Almost impossible to get Pokémon card in the past few years. Right around the 25th anniversary of the Pokémon franchise, the Pokémon card has seen a massive resurgence in popularity; whether fueled by pandemic boredom or dream of getting rich from your Charizard card, Pokémon Cards both new and used are sold out as soon as they hit the shelves. People stock up on McDonald’s Happy Meals for special cards. Retail stores such as Target took the card off their shelvesonly choose to sell online, allegedly because frantic shoppers have created safety concerns in stores. People are flooded with card scoring services with so many cards from collectors hope to make it so rich that they have to pause new submissions to clear the backlog.
Last year, The Pokémon Company acknowledges the shortage of Pokémon cards and announces it is ramping up production to meet the high demand.
“We know that some fans are having a hard time purchasing certain Pokémon [trading card game] products due to very high demand,” the company said in a tweet. “In response, we are re-publishing the affected products at full capacity to ensure more fans can enjoy Pokémon TCG.”
The Pokémon Company is not kidding. According to data published by The Pokémon Company, it has produced more than 9 billion cards in the past year alone. This is more than double the rate of the previous year, when the Pokémon Company created 3.7 billion cards. (It typically generates between 1 and 2 billion cards a year, Pokémon expert and Serebii webmaster Joe Merrick told Polygon.) To date, more than 43.2 billion cards have been produced since. Pokémon Trading Card Game debut.
More than a quarter of all printed Pokémon cards are produced between 2020 and 2022. There’s never really been a production of Pokémon cards – The Pokémon Company simply couldn’t keep up with the huge demand. such huge.
“It’s definitely a big deal and shows a reaction to the situation that happened at the end of 2020, in terms of the general consumer getting the card,” Merrick said. “Pokémon” [trading cards] hit a popular trend again and people are buying out of stock, not necessarily for good reason, and it’s nearly impossible for people to get their hands on any new products. It’s a nightmare for the general consumer.”
Charlie Hurlocker, a Pokémon expert and senior consultant for taxonomy company CGC, told Polygon that the Pokémon Company is likely to over-produce Pokémon cards today, flooding the market with its collections. to lower prices and keep all shelves stocked. The strategy seems to be working: Most stores have products on shelves, and prices on the primary and secondary markets are down. Hurlocker says booster boxes, during the peak of the Pokémon craze over the past few years, have been selling at online retailers for more than 20% MSRP – which seems like a big price increase, because boost boxes strong, he said, are sold for much cheaper. The current, with a wide range of cards and sets on the marketPrices are falling back to normal, Hurlocker said, with retailers really just breaking even on card sales.
A second indicator of the Pokémon Company’s overproduction is the bulk card market, Hurlocker said.
“There is an entire secondary market based on the value of any Pokémon card,” he explains. “Pokémon cards peak in 2021 at six cents a card – any card costs six cents, just because demand is so overwhelming. Now that price has served. It’s like a penny, and the biggest two [bulk] Buyers don’t even buy. “
Hurlocker added, “The overprint is working.”
Six cents per card doesn’t sound like a huge number, and it isn’t – especially when you comparing it to hundreds of thousands of dollars made Pokémon cards big news. But the tons of cards, even though the price has dropped, are still very rare and worth a ton. But most Pokémon cards are not rare ones. They are regular cards or energy cards and there are many of them. Hurlocker says demand is so high that bulk cards that will cost six cents each are a big deal.
The Pokémon card bubble hasn’t burst, but the franchise is returning to its current normal level of hype. new pack, like coming Pokémon Go expansion with peel off, card Ditto trolley, will likely enter the cycle with high demand, but it won’t be long before packages return. There may not always be Pokémon cards on Target’s shelves, but you can’t get them anymore.
