Pokémon Cards 101: Complete Beginner's Guide to Collecting & Valuing

welcome to my first Pokémon cards 101 Master Class My Name is Oliver and I've been collecting Pokémon cards my whole

life a couple years ago I decided to dedicate the majority of my time to building an educational platform for

Pokemon card collectors you may notice that the audio quality and video format change throughout this class this is

essentially a super cut of all of my educational videos edited together now I have gone through and cut out anything

that isn't relevant today so all the information is up to date I'm also going to jump in after each video and

summarize key points but you might have to suffer through some of my early videos where I wasn't as comfortable on

camera I've added chapters with timestamp so feel free to skip around ask questions in the comments or even

watch at 1.5 time speed if that's better for you okay let's get started the very first video we're going to watch was

created for beginners and acts as a sort of bird's eye view of the Pokemon card hobby if you're returning to the Hobby

after a Hiatus it can be confusing let me break it all down for you starting with booster packs so this is a booster

pack today I've got a$1 19.99 pack here for comparison they look similar but the cards inside are a lot different the

cards are a lot shinier now and unlike the original packs each booster will contain a guaranteed Holo and two

reverse Holo Cards and any any of these can be swapped out for a higher Rarity oh and by the way the Rarity scale is

quite a bit different in an old pack the hit was a rare represented by a star and if you were lucky you could pull a

hollow rare today rare is actually on the lower end of the Rarity scale yeah there's a whole scale of Rarities now it

can be confusing but all you need to remember is black silver gold and one star two star three star I have a whole

in-depth guide on the Rarity system so feel free to watch it later but the key takeaway is that special illustration

rares marked with two gold stars are the most valuable on the secondary Market they have detailed artwork and texture

on the face these are the cards that everyone chases after a common question I get is which booster pack is the best

to open and the answer lies in expansion sets there are a lot of expansion sets a new one is released about every 3 months

so over the past 25 years that's a lot of sets it'll make more sense if we look at the structure we have different

blocks of the TCG that span more than a year this is sometimes called an era for example we're in the scarlet and violet

era right now but this will change soon because most of these errors coincide with the release of the video games and

they also come with a unique game game mechanic you might remember Pokémon EX from the ex era in 2003 and they've

actually returned a few times over the years but we've also had GX V and more the booster pack we just opened says

scarlet and violet but it also has a set name 151 in this case new sets contain new cards mostly sometimes they reprint

cards for the TCG or just to cash in on Nostalgia like chariz here for example each set includes a few Chase cards and

these are the sought after ones that stand Above the Rest usually going for a couple hundred bucks on the secondary

Market the biggest Chase Card though of the modern era is this Umbreon Vmax each set has a set symbol so you

could quickly identify which set a card was from based on the symbol but they recently removed these and now use an

abbreviated version of the set name so there's a lot less confusion there are a lot of resources

and apps you can use to see which cards belong to which set some websites I like are Pokemon cards.com and the official

database pokemon.com regarding apps I like decks and poke collector now I'm not

affiliated or sponsored with any of these they're just what I like to use and if you're returning to the Hobby you

might feel the urge to collect every card from a set we call this a master set just a warning this is harder to do

today than it was in the early 2000s sets are bigger and cards are harder to pull plus we have all kinds of variants

and promos which are optional and would lead you into something I call a grandm set now I do have a whole video

dedicated to master sets so you can learn more there if you want to master set one of the original sets like Bas

set for example buying singles is best the booster packs are just too expensive now but you should also consider 151

this is a modern set that includes only the original 151 Kanto Pokemon it's kind of like a new updated base set and by

the way if you do decide to start a master set collecting all the cards just by opening boosters is just no longer

feasible you'll spend two to three times more open as many boosters as you want but then buy the cars you're missing and

you'll save yourself tons of money I promise next you're probably going to be collecting promo cards now this isn't

something that has actually changed all that much remember black star promos like the ones you got from the movie

theater they still do these although the sets are much bigger they don't belong to one of the regular expansion sets

they actually have their own set that in spany entire era of the TCG for example the scarlet and violet black star promos

started when scarlet and violet came out like the video games which is when the scarlet and violet set came out and it

will end when the scarlet and violet era ends when the new games come out it's one big set that's drip fed over a year

or two now some promos can be hard to find and become quite expensive this gray hat Pikachu was available to

customers who visited the van go Museum in Amsterdam unfortunately this turned into

a pretty large Fiasco involving scalpers and corrupt employees and produced headlines across the world and yes

people actually bought plane tickets to Amsterdam just to get one of these cards this was a holing and the Pokémon

company issued several statements about it eventually pulling the card from the museum and offering it through the

Pokemon Center the official store which we will talk about later and even some GameStop locations so this dropped the

price as Supply increased but 99% of promos are going to be found in bundles with products that you can find on the

store shelves so you don't really have to worry about that collection boxes etbs and blister packs will have promos

but there are dozens and dozens thousands of products now this video would be way too long if I went through

every single TCG product and explained each one in depth but luckily I've already done that

so once again I'll link the video here and also down below the like button but the tricky thing about promo cards is

that they're only available for a short amount of time and some of them like the Pikachu with gray felt hat can be tricky

to obtain in this case you'll have to visit the secondary market now back in the day the secondary Market was

basically bringing your binder onto the school bus and trading cards but today it's much

less wholesome so the secondary Market ranges from $1 listings all the way up to the six and seven figure deals that

we see on social media these highle deals are typically done privately or at auction but for Norm like us we go to

eBay and TCG player we'll get into this more when we talk about buying and selling cards but first we have to

discuss how we got here so collecting Pokemon cards was a pretty small hobby for a pretty long time after the initial

launch of Pokemon died out the franchise existed on a small but healthy scale but then in

2016 Pokémon go launched and and this caused a lot of people to come back Pokemon cards flew off the shelves and

the demand reached an all-time high however this was nothing compared to co to the pandemic this was a Kind of

Perfect Storm people were in lockdown isolated in their homes this means that digging through your attic or basement

and rediscovering your old 1999 Pokémon bind was actually really calm lots of people were doing this and in addition

to this everyone had extra money from government checks and also skipping their annual vacations and no longer

going out to eat with friends everything exploded collectibles in general absolutely skyrocketed cards were

hitting market prices that had never even been dreamed of because it all comes down to supply and demand

especially at the time when the supply chain was barely moving people were literally fighting over booster packs at

