Jeff was born and raised in St.Louis and followed the St.Louis Cardinals baseball team and the St.Louis Hawks basketball team. His father, Harry, worked in a clothing store in downtown St. Louis, where many professional athletes bought their clothes. One of Harry's favorite customers was Bob Pettit, the great St. Louis Hawks player.

Jeff moved to Arizona and attended Arizona State University. While living in Arizona he was the editor of the Gilbert, Arizona newspaper, and also worked for United States Congressman John Rhodes. He then moved to San Diego, and attended law school there.

Jeff always says that he started collecting when he was young because his mother, Millie, never threw away his baseball cards or comic books.

In 1998 Jeff started adding to his collection, and built a structure to house his items, which is now a museum. Andy Strasberg, the former public relations director of the San Diego Padres, came to the museum, and told Jeff that he had a world-class museum, and that he should show it to other people and groups. Within a couple of weeks the president of the Baseball Hall of Fame, at the time Dale Petroskey, was at the Figler Museum.

Presently there are three galleries to the museum, namely sports, presidential/ historical, and pop culture.

In 2006 Jeff and his wife Linda established the Figler Foundation, a non- profit organization and proceeds from Jeff's "collecting" activities go to the Foundation. Jeff is involved with various community and national groups including Make-A-Wish Foundation. He presently maintains residences in San Diego, St. Louis, and London.