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By Alex and Eric, 23.11.2020 | updated 24/11/2020
The truth behind Pokemon Cards
Background and History:
Pokemon as we know it is the famous trading card game that was popularised in the early 2000s. But how did it start, where is it from and how do some cards have such exorbitant prices?
Pokémon was originally a video game duo published by Nintendo for the GameBoy in 1996, a then popular game console. These two games were Pokémon Red and Blue. Nintendo continued to release games for its consoles and Pokémon quickly grew to become a multimedia franchise with comics, spin-off games, an animated series and most importantly for this article, trading cards. The trading card game was released a few months following the game and immediately garnered a lot of attention from Japanese players. With a unique game system and attractive design, it did not take long for them to be released in the US in 2003. It received international recognition and with more generations of cards being released, collectors started having a hard time acquiring older and rarer cards.
The Economics Behind It:
So, why do some pokemon cards reach insane prices? Well, partly because Pokémon is the highest-grossing entertainment franchise of all time. Having acquired a whopping $90 billion since its conception in 1995, it continues to grow in popularity, its demographic constantly widening at an unprecedented rate. Once a viral sensation all over the globe, it hasn't fallen off the map. In fact, the augmented reality game Pokémon Go is earning more money than it ever has before. According to mobile analytics firm Sensor Tower, Pokémon Go had a record year in 2019, taking in an estimated $900 million through in-app purchases.
The main factor that can somewhat justify the prices of these pieces of paper is supply and demand. Supply is the amount of goods that a company has, pretty self explanatory. Demand refers to how many people want those goods. When the supply of a product goes up, the price of said product goes down and vice-versa. At some point, too much demand for a certain product will cause the supply to diminish. Some cards have a limited supply to begin with, making up a small percentile of the total cards in circulation. In this scenario, some Pokémon cards are in such small supply compared to the amount of customers the multi-media franchise has, that the prices of these cards increase well above what you would expect of a paper card with some fancy colours on it.
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