CheckOutMyCards.com

Tim Getsch, MS

Founder & CTO

Tim grew up in Minnesota as an avid collector of baseball, basketball, and hockey cards. He fell in love with numbers at a young age and went on to earn a BS in Math at age 19 and a MS in Computer Science, both from the Institute of Technology at the University of Minnesota. In 1999, Tim was hired by Microsoft as a Program Manager on Excel. In 2001, Tim switched to Microsoft Access, where he is currently the most tenured Program Manager on the team.

Tim started dreaming about the possibilities of a centralized sports card exchange in the fall of 2003. He built software in Microsoft Access to analyze and bid on eBay auctions, and he built LowPriceCards.com as an outlet to sell excess inventory purchased from eBay. In the fall of 2006, Tim started building CheckOutMyCards.com as a successor to LowPriceCards.com, so users could post and manage their online inventory.

More detailed history and vision for CheckOutMyCards.com

Julia Getsch, MA

Business Manager

Julia grew up in the Midwest and has lived in the Seattle area since 2000. She completed her BA in Psychology and MA in Counseling Psychology with an emphasis in Culture and Social Justice at Northwest University in Kirkland, WA. As the top graduate, she was selected by the Dean to assist him in developing a young program and running a successful graduate school. She served as a director and adjunct faculty. After her university time, Julia worked for a law firm with a focus on business law (www.changlawgroup.com). These experiences led to her desire to begin a start-up, and she was thrilled with the prospect of starting CheckOutMyCards.com with her husband and friend. Julia also serves on the board of the Iranian American Community Alliance (www.iaca-seattle.org) and as Co-Chair of the Civic Action Committee.

Andrew Bird

Software Design Engineer

Andrew has been passionate about computers since he was very young. After high school, Andrew studied computer programming at Hennepin Technical College in Eden Prairie, MN. Over the course of his studies, he fell in love with web development and began to vigorously study it outside the classroom. In 2002, Andrew began building websites for friends, family, and himself. Through personal independent study, Andrew became well-versed and impassioned with the concepts of web standards, semantic development, search engine optimization, user interface design, and information architecture.

In 2005, Andrew accepted a web developer position with Saint Paul College in St Paul, Minnesota. Less than a year after starting at the College, Andrew taught a four credit Web Design class and served as adjunct faculty as well as web developer. In February 2007, Andrew walked away from a promotion at Saint Paul College to join the CheckOutMyCards.com team.

Our Story

At Tim's 10 year high school reunion (November 2006), he ran into a longtime friend, Akash Garg, who co-founded hi5.com. This inspired Tim to take CheckOutMyCards.com to the next level. On that same trip, Tim and Julia ran into another friend, Andy Bird, who was looking for the next "garage startup." By the end of February 2007, Andy moved to Seattle to join the team, and Julia resigned from her position at the law firm. Currently Andy and Julia work fulltime on www.CheckOutMyCards.com, and Tim works fulltime at Microsoft and part-time on www.CheckOutMyCards.com.

At CheckOutMyCards.com we have something special. Hopefully this is apparent from our website. We are excited for the future and the new, original functionality that we are bringing to the collector community.