Walmart thankfully we've somewhat recovered from that embarrassing moment but things do get a little

sketchy from time to time be prepared and we haven't even touched on grading yet basically you can

send your cards to a company and they will authenticate it and give it a grade based on its condition they encase it in

a plastic slab and ship it back to you sounds silly and it is but it's extremely woven into the Collectibles

culture grading increases the value of your card especially if it gets a 10 the price gap between a 9 and a 10 is huge

because most collectors want tens which leads us to investors you probably already know about this and

this these are vintage Pokémon cards that now cost the same as a house however back in 1999 you could pull a

first edition Charizard for a $3 pack if you got lucky if not you could buy one from a friend for 15 bucks people want

to get in on the great returns however the golden age has passed great returns can still be had but it's

unlikely to ever hit that level ever again remember Pokémon cards are Collectibles so they actually gain value

and this creates an opportunity for people to make money once an expansion set is out of print it starts to get

more expensive people will buy sealed product and hold on to it until they make a great return now to be clear I'm

not judging anyone here I'm just letting you know what's up in today's Collectibles culture and if you find

this intimidating you don't have to worry about it you could just collect cards but there are opportunities for

collectors for example if you pull an expensive card but don't really care for it you can grade it sell it make a small

profit allowing you to upgrade to the card you actually desire but if you want to get a card graded you're going to

have to take care of it for example this first edition Charizard you had when you were a kid if you kept it in mint

condition it could sell for a lot of money but if it's in poor condition it's worth a lot less now if you're

collecting cards you're going to need sleeves these are little pockets made of plastic that you put your card into we

have different sizes the two most common are standard and slim sometimes called perfect fit or inner sleeves either is

fine it's just a preference thing but you can also use both and double sleeve your cards after this you have a few

options top loaders are common these are also called rigid or hard sleeves and they're basically just a bigger thicker

version of a sleeve but no longer flexible there are also card Savers sometimes called semi- rigid sleeves

these are flexible but they hold your card in a way that will prevent it from shifting these are especially used

during shipping now you can find binders that fit top loaders and even card Savers if that's your style otherwise

regular binders fit sleeved cards now it's sinful to use any of this without first using a sleeve by the way if you

buy just one thing by sleeves and everyone has different standards when it comes to sleeving cards despite my

channel name I don't actually sleeve every card I usually sleeve anything Hollow and leave nonone Hollow cards

naked but that's a personal choice and you can do whatever the heck you want now back in the day we used three ring

binders with clear pages but these are out the general consensus around these three ring binders is that they can harm

your cards I've experienced this myself in addition to this top loaded Pages means cards can fall out of the binder

if held upside down today we have an improved design these binders offer much more for card protection the pockets are

side loaded most have zippers and the soft interior prevents the pages from getting dull these are just so much more

better than the old playground binders that would collect dust and dirt potentially hurting the value of your

cards let's move on to how to value a card all right so maybe you dug up your old collection or you have some new

cards you want to know the value of let's jump on to eBay really quick eBay isn't the only Marketplace to buy and

sell Pokémon cards but it's the biggest first I'm going to search for the card name that is the Pokemon's name followed

by its card number at the bottom in this case Pikachu and the number is 60 of 64 then we're going to enter the

condition of the card based on this scale and I'll drop a link below the like button if you want to look into

this condition guide a little more in this case I'm going to search LP which means lightly played based on some of

the whitening on the edges of this card here are the search results so we can see that we searched the right card

there's one more thing to do though I'm going to only fill to sold listings this way we can see what people are actually

paying for the card not just their asking price now you can buy or sell cards on eBay just make sure that this

seller has good feedback and make sure you look at the images closely and you'll most likely have a good

experience and yes sometimes you'll find fade cards but eBay has an authenticity guarantee and I've always gotten my

money back a quick tip here that has saved me money combine shipping when possible and if you don't see an option

for it in your cart just message the seller sometimes shipping makes the card no longer worth it but reaching out to

the seller Works they almost always are willing to work with you another huge Marketplace is TCG player which is

actually owned by eBay and TCG player is a great resource too if you want to look at card values over time you get these

neat little Gra and average prices you can watch and pay attention to if you want to make Pokémon

card shopping more of an experience check out local card shows there is one near you here you can walk around and

browse an insane collection of cards you're probably going to see stuff you didn't know existed or things you

otherwise would never see in person and you'll get the chance to meet new people my friend Coupe does this and uploads

his whole day to YouTube so you can get a handed and honest look into the world of card vendors he also gives cards to

kids for free which is hard not to love if you want to buy new cards like fresh booster packs then the official website

pokemoncenter.com is going to be the best place to start however they are sold out often anything after this is

going to be at your own risk but most of the time GameStop Target places like that are going to be safe avoid

AliExpress Etsy and Teemu guys if Pokemon cards are extremely cheap they're fake okay fake

cards often come from fake booster packs a quick way to tell if a booster pack is fake are these triangle cuts on the top

and bottom now not all fake packs have the triangle Cuts but it's a good place to start fake cards often have typos and

po print quality and just feel bad remember how some new cards have texture on them fake cards often mess this up or

they just skip the texture Al together a good first step in identifying a fake card is to just Google search the card

compare the images to your card and look for obvious mistakes so the key takeaways of this video are everything

is different expansion sets can get confusing but I have a whole video on that that we will watch shortly the

secondary Market drives all the prices and a lot of people take advantage of that and buy sleeves if you don't have

sleeves buy some and if you're ready pick up top loaders and a binder as well now I skimmed over a lot of Concepts in

that video and we will be taking a deeper look at them later in this course such as Master sets card value and

grading the next video covers all the different kinds of Pokémon card products you'll find in stores and what's

included in each of them okay it's kind of confusing especially if you're returning to the Hobby after a

long Hiatus here is a crash course on all Pokemon TCG products and how they work back in the day we had decks and

booster packs to supplement your decks and that's pretty much it but today we have new products coming out almost

weekly first we have the booster pack which hasn't changed much the cards inside have though booster pack

composition changes every now and then but the basic principle is still there mostly non Hollow relatively common

cards and a chance at a very cool rare card sometimes maybe even two very cool rare cards and they each come with a

single code card these are for the Pokémon TCG mobile app if you scan the QR code you redeem a booster pack in the

game another product you'll see on the shelves is the Elite Trainer Box but most of us just call it an ETB for short

now each set is going to have its own ETB and it will only contain cards from that set these are popular because they

offer a decent price per booster pack as well as a handful of other goodies you get 10 booster packs a bunch of supplies

a promo card and the Box itself which comes in handy etbs are a popular choice for sealed collectors due to their

visual appeal and I would actually argue that this is the best product to buy if you're a beginner maybe you're a

collector or a TCG player maybe you don't know yet this product offers a little bit of both and and you can find

special Pokémon Center exclusive etbs on the official website right now they come with an extra booster pack so a total of

