Magic: The Gathering – Murders at Karlov Manor Play Booster Display was on top of the January 2024 TCGplayer Top 25 Sealed Products chart, which ranks the most active products on the platform by dollar volume, showing the beginning and ending prices of each product. The chart also provided insight into the trends that have developed in the TCG market to kick off the new year.
Magic: The Gathering had an interesting start to January 2024, as preorders for its new Standard set seemed solid. Murders at Karlov Manor Play Booster Display claimed the #1 slot and other Magic products locked up eight spot on the chart (see “January 2024“). Everything seems like it is back to a normal beginning-of-the-year cycle for Magic sales, at least as far as preorders go. Additionally, the singles prices of Standard cards have been on the rise a little bit as well as players prep for the MagicCon Chicago $75,000 event (see “Revitalizing ‘Magic: The Gathering’s’ Standard Format “).
Beyond Magic’s performance, The Big Five (Magic, Pokemon TCG, Yu-Gi-Oh! TCG, Disney Lorcana, and One Piece CG) are all settling into their place in the TCG market. Disney Lorcana’s The First Chapter continued to see a resurgence in buyer interest, post-reprint, and One Piece CG remains on fire. Yu-Gi-Oh! TCG turned in a fairly standard showing, based on the events of recent months. The only real laggard in the group in Pokemon TCG, as Paldean Fates products (see “‘Pokemon TCG’ 2024“) seemed to turn in sub-par preorder numbers. The action of the Big Five all lines up with TCG market blurbs heard in ICv2 distributor interviews.
There are two more significant points of interest on this chart. The first is that Flesh and Blood TCG: Heavy Hitters Booster Box made it up to #9 on the chart. It seems that Flesh and Blood disappears from the chart for months at a time, and then pops up again about 2-3 times a year when they have a strong release. This probably means that the game is fairly healthy, and weathering the excitement brought to the market by bigger releases like Disney Lorcana sets. This game has a strong player base and will probably be around for a while to come.
The second point of interest involves case movement. On this chart, there are significant sales of cases of boosters as opposed to just individual booster boxes, particularly with One Piece CG and Disney Lorcana. Some of the One Piece CG movement with Awakening of the New Era seems very odd, at first glance, as sealed cases go for more than 12 individual booster boxes would cost (12 boxes at $247 booster displays total to $2964; cases sell for $3257). The likely explanation for these mass quantities of booster displays are being moved in this fashion is that collectors want to buy the cases sealed in order to preserve the perceived case ratios of opening up ultra rare hits. Some of the One Piece CG parallels for hundreds of dollars on eBay and Whatnot.Source: ICv2
