You Can’t Escape This Pain

Collectors are quitting Pokémon.

All because of the booming Pokémon market.

And, I get it:

It’s not fun to collect when your experience is defined by missing out: empty shelves, scalpers, and prices that are many times MSRP.

It’s familiar to me.

This was exactly like the market I joined in late 2020 when I started collecting and investing in Pokémon again.

And this experience has returned in 2025.

Fortunately: it’s not all doom and gloom.

Because what comes up must come down.

I saw it happen in 2022 and 2023, when Pokémon was cheap and easy to find. You wouldn’t believe how easy it was to find affordable Pokémon products!

It must have been heaven, right? Every collector’s dream… right?

No.

The market said they wanted larger print volumes and cheaper prices. And, when they got exactly what they asked for, they claimed Pokémon was now worthless! That they’d printed so many new cards they destroyed the collecting hobby!

The pain of the market highs was replaced with the pain of the market lows: more than just the sting of financial losses, it was also the uncertainty and embarrassment that comes with being invested in a falling market.

And yet, here we are in 2025, in the middle of another booming market, and those worthless products have seen their prices explode.

This is the inevitable Collectibles Cycle.

And, with it, the inevitable emotional pain.

As a Pokémon collector, there will always be difficulties during each phase of the Collecting Cycle. We will always want available and cheap products when the market is booming. And, as soon as the market corrects, we’ll always dream of rising collection values, and the validation that comes with with being proven right: that Pokémon was worth it.

We can’t avoid the pain that comes with the cycle.

And so, if we can’t avoid it: we must embrace it!

Everything that sucks about the current market is a result of the growth in Pokémon: with more collectors than ever before, it’s no surprise that demand has exceeded what The Pokémon Company can print.

It sucks, but as long-term collectors and investors, we need to remember this growth is amazing for everything we love about Pokémon.

The Pokémon Company has already announced reprints, and rumors suggest the first wave of reprints are coming soon. If The Pokémon Company does what they always do, we should expect reprints to begin forcing the correction and triggering a bear market.

This correction will be painful, but it will allow us, the die-hard collectors and investors, to build our collections at prices we can only dream of today! And, sometime beyond that, the market will boom all over again.

And bring the cycle of pain with it.

As Pokémon collectors and investors: we choose this fight.

Embrace it 💪

As always,

Thank you so much for reading the TCG Buyers Club newsletter. My name’s Grey, I buy cardboard, and I’m on a mission to make Pokémon collecting and investing simple.

Cheers 🍻