11 and a second promo card with a Pokémon Center stamp on it there's also upcs which we'll visit in the next

section and recently they started making these booster bundles this is a box of six booster packs and nothing else these

are good if you don't want all that extra stuff and the packaging can double as a cheap deck box too if you're in a

mini tins contain two booster packs Pokeball tins contain three booster packs and the regular tins come with

five boosters plus a promo card sometimes you'll find tins exclusive to a set so they only contain cards from

that set but they usually have assorted packs inside from previous sets next we have collection boxes these come in any

size or shape many of them have a unique theme for example we've seen Charizard boxes or EV lution box

and they all come with promo cards but some come with other stuff like figures posters binders or pins now you might be

curious about booster boxes these are not sold at retail stores you can't find it at Target you can't find it at

Walmart back in the day these were meant exclusively for game shops to purchase and then sell the boosters individually

but now anyone can just order them online and this is the lowest price per booster pack you will find these are a

popular choice for Pokémon card investors since they quickly gain value once the set is out of print theme decks

are decks with a theme after all there is a game to be played with these cards these are preassembled Decks that should

be pretty easy to understand and use the Pokémon and trainer cards have nice Synergy and there will be enough energy

cards to support different strategies and similarly build and battle boxes are focused on building a deck however these

do not contain decks they just offer the necessary cards from the new set to start building strategies and play

around with the new release these also contain four booster packs unless you get the buildin battle Stadium version

which does Supply you with everything you need to play a game for two people actually these are great choice for

anyone who's wanting to learn the TCG so those are the main products that you're going to find for pretty much every

expansion but there's some more that come at different times of the year this all started with the video games and to

this day the video games still lead the franchise previously we were in the sword and shield era but once scarlet

and violet released for the Nintendo switch the TCG moved into the scarlet and violet era or block of the TCG so

all of the products being released right now will say scarlet and violet on them and in a year or two they'll say

something else we usually get a new expansion every 2 to 3 months so we get five or six per year most of them will

be Mainline expansions but we typically get one special set around the holiday season and I'll come back to this with

the release of these Mainline expansions every 2 to 3 months they'll be accompanied by etbs tins decks blister

packs and everything else I already mentioned the holiday season is when we get more interesting products we get

collection boxes that cash in on Nostalgia actual holiday products like the trick-or trade bundles and holiday

calendars and an ultra premium product now we only saw the introduction of Ultra Premium collections or upcs for

short a few years ago these are big expensive boxes with very collectible cards and these are marketed more to the

adult collectors such as myself upcs are like high-end etbs they usually contain a handful of booster packs a playmat

sleeves high quality TCG supplies like metal dice desirable promos and sometimes metal cards by the way there

are only a few metal cards and they all came from upcs these ones are fake the holiday season usually brings some other

products too like the Pokémon TCG classic or this premium Charizard product now I said I would come back to

the special set so these Mainline expansion sets have a tight schedule and we know what to expect from them they're

like the bread and butter of the TCG they reveal new card types Rarities game mechanics mechanics but special sets

sometimes called holiday sets are a whole different pocket monster Pokémon 151 you're probably aware of this set

because you know it's only the most successful set ever this set features only Generation 1 Pokémon from Kanto

it's pretty typical for a special set to capitalize on '90s Nostalgia many of us are in our 30s now with disposable

income so they take advantage of that there are three main things to note about special sets first they kind of

Break The Rules you'll notice that you can't buy a booster box of the Pokémon 151 set in English they pretty much

force you into buying these collection boxes with the exception of the booster bundle I mentioned earlier second the

set itself will be geared towards collectors we're talking huge Chase Cards Limited promo cards that will be

hard to find and big sets that cost a pretty penny to complete lastly the special sets usually get reprints these

products sell they literally sell out like crazy even a year after release Mainline expansions might hang around

for a few months but special sets will be available for a year or more with Costco rolling in new pallets on a

weekly basis one of the biggest most powerful tools the Pokemon franchise has is promotional cards so this might be a

little bit of an oversimplification but any cards that you find outside of an expansion set are going to be promo

cards promo cards can be expensive or cheap really cool with unique exclusive artwork or pretty underwhelming they can

be anything and can be found anywhere but most of the time you'll find them on the shelves imprisoned behind a plastic

barrier this topic goes pretty deep so I'll probably make a promo cards explained video in the future but for

now let's just break them down into two categories black star promos and other promos so to keep track of promo cards

they actually have their own set these are called Black Star promos and it's a set that expands across the entire era

or block of the TCG so for example scarlet and violet Blackstar promos started with these little guys numbered

one two and three and the final promo will be before the next video game releases and starts the cycle over again

but there are promo cards that don't belong to the Blackstar promo set these are also found in products and again

I'll use Pokemon 151 as an example the Alakazam EX collection box came with three promos Alakazam which is a

Blackstar promo but also Abra and Kadabra which are not black star promos these are cards from the main set but

now they have a different Hol pattern these kinds of promo cards have been a thing for a very long time they're kind

of hard to keep track of because they don't have a home like Blackstar promos do and in the same category I would put

stamped cards like this GameStop Charmander this is identical to the mainline Charmander in every way but it

has a GameStop stamp on it and it's not a Blackstar promo the McDonald's Pokemon cards are kind of weird they are a set

like they actually have their own numbering system and booster packs but to me they feel more like promo cards

because well it's really more of a promotion campaign premium tournament collections tend to pop up every once in

a while they feature a trainer character instead of a Pokémon and come with a nice promo card featuring that trainer

seven assorted booster packs and game supplies and it all gets packed into this cute little milk carton inspired

box lunch boxes officially called collector's chests are a seasonal product that is marketed to the younger

consumer and contains five booster packs plus some stick a coin a notebook and a mini binder the trainers toolkit is

specifically for those who are into the TCG much like the pre-built decks or build-in battle kits they offer much

more value to someone who's going to be playing the game in person these toolkits come with only four booster

packs but a ton of TCG stuff like energy card sleeves and a deck builder guide oh and an official TCG rule book okay if

that was overwhelming you're not alone it was overwhelming to make believe believe me etbs or Elite Trainer boxes

are going to be the best product for beginners since it offers a little bit of everything but if that product isn't

right for you there should be something else if you want just packs try a booster box or a booster bundle but etbs

are by far the most popular in fact the next video is a deep dive on the ETB and why it's positioned as the best Pokemon

product but it's also sort of a sequel to the last video going further into product design and how different

products fit into different marketing tactics the Pokémon company uses various methods of marketing psychology on us

and I think it's important to know how we're being manipulated into buying Pokemon cards this is an Elite Trainer

