through Sunday, October 8–11, 2026 for what is being promoted as the largest sports cards and memorabilia show ever held in Kentucky — 166,000 square feet of vendor floor across four full days. Anchored at the same expo complex that hosts the Kentucky State Fair and the National Farm Machinery Show, Derby City has rapidly grown into the marquee Kentucky hobby weekend, drawing collectors and dealers from Louisville, Lexington, Cincinnati, Indianapolis, Nashville, St. Louis, Knoxville, Columbus, Atlanta, and well beyond. If you are planning a single Kentucky hobby trip in 2026, this is the one most collectors plan their travel around.
The vendor floor is enormous and genre-balanced. Sports dealers stock deep MLB, NBA, NFL, NHL, UFC, boxing, MMA, soccer, and college football inventory across every era — vintage Topps, Bowman, Fleer, Goudey, Play Ball, and pre-war tobacco runs from the early 1900s through the 1980s, junk-wax 1990s monster boxes, and modern Panini Prizm, Donruss Optic, Select, Mosaic, Topps Chrome, Bowman Draft, and premium Topps Dynasty, National Treasures, Flawless, and Immaculate. Louisville Cardinals, Kentucky Wildcats, Cincinnati Reds and Bengals, Indianapolis Colts, Louisville Bats, and Louisville City FC inventory is exceptionally deep here, and Muhammad Ali boxing memorabilia and Kentucky Derby horse-racing pieces hit a level you will not see at any other show in the country — this is the city the Champ called home and the city the Run for the Roses calls home, and dealers stock accordingly. TCG dealers cover Pokémon singles and sealed from vintage WOTC through modern Scarlet & Violet and Japanese exclusives in tremendous depth, plus Magic: The Gathering Commander and Standard staples, Yu-Gi-Oh!, One Piece TCG, Disney Lorcana, Dragon Ball Z Fusion World, Digimon, Star Wars Unlimited, and Flesh and Blood. Locked cases display PSA, BGS, SGC, and CGC graded slabs, and live breakers, on-site grading drop-off, and athlete autograph signings are typically announced rolling on derbycitycardshow.com and @thederbycitycardshow on Instagram in the weeks before the event.
Thursday is a 4:00 PM to 8:00 PM VIP and early-entry preview window, Friday runs 2:00 PM to 8:00 PM, Saturday is the marquee day from 10:00 AM to 6:00 PM EDT, and Sunday wraps with a 10:00 AM to 4:00 PM session. Tickets — single-day, weekend, and VIP early-entry — are sold online at derbycitycardshow.com and at the door, and kids 12 and under typically enter free with a paying adult. Hourly door-prize raffles and pack giveaways run all weekend.
The Kentucky Exposition Center is located at 937 Phillips Lane, Louisville, KY 40209, directly across the Watterson Expressway from Louisville Muhammad Ali International Airport and a short Lyft from downtown Louisville hotels and Churchill Downs. South Wing C is climate-controlled, ADA-accessible, and laid out for thousands of attendees with wide aisles and dedicated freight access for big setups. On-site paid parking is plentiful.
This show fits every collector type — vintage buyers, modern flippers, breakers, families, Pokémon hunters, casual fans, and out-of-state travelers planning a hobby weekend in the Bluegrass. For the best experience, buy a VIP weekend ticket online ahead of time, arrive Thursday for first-look inventory, bring cash plus Venmo, Zelle, and PayPal backups, and carry a detailed sorted want list. Save Sunday afternoon for negotiation. Follow @thederbycitycardshow.