![]() To the fervent card collector, one who holds the view that a card’s intrinsic value is measured in memories, not its monetary worth, the rest of this article may present as a nuisance plaguing the hobby.īut I promise there are several ways to flip undervalued cards without harming the hobby in the same way that scalpers prevent the next generation of Pokemon lovers (and nostalgic adults) from finding product on modern store shelves.Īnd to that effect, that is where my October Pokemon rediscovery began. Not all hope was lost, however, as now, twenty years later, I was armed with two very important pieces of ammunition to once again rebuild my collection: disposable income and digital marketing knowledge. $112.00 for entire completed Base, Fossil, and Jungle sets, among other assorted incomplete sets/semi high-value cards. I sold my entire collection on eBay years earlier for what now amounted to pennies on the dollar. To add salt to my now wounded psyche, I discovered I had done what every 2020 Pokemon re-discoverer kicked themselves for. Production stopped in 2003, and the rest is history (Nintendo took over and began their own card series). Wizards of the Coast (the original designer-manufacturer of the cards in the U.S.) produced a few tens-of-thousands of sealed packs of various print runs, and that was it. Turns out that when the most popular franchise of all time (and it is not even close) stops printing the original vintage cards, nearly twenty years later, the price continues to increase as supply drops.Īfter all, it’s not like they printed unlimited sealed packs. A quick eBay search showed the packs that I was accustomed to forking over $2.99 for in 1999 had swelled to over $600 each. Reality CheckĪnd just like that, the brakes got pumped. The child-like giddiness of getting to watch someone open packs, and of course, wanting to now do it myself, had re-emerged. (Spoiler alert: Leonhart didn’t pull a $100,000 card in that video, but he did pull one worth $500,000 in this later-published video.)Īnd just like that, I was entirely re-hooked. The immense jealousy of the kids that had better cards (that their parents bought them, cheaters). The glossing over them with friends on the school bus. Laughably, I did chores at an unprecedented clip. ![]() Who didn’t? A late-eighties baby, I turned double digits at the height of the Pokemon boom.įor several years, I begged my mom to buy me single packs at a local card shop, Target, 7-Eleven, wherever one could find them. They flashed the one headline my eyes (and mouse) simply couldn’t gloss over. (The digital marketer in me can appreciate the cookie-setting, browser-spying, API-integrating, web property-tracking behemoth that Facebook is.) Today, Facebook’s algorithm accidentally guessed correctly. But I do enjoy the occasional Starbucks workday.) I’m mindlessly scrolling my Facebook news feed and up pops the dreaded “Suggested for You” section that almost never contains content I’m actually interested in.īut today was different. ![]() (I work from home, so this isn’t new to me. It’s mid-October and I’m trapped at home like millions of other Americans, weary of the restrictions put in place to help stop the spread of COVID-19. Six months and six figures later I’m sharing the lessons I learned flipping Pokemon trading cards to make money during the pandemic. The latter of those aforementioned rediscoveries - an old hobby - turned out to be the most unexpected, but one of the more welcome, developments to resurface during my last trip around the sun. After all, even binge-watching Netflix gets boring after a few weeks. You name it, we learned a lot about what we used to do during our downtime way back when handheld technology didn’t occupy our every waking moment. Reconnecting (virtually) with old friends, their love for being outdoors, a rekindled fire for an old hobby. If there were a silver lining to be found amidst an angst-filled 2020, it was that many people had the free time to rediscover things that were previously important to them.
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