Box but everyone just says ETB for short if you're returning to the Hobby you might be wondering what is so special

about the ETB everyone's talking about them but they don't really seem to be that good so what's the deal well it has

a special promo card which can sometimes be very desirable these days the promo is almost always a beautiful

illustration rare and if you purchase a Pokemon Center exclusive ETB from the official website it comes with an extra

promo but this one has an exclusive stamp and these often sell on the secondary market for more than the ETB

itself they also come with dice counters and energy cards these are for the TCG and while they're nice to have many of

us don't actually use use them oh and these dividers which are really really nice but they never really give you

enough the sleeves can sometimes be cool or even desirable if they have a cool design or popular Pokemon on them each

ETB is going to have a mascot Pokemon who's going to be on the front of the Box the booklet and sometimes the

sleeves and people don't talk about this often enough but it also comes with a booklet that shows us all the cards in

the set furthermore it has a key so you know which cards come as reverse holos and regular holos it's incredibly useful

even to a veteran collector like myself and of course we have booster packs etbs will always come with booster packs

exclusive to that set back in the sword and shield era etbs came with eight booster packs but if it's a scarlet and

violet product it'll have nine and you may have noticed that the Pokemon Center etbs are a little bit more expensive

well they each come with two extra booster packs so a sword and shield ETB is going to have a total of 10 and then

a scarlet and violet ETB is going to have a total of 11 but only the scarlet and violet ones come with that extra

promo card with the exclusive stamp on it and the contents of an ETB can sometimes change a little bit like for

example the Pokémon go ETB had a deck box in it but we've covered the basics but that's just regular TCG junk and if

you really want the sleeves or like the box or something you can always buy it on eBay for pretty cheap so why is

everyone so obsessed with etps well it's the value proposition think of it like this every product on the Shelf is an

offer the Pokemon company is making you an offer in exchange for your hard-earned money now we're going to

come back to this but I want you to think about the ETB and what it offers you in other words why would you buy an

ETB I ran a quick poll on my channel and 2third of you have purchased an ETB in the past and if you Google this question

why do people buy etbs you'll find multiple Reddit threads asking this very question and the overwhelming answer

is because they're the only thing available it's the only thing that people can find and this will be

different based on where you are in the world but a lot of Pokemon TCG products sell out and they're hard to find even

online like booster bundles or collection boxes but for some reason the ETB is always there and usually at a

pretty good price anecdotally I can confirm this my local GameStop's usually pretty good at staying stocked up but if

I go to my local Walmart it's almost always empty with a few etbs scattered on the shelves now one reason for this

is that they make a lot of them if you're a returning customer to your local retailer you might notice that e

TBS tend to stay stocked up longer than the other products for example shining Fates came out in 2021 but in

2023 it was still being restocked at Walmart even though the rest of The Shining Fates products were long gone

and out of print but if etbs are as amazing as everyone says why aren't they the first to sell out well the answer is

in the rest of the product line a booster bundle offers six packs and nothing else no fluff the value

proposition here is cheap booster packs and that's it the trainer toolkit is full of TCG supplies and nothing else

this product offers the consumer a quick and easy way to play the TCG and try out new card combinations and strategies

collection boxes are exciting and usually come with multiple promo cards in addition to this they offer eye

appeal and this is a big deal for sealed collectors if you collect cards and if you're watching this I'm going to assume

you do you fall into one of these three categories Card Collector TCG player sealed collector and you don't have to

belong to Just One Tribe like some sort of sports team you can belong to two or maybe even all three of these categories

so each of these categories has its own offer a product made specifically for each of them card collectors like people

who want to build master sets and maybe send some in for grading they'll probably buy booster bundles people who

want to play the TCG maybe even competitively are going to grab the trainer toolkits or maybe the buildin

battle box because it has the best value for them there's a value proposition there and sealed collectors or investors

of Pokemon cards are going to buy whatever has the best return which is booster boxes collection boxes and

anything with promos printed in a low Supply this is sometimes called targeted marketing or Market segmentation and

there are some of us who do actually belong in all three categories in this case you might want cards TCG supplies

and something that can offer you a return on your purchase you know just in case you don't pull anything good in

this case the ETB might actually be your first choice in marketing this is called a bundling bias so if you do want a

little bit of each in instead of buying the trainer tool kit and a collection box and maybe booster packs you can just

buy the ETB it's easier and it's cheaper because it's bundled together and I touched on this a little bit in a

previous video and I would actually argue that this is the best product to buy if you're a beginner maybe you're a

collector or a TCG player maybe you don't know yet this product offers a little bit of both all right let's jump

back to the question I asked you earlier why would you buy an ETB because it's the only thing on the Shelf okay maybe

but actually it's because the value proposition of an ETB aligns with all three of those categories and the ETB is

specifically designed to do this it's an insurance product the Pokemon company needs something that is good enough for

everyone it has a pretty decent value proposition for each of us no matter which category you're in and so when you

get to the and everything else is sold out and there's just some etbs you say all right

at least it has something that I want and the box is nice too this is called situational marketing and this is

where you realize that all roads lead back to the ETB so the ETB is designed to prevent the consumer from leaving the

store empty-handed but the Pokémon company takes this even further every every year

we get a few different expansion sets one of which is a special set this is usually some hyped up Nostalgia heavy

Banger and to be fair it's usually pretty good like Pokemon 151 for these special sets they do not offer booster

boxes or individual booster packs this Narrows the product selection and the value proposition of an ETB becomes even

sweeter suddenly the price makes more sense for collectors and the demand goes up for investors and if you're a TCG

player special sets don't offer TCG focused products this is why etbs are almost always on the Shelf but the

Pokemon 151 etbs are not so it's important to note that I am a big fan of etbs and I highly recommend them that

video basically outlined why they seem to be the one product that fits all consumers now depending on when you're

watching this Pokémon cards might be hard to find we go through occasional hype Cycles in Pokémon where products

are sold out everywhere however this will pass and things will go back to normal like they always do in many of

these videos you see me make references to the Pokemon card products you find in Walmart or Target which might not be a

thing right now but when I made some of these videos it was as simple as just walking into the store and buying as

many cards as you want next we're going to Deep dive into collecting culture and how should

approach Pokemon card collecting it can be no it is it is overwhelming and having some sort of direction or goal

when you start is critical so this lesson involves an introspective look maybe some self-reflection on why you

collect and how you should collect in the future it was originally written as a budgeting video although it didn't end

up like that this hobby can get crazy expensive so this should help you navigate all the choices some of the

world's top col collectors each have very specific goals but they also have qualities that drive them to completing

these goals and eventually owning some of the most impressive Pokemon card collections in history and no they

aren't all rich in fact many are regular people like you and I so what does it take to be the very best like no one

ever was why are you collecting Pokemon cards it's not a rhetorical question I'm

actually asking you I built this flowchart that will go through step by step as a self audit so we can identify

which goal suits your collecting style best this started out as a how to collect Pokemon cards on a budget video

but during my research I found that budget big or small isn't what's holding us back it's the collector and the

pressure put on us here's the first decision we have to make what motivates your Collective on the left we have an

honest true love for the cards when I was a little kid I loved Pokemon Yellow on my game boy I still have the exact

