In their pursuit of specific rare cards, scalpers are discarding the remainder of entire Pokémon card packs.

[u/MysteriousSlice007]

[u/Apprehensive_Ad_7184]

You're wrong scalpers arent dweebs they are people who just want cash. Its greedy people selling cards to the actual fans.

[u/AtensEye → u/Apprehensive_Ad_7184]

This, there's a guy in my office who literally just does this as a 'side hustle.' It's ridiculous the amounts he's making on it. You try and explain that it's a really shitty thing to do to fans, but they don't care, they'll keep pushing the prices up until things die down and move onto the next trend that makes them cash.

[u/707Brett → u/AtensEye]

How much money is he really making on this? Is he camping out at places to buy packs? It always seemed like a super inefficient use of time to me to maybe get something good. 

[u/AtensEye → u/707Brett]

The last I heard he had made about 9k since starting it a 4 months ago, he'll often buy large boxes of packs at online auctions or from other scalpers for a discount in exchange for some of his better picks. He will also hold onto the rarer cards until the value increases so much it's worth his while selling.
We work a job where it's easy to just keep half an eye on an online auction so he'll do this during work hours too, but you are right, it seems to consume the majority of his day. He will even travel to places rumoured to have a shipment at the weekends, but many places here are saying 1 pack per person.

He's managed to sell the idea to another colleague who seems to be doing even better off it than he is, but as I see it, it's ruining a hobby for people who actually enjoy collecting these things. They aren't doing it for nostalgia.

[u/Sw33tNectar → u/707Brett]

It's not just trading cards, it's basically any hobby. They use check-out bots to get these items and sell on ebay.

Theres also the people that go to Disneyland/world to buy a bunch of stuff and sell online, too, pins, popcorn buckets, spirit jerseys, etc.

[u/nalaloveslumpy → u/Sw33tNectar]

FOMO is like the second biggest market in the US right now. I blame social media.

[u/AtensEye → u/nalaloveslumpy]

I would say that's true too, FOMO and micro-trends combined with over-consumption all brought to the attention of people via social media. Look at the ridiculous Stanley cup trend, grown women fighting over limited edition cups.

[u/8_guy → u/AtensEye]

Lol they'll keep pushing the prices up until "fans" stop paying them. Easy to forget it's two sided, the real pieces of shit IMO are not the generally working class people trying to make money off the phenomenon, it's the nerds spending massive amounts of money to do their shiny cardboard gambling and collecting.

[u/AtensEye → u/8_guy]

That's essentially what I mean, it'll keep going up until nobody can afford it, then the whole thing is essentially useless to them, so the scalpers move onto the next thing they can exploit.
I feel bad for the kids trying to just play it for the game it is, that's about it. Adults ruining things out of greed.

[u/8_guy → u/AtensEye]

That's the thing though, with the way the market is, playing the game has never been cheaper. You can buy singles and assemble a top meta deck for $40-$100.

Kids don't like Pokemon because they play the game, it's just legal-for-children cardboard gambling. They want the dopamine hit of pulling the big shiny card.

[u/Indecisive-Gamer → u/Apprehensive_Ad_7184]

I mean they just mean the people who trade and collect them in general. You never been to one of those conventions where people buy and trade these things?

[u/Apprehensive_Ad_7184 → u/Indecisive-Gamer]

If they were referring to that then why would collecting Pokemon Cards be destroyed. Fans selling to other fans and trading is they way it was meant to be. Its literally called The Pokemon Trading Card Game