’30th Celebration’ Singles Prices Drop Rapidly Because of Better Hit Rate and Huge Supply
Pokémon TCG flippers melted down on a Discord server about the recent Pokémon TCG: 30th Celebration set.
It appears that reality finally caught up with Pokémon TCG flippers. A few days after the first wave of Pokémon TCG: 30th Celebration hit the streets, the prices of singles for the set began plummeting rapidly after an initial uptick (see “Wild Post-Release“). Special Illustration cards were dropping somewhere between 40% to 50%, some of the other rare Pikachu illustration cards were down over 80%, and other cards were down considerably (based on TCGplayer and eBay pricing). Social media influencers and various media outlets claimed that these prices were the result of higher hit rates and an oversupply of product for the initial wave.
The flippers, who rely on short supply and high singles demand to flip their cards for more than retail price, were apparently upset by this development and took to a Discord server to voice their concerns (posts were later copied onto Reddit threads). Here are some of the quotes from flippers posted on the server:
“Pokemon needs to do something. Everyone can get multiple ETBs, and as someone that got over 2000 from the Pokemon Center, Walmart, Amazon, Target, and Best Buy drops I am PISSED. They made way too much supply and it’s hurting the people that actually ensured their business makes money…”
“I’m seriously considering taking legal action against Pokemon. It’s disgusting that they didn’t share exact print numbers, pull rates, and how big the supply truly is…No one has supported Pokemon more in the past than us, helping distribute the product at fair market value instead of underpriced MSRP…”
“I don’t know what to do. I maxed out three different credit cards buying as much 30th Anniversary stuff as possible. Everyone was talking about it for over a year. It’s the most hyped set ever. Why did they make so much? What am I going to tell my wife??? There’s no way I can offload all this at a profit and my local stores are not accepting returns. I’ve been nothing but loyal to this brand for over eight months and this is how they treat us? They knew it would financially ruin people. They knew the secondary economy they created. They are no worse than a community government controlling their currency. Pokémon’s greed ruined my livelihood. ”
It is entirely possible that some these posts are satirical, especially the last one that mentions the posters being “loyal to this brand for over 8 months” (a comment which inherently lends itself to dark humor about the nature of flipping). In the meantime, on the other side of the conversation, a wave of schadenfreude (see “Reveal in ‘Schadenfreude’“) washed over Pokémon fans who were just trying to collect the cards and pay somewhere close to retail price for 30th Celebration product to open. The social media reactions to the Discord meltdown were, of course, priceless:
“It’s nice to see parasites suffering.”
“Scalpers calling themselves secondary distributors is a wild rebrand.”
“The 30th Anniversary set has somehow unlocked the rarest card of all: a sealed box that stays on the shelf.”
“People discovering this like some new information; anyone with half a brain knew the Pokemon market is artificially inflated.”
“Nintendo should launch a reprint in a month just to @&%* with them.”
At the end of the day, most retailers, distributors and games industry professionals probably had an inkling that the 30th Celebration set would have a massive print run based on preorder numbers. The singles card price action is not really too surprising, given the initial supply product and the two-year product reprint cycle. However, the demand for the product is still very high amongst fans and live stream sellers. Perhaps the glut of product for this set will finally put a damper on the FOMO driving people to commit robberies (see “Armed Robberies“), get in fights in parking lots and engage other nefarious behavior in an effort to obtain product.
Source: ICv2