Game Boy and cartridge right here sugam Mor's waterc color illustrations to this day are so inspirational to me and I

only got to open booster packs on special occasions so it made Pokémon cards very special to me at this point I

just want the most fun for my money and if you feel this way too you might take this path but you'll be faced with more

serious ethical questions like are you comfortable with gambling when you open a booster pack you are engaging in a

gambling mechanic this behavior is addictive and in rare instances dangerous if you keep spending to chase

a single card eventually outweighing the original cost of the card you're chasing back in the day the odds of pulling a

Charizard was about 1 in 108 packs but some Modern Chase cards are estimated to be 1 in 2,000 packs if you're

comfortable and you know the risks then you'll end up opening booster packs to get most of your cards following the

chart we see that this leads us to the most expensive way to collect and this might be a good time to mention that

this is just a chart that I made and I'm just a YouTuber you might feel like you're a combination of multiple paths

and that's okay in fact it's realistic the important part comes later when we talk about goals but for now if you're

not comfortable with the gambling aspect then you'll want to focus on trading and buying singles trading is the best

because it's essentially free so try to make trades when you can but buying singles is widely accepted as the

smartest way to collect from a financial standpoint today there are a lot of great cards for just $1 to2 every time

you open a booster pack and get nothing interesting you lose the value you paid it's even worse if you already have all

those cards opening some packs and then switching to a single strategy is popular It's the Best of Both Worlds but

it requires strong willpower buying singles also offers flexibility you can buy any card at a few different price

points a card graded at a 10 will be the most expensive obviously but you can go for a near mint raw copy a lightly

played one or even a damaged one if you really value that discount okay let's jump back to the beginning and try the

other path what motivates your collecting on the right we have a value based collecting strategy this is if you

want to build the most impressive net worth out of Pokémon cards there is something captivating about

holding a binder that's worth five figures so if this sounds like you there are three paths to take sealed

speculating and flipping now I won't go into too much detail but these are different ways that you can make money

by collecting Pokemon cards keeping sealed product that gains value over time or buying raw cards grading them

and flipping them into the profit is super common ways to build value I represent these as separate paths here

but in reality you'll be doing all of these three things the idea behind this type of strategy is that you can use

your profits to buy the cards you want making them in a way free all of these investing paths lead to the clock symbol

which represents time what financial worth you can assign this is up to you not me this could be the most expensive

way to collect or the cheapest depending on how you feel about it so if you're on a tight budget you can try flipping a

card to pay for a different card but but you need to consider your time as well it might make more sense to pick up an

extra shift at work or find a second job okay so maybe you notice that every path eventually leads to One path and

that's because any combination of collecting habits or strategies can eventually arrive at any goal the

flowchart was to provoke thought and reflection on how you buy your cards I ran a poll on my channel and almost

2,000 of you voted on one of these four goals one came out on top by a huge margin can you guess which

one if you have a fascination with a specific illustrator a specific Pokemon or collecting all of something then this

might be the goal for you over 50% chose this as their collecting goal some of the most fascinating sets in the world

started with personal goals like David person who's collecting every single card ever or Jesse Pang who's collecting

the gold star cards in pristine cgc 10s or Mr Amadeus who says right now I'm focusing on collecting first edition

trainer cards not all of them because I don't like them all but the ones I like the handdrawn art from those early

trainer cards has a special quality to me with a goal like this I can tell Mr Amadeus grew up like me absolutely

fascinated with vintage Japanese art style a popular one I see is one card of every Pokémon so completing the Pokedex

since there are over 1,000 Pokemon that means this goal would include collecting over a thousand cards but there are

sorts of rules you can set for yourself for example maybe you only want Hollow cards or maybe each card has to be the

most expensive card for that specific Pokemon a collector with this goal probably isn't opening booster packs

very often because that would just be a poor use of their budget or maybe you're goal is to have fun with your kids and

family or just build a deck and play the TCG which is totally respectable like CLR 977 who says I just want to play

with my sons we treat Pokemon like a board game and nothing more goal number two is Master set

collecting the reason this isn't in personal collections is because a master set is a

predetermined list of cards and you're probably going to be collecting cards that you don't really have a passion for

as a natural part of the process you might choose one specific set to complete or you might start with your

childhood collection and fill in the spaces that you're missing if you're crazy enough you might start with the

1999 base set and try to master set every single set up to the most recent release for one to achieve this they

would have to exercise a lot of discipline and use strategies like trading and buying singles they wouldn't

have time to flip cards on eBay a friend of mine Max Max City set out to collect the entire set of 1996 Cass prisms all

in a PSA 10 he didn't randomly acquire these he specifically sought out each one and the hard work paid off he now

has something incredible the third goal is one that I personally find very tempting the goal is to have one

specific Grail card this would be something like a first edition Charizard or Pikachu illustrator maybe a prototype

card or the test print Blastoise with the magic the Gathering back many of these are in the six figure range and

therefore are Out Of Reach for most collectors including myself but there are mid- tier Grail cards like the gold

stars or some rare promo cards now please forgive me but I'm going to use Logan Paul as an example here he set his

eyes on Grail cards Pikachu illustrator and first edition Charizard I know what you're thinking he's Rich so he can buy

whatever he wants and while that is true the fact is he set goals and he met them but most of us don't have millions in

disposable income so what do we do by automatically saying the words I can't afford it your brain stops working by

asking the question how can I afford it your brain is put to work this is a quote from Rich Dad Poor Dad by Robert T

kosaki what it means is that when you say that you can't afford something like let's say a PSA 10 first edition

Charizard you stop thinking about it you lose focus and youve move on to other things probably booster packs but when

you say how can I afford that Charizard the gears start turning and if you keep that thought at the Forefront of your

mind it can eventually happen if your Grail card is out of your price range that's kind of a good thing if you could

just go and buy it then it wouldn't be a Grail card would it as your collection grows and becomes more valuable you

could perhaps sell it all or trade the entire collection for that one Grail card 20 years from now and from here you

have leverage you could trade this grail for a different Grail when you get bored of it or

something if this is your goal you can't afford to lose focus forget about the new Pikachu or Evolutions if this is

your goal you can't afford to lose focus this last goal is a bit of a wild card money now collecting Pokemon cards

to make money isn't frowned upon this is frowned upon don't confuse the two some Pokémon cars are world class

Collectibles and that means that there's money in this hobby some people collected first edition Charizards and

sealed booster packs back in 1999 and now they have the opportunity to take care of their families for Generations

if you have a little one and you want to build a collection with them or for them over the next 18 years with the

intention to sell it off and pay for college then that's a perfectly reasonable goal to too look at the price

of a teamup booster box from 2019 that's only 6 years if you bought a dozen of these paying college tuition isn't a

joke anymore it's realistic it might happen and if your goal is actually the Grail card then this could be a step

toward that too but that takes an incredible amount of discipline experience and luck not to mention a

high cost up front maybe you really align with one of these goals a lot of people in the poll did but others went

down to the comment section because they felt like one goal didn't represent them accurately Hispanic Panic says so far I

want to collect every Crown Zenith card and as many of the gavor line as I can so they mostly align with the master set

goal for Crown Zenith but have a personal side goal of collecting gavor cards ninja stroll says basically

collect whatever I can with no end goal in sight and I'm sorry to pick on you ninja but this is actually the exact

problem we're trying to solve here building a world class collection actually means setting a goal and

holding yourself accountable the Pokemon company profits off of fomo and impulse buys so they're going to push that no

one is buying every promo every set and every Chase card that comes out so don't feel pressured so the biggest takeaway

for that video is to set a goal lots of people choose one Pokémon and collect every card of that Pokémon and I think

that's a great default if you don't have any other ideas yet I like Bulbasaur for example buying whatever you can find

will end up draining your bank account and it might feel like gambling your goal might be to complete a master set

or grandmas set which is our next lesson this is my 1999 base set master set if we check the very first card here we can

see that Alakazam is number one of 102 now if we flip a few pages and this is where jungle starts so let's ignore that

we can see that the last card in Bas set the water energy is 102 of 102 I've completed this set and

collected all 1002 cards so we call this a master set now let's jump ahead 24 years this is my Pokemon 151 Master set

well it's not a master set yet I'm still working on it but now we have reverse holos secret rares and even a card made

of solid metal the TCG has evolved but so has the terminology welcome to master sets

101 base set is an easy example because there's no fluff just the original 102 cards but a year later Team Rocket was

released this set introduced the first ever secret rare dark Raichu check out its number at the bottom 83 of 82 and

dark Raichu isn't just the first secret rare it was also the very first time a card was released in English before

Japanese in fact this card was made by Wizards of the Coast in America and it's rumored to have delayed the set's

release by 3 months so in case you don't know a secret rare is any card where its number surpasses the set number just

like dark Raichu here it's no question that dark Raichu needs to be caught in order to complete the Team Rocket Master

set today all sets have secret rares and lots of them Stellar Crown released in September 2024 has 33 secret rares but

some sets like paldi and Fates released in January 2024 have as many as4 secret rares which make up the

majority of the set you have to collect all the secret rares to complete a master set there's no argument here so

let's add that to our cheat sheet and next up let's discuss reverse holos reverse holos were first introduced with

the legendary collection in May 2002 interestingly this was an English exclusive set made up of reprints from

basad Jungle fossil and Team Rocket this was done to make cards more available and playable for the TCG but 20s

something years later has turned into one of the most collectible sets of all time so every card in this set has a

reverse Holo counterpart doubling the total of the set but the number doesn't change for example Al Kazam is one of

110 and the reverse Holo Al Kazam is also one of 110 this brings the total of the set to

220 modern sets all include reverse Holo Cards but not for every single card like the legendary collection if you have one

of the booklets found in an ETB product they will provide you with a key so you can see which cards in the set have

reverse holos but basically everything common uncommon and rare is going to have a reverse Holo variant and as you

can see I've included reverse holos in my Pokemon 151 Master set and yes these are a requirement for the master set so

let's add that to our sheet too next we're diving into promo cards most promo cards belong to their own set like the

black star promos this started all the way back actually at the beginning of the TCG maybe you remember receiving a

promo card when you went to see the Pokémon movie in theaters this Dragonite doesn't belong to the base set or jungle

or Team Rocket though it's actually number five of the Black Star promo set and the Black Star promo set itself can

be a master set but when it comes to the modern TCG this hasn't changed scarlet and violet has its own black star promo

set although these sets are massive and some cards might be impossible to get but this is where the line starts to

blur a little bit let's look at this Pokemon 151 product it comes with all sorts of goodies like booster packs a

playmat dice a coin and some promo cards Mew and Mewtwo here are actually black star promos which means they belong to

the Black Star promo set not Pokemon 151 and if this feels weird to you you're not alone it's weird I think most

collectors would consider these promos to be part of the Pokemon 151 expansion but they're not however I think most of

us would include them in our Pokémon 151 Master set personally I like to keep them at the end after the secret rares

like I said this is where things start to get blurry and this is a good time to mention that Master set isn't an

official term it's a word that collectors made up to describe a complete set so you might have a

different idea of what Master set means and if you disagree with me go ahead and comment it below so we can start a

discussion to help out the newcomers to the Hobby so for now I'm going to put the Blackstar Promos in the not required

column but we will revisit this before the video is over I promise we have to stay on track and next upep we have

unnumbered promos if Blackstar promos made things blurry unnumbered promos make things messy this is truly where

most of the confusion comes from but I'm going to try and break this down in a simple way let's jump back to the team

rocket set of April 2000 we have our 82 cards plus dark Raichu the secret rare for a total of of 83 cards but this

number gets bumped up to 86 if you want to include the unnumbered promos dark Gyarados dark Arbok and dark Charmeleon

dark Gyarados can be found with a pre-release stamp on it and dark Arbok can be found with a gold W stamp these

were both available through the Pokémon League but at different times and the third dark Charmeleon which also has the

gold W stamp was only available through an exclusive craft Foods giveaway that was only in Australia and to be clear

these cards are already in the Team Rocket expansion set but without any special stamps but they are otherwise

identical and this practice of just stamping regular cards and releasing them as promos spans the entire history

of the TCG way back in the Wizards of the Coast days all the way to today in the modern sets if we flip to the back

of my Pokémon 151 binder we'll see this little guy this Charmander looks just like the one from the main set but he

has a GameStop stamp this is essentially the same as he pre-released dark Gyarados to the team rocket set sorry

for stating the obvious but yes this Charmander was only available through GameStop there is a squirtle and a

Bulbasaur with stamps that I don't have yet they came from the Pokemon Center and Best Buy respectively oh and another

one is the EB Games Charmander 2o and it doesn't stop there Pokemon 151 is kind of notorious ious for unnumbered promos

Snorlax has a Pokémon Center stamped variant which was only available through Pokémon Center exclusive etbs Pikachu

and Eevee have Pokemon together stamps Voltorb has a professor program stamp and there's a cosmos Holo variant of

that variant Doo has a play Pokemon stamp and then a bunch of the cards have Cosmos Holo or reverse Cosmo Holo

variants and now to make things even more complicated some cards have slightly different Cosmos Holo patterns

and if you want to know more about this I made a video on it and if that was overwhelming I don't blame you it is

overwhelming like that Vol orb for example is so rare that it's much more expensive than most of us are prepared

to pay so to complete a master set are these unnumbered promos required well lately I've heard the term grandm set

thrown around and I think that's what we're looking for here it sounds kind of crazy to add another tier but with

dozens of additional cards there's a need for a higher level something to describe a master set that includes

everything so we can clear up all of this confusion and if I'm not mistaken the title of grandm originates from

chess a chess grandm is the highest possible title aside from world champion and it's extremely prestigious and

difficult to obtain so let's revisit that cheat sheet for a master set the total number of cards plus secret rares

are required all reverse holos are also required basically anything that can be obtained through a booster pack is going

to be mandatory to complete a master set Blackstar promos such as the Mew and mew2 I mentioned earlier are not

technically required because they belong to their own set but if you're not collecting the Blackstar promo set then

I would encourage you to include them with your master set like I have anything beyond this is going to fall

into the grandm set to complete a grandmas set everything is required remember this is the highest tier the

most complete a set can be this includes everything from the master set plus unnumbered promos all stamps all Holo

variants all Hollow patterns metal cards box Stoppers jumbos everything like there are literally no more cards to

collect no question that you are done and one of the most difficult grandmas sets to complete is actually probably

base set while this is one of the easiest Master sets to complete the grandmas set is close to Impossible you

would need to collect all four print runs plus variants that were only included in promotional products like

the trainer decks A and B A grandmas set of Japanese Bay set would even be more difficult I guess because you'd have to

collect the no Rarity cards which are extremely rare I can't stress just how difficult to complete a grand master set

is so I made this point in the video but I want to reiterate that the term Master set means many things if you were to go

look at the comments on that video everyone is dropping their own definition of Master set and what

mastering a set means to them lots of people skip reverse holos for example they don't like them and that's fine

it's important to build a collection that is unique to you and your tastes otherwise we would all just have the

same col cards the next video is a lesson on expansion sets so this should help put Master sets into better context

we take a look at all the expansion sets released since 1999 and go over patterns that have surfaced over the years I talk

about the difference between regular sets and special sets and more the thing about Pokemon card sets is that they

don't really explain anything for example which sets are special sets how long will they be printing the set for

and what does all this junk at the bottom of the card actually mean what is a set okay so each series

is made up of smaller sets so the first set of scarlet and violet is called scarlet and violet we call this scarlet

and violet Bas but after that they get super cool anime names like Paradox Rift or evolving skies and each of these sets

add additional cards either to collect or play the game and even though everyone just calls them sets they are

officially called expansion sets because well they expand the game each set gets its own set of products like booster

packs collection boxes etbs booster bundles and more however some products will contain booster packs from multiple

sets Pokémon started back in Japan in 1996 when the video games were released and to this day they guide the general

direction of the entire franchise each time a set of Mainline games are released a new generation of Pokémon is

revealed shortly after this the trading card game follows previously we were in the sword and shield era but now we are

in The Scarlet and violet era the pattern is simple and pretty easy to follow but if we go way back to the

early 2000s these sets weren't called red and blue gold and silver everything from Bas set to Skyridge is referred to

as the original series and follows a alongside the Game Boy [Music]

games from red and blue all the way up to Crystal Version after the original series came the ex series which ran

parallel to Ruby and Sapphire for the Game Boy Advance after this Diamond and Pearl came out in 2007 and this is when

the TCG adopted the pattern of using the game title although there is still some Nuance for example heart gold and soul

silver gets its own series but other remakes like Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire they just get a special set one

thing I get asked a lot is why individual booster packs aren't for sale for a particular set well that's because

they belong to a special Set You could argue that the first special set was Southern Islands back in 2001 but Dragon

Vault from 2012 is officially recognized as the very first special set back then special sets were small Dragon Ball only

had 21 cards if you count the one secret rare and double crisis from 2015 had 34 cards and they dropped the series logo

Dragon Vault was just Dragon Vault not black and white dragon Vault today special sets are much larger often

exceeding 200 cards and starting with scarlet and violet they now include the series logo special sets used to be rare

but now they're released semi regularly following Trends from Sun and Moon and sword and shield we can expect at least

five special sets in The Scarlet and violet series and some people like to use the set number to reference each

expansion so the first set of scarlet and violet series scarlet and violet base is number one pal and Fates is two

and so on but special sets are in between so Pokémon 151 is actually number 3.5 and Pres Matic Evolutions is

8.5 and I love special sets but they are mostly a marketing tactic if we look at the special sets we've gotten over the

past few years they're mostly designed to draw in the Gen one fans who grew up playing the original games they also

pack them full of amazing cards with pull rates that are just enough to encourage gambling and part of that

strategy is to withhold individual booster pack sales let's look at at 151 this set's product lineup was all boxes

and bundles with the best value being the booster bundles uh as long as you can get them at

MSRP you can't buy a single booster pack you have to buy multiple this is just their way of making you spend more money

another point of confusion is reprints unfortunately the Pokemon company doesn't disclose the number of cards

that are printed for each set and it's fairly incon consistent that way there's a sense of scarcity and fomo and

consumers are more likely to purchase products just in case they aren't restocked the following week these days

it feels like I'm always hearing about Pokemon 151 getting a reprint this means that the Pokemon company might have more

151 products made so your local Walmart Target or GameStop would get more 151 products in but no one really knows

until Distributors start allocating products to vendors what I mean is that some random Reddit comment isn't as

credible as the GameStop manager who might actually know something by the way when a set is reprinted the cards are

the same there's no difference between the first wave and the latter one there are a lot of questions surrounding

reprints and unfortunately we don't have a lot of answers but I always go back to the Pokemon company being a business

that wants to make money secondary market prices don't benefit them directly sales do a set like Pokemon 151

or surging Sparks is in high demand so they are heavily incentivized to print more cards but why do we see some cards

Skyrocket in price only to come down the following weeks this Pikachu for example shot up in price as soon as it was

released people couldn't find surging Sparks boosters because it was all sold out and since it's a special

illustration rare we knew it was probably hard to pull a lot of people choose to just buy the Chase card

instead of gambling for it this along with other factors contributes to cards being super expensive at the launch of a

new set and at this point you might hear rumors about the set being short printed or out of print and that's

misinformation or a fear-mongering tactic to manipulate the price of the card new sets will be continually

printed at least until the following set is released so don't drop too Grand Grand on that Pikachu just yet but

enough about that we need to discuss set composition if you feel like there's a new set coming out every other week

you're not alone it's overwhelming and when you have a busy life it's hard to keep track of what the heck is going on

in Pokemon basically you can expect a new Mainline expansion every 2 to 3 months now this isn't set in stone they

like to mix stuff up every once in a while but you can expect five to six sets per year it feels like more though

because we get a lot of news about release dates Japanese set releases leaks and stuff like that all the time

now I don't touch on the Japanese side of collecting often but it's essential to understand how the international sets

are made Pokemon cards usually release in Japan first and then a couple of months later they're released

internationally but it's not as simple as just a translation Japan and North America are two different markets with

different consumer habits Japanese expansion sets are smaller and released twice as often for example between May

and November we got Twilight masquerade shrouded Fable Stellar crown and surging Sparks within the same time frame in

Japan they got two Battle Master decks night Wanderer Stellar Miracle two Stellar terot type starter sets Paradise

Dragona and super electric breaker which all released new cards a lot of these Japanese these releases are going to be

combined for the international market these Stellar type teras sets in paradise drona and super electric

breaker are combined to make surging Sparks this is why we often know which cards are going to be released we get a

sneak peek into the future by observing the Japanese sets another difference you'll notice between Japanese and

international cards is the set identification system found in the lower leftand corner of the card Japanese

cards have a rather confusing numbering system but the international cards have an abbreviation of the set name for

example here's SSP which stands for surging Sparks the N refers to English if we check a Spanish card it has es s

for espanol now not all of this applies retroactively if we go back to the sword and shield series we can see that they

had set symbols this system wasn't great because many symbols looked similar and it was a lot harder to memorize

intricate shapes the Japanese cards never did this but their system was only a little less confusing some sets have

subsets this is a set within a set like the gallerian gallery or trainer Gallery if you open a booster pack of crown

Zenith you can pull cards from Crown Zenith obviously but also from the crown Zenith gallerian Gallery which has its

own number system and the Trading Card Game can also influence which cards are in which sets any TCG will naturally

have cards that are better than others and make it into to the mainstream meta because of this new cards have to be

developed to counter those cards that are doing too well and sometimes cards can be developed to support other cards

that are getting neglected now I'm not super educated on this but the Channel ptcg radio is if you want to get into

the nitty-gritty details and really nerd out and some cards even get reprinted so they're more available for TCG players

making it so they don't have to fight the secondary Market just to play with a deck that they like okay so far we've

only touched on Mainline expansions but we get lots of smaller mini sets from time to time some examples here would be

the Halloween trick or trade sets and the McDonald's collection sets which don't have any expensive Chase cards

since they're primarily meant for kids and the play Pokemon sets which can be completed by attending in-person events

if you take a closer look these sets are actually reprints from the mainline expansions but with New Hollow patterns

and sometimes stamps attracting dieh hard collectors who might be searching for a special variant for example this

Pidgey is a reprint from the Pokémon 151 special set but with an exclusive stamp on it you might want to collect this

single card to add to your Pokemon 151 binder but not the whole play Pokemon set but it wasn't always this way if we

go back to the watt SE era there were plenty of unique minis sets that contained new cards so norn islands is a

great example this was a set of 18 new cards with Incredible artwork and Hollow patterns released in Japan and then in

English 2 years later this was a really cool promotional set but actually had its own symbol and number system so

these wouldn't be categorized as black star promos which is its own set the first Blackstar promo was Pikachu in

1999 and after this they added an additional 52 with the final being suun in 2003 these 53 cards became the first

black star promo set this tradition has been carried on to the present day so there is little confusion each series

comes with its own Blackstar promo set that is drip fed throughout the term some are small like the 53 card wizard

set but some are large like the sword and shield Blackstar promos which is a whopping

307 cards japanese cards have a similar system but the black Stars replaced with a little box that just says promo just

like the mainline expansions but there was a time in the past when they did borrow the black star symbol for a bit

now I want to get into the more nitty-gritty parts of the Hobby and we're going to start with grading 101

this video covers card grading again from a bird's eye view and after watching you should be able to identify

different grading companies understand Raw versus graded values and how the secondary Market impacts

grading we'll talk about how to grade a card in a minute but first we need to discuss why people grade cards and it's

not as simple as you may think the biggest reason is probably resale value tens are where the money is made and

there is a lot of money to be made some people have built huge businesses by purchasing raw collections grading them

and selling the tens but there is risk involved unfortunately having a card graded really means you're paying for an

opinion there's a long running joke that your grader might have had a bad day and as a

result your card got a lower grade than it deserved even though this is a joke

there's some truth in here and we know this because there are thousands of examples online of people cracking slabs

open and resubmitting their cards until it gets a 10 because 10 sell for a lot more than nines Now resubmitting isn't

free you're essentially submitting another card therefore paying the fee again because of this companies that

utilize machine learning or AI to grade a card are on the rise the theory behind this is that you should be able to

resubmit a card and receive the exact same grade every time but most cards are still being graded by humans which means

it's a bit of a gamble another perk is that grading companies will authenticate your card so once it's in a slab you

know it's not fake most of the time unfortunately the more money the more corruption and scheming tend to leak

into the hobby now I don't want to discourage anyone from buying their first graded card but there are fake

slabs out there some labels will have a QR code on the back that you can scan and it will take you to the high

resolution scan of that card this way you can compare the hollow pattern or unique characteristics to confirm that

no funny business is going on and while you're on there you can check out the population report you see each service

has a pop report that displays how many cards have been graded and at which grades for example that Umbreon card

that everyone loves has been graded by PSA over 20,000 times and most of them got tens we can learn a lot from

analyzing a pop report for example the first edition Snorlax from Jungle has been graded over 4,000 times but only 47

have received a 10 so it's probably pretty expensive to buy a 10 by the way this would also suggest that it's a good

opportunity to make some money if you happen to have a raw gem mint copy at home my advice even though I said this

would be unbiased is to just enjoy it for yourself grade the card that you want to grade and if you see an

opportunity to make some money take it grading cards and selling them or trading them to obtain a card you want

more is very reasonable and acceptable let's start at the beginning the first thing you have to do is choose

a grading service they all offer different slabs labels pricing and perks however the industry is heavily

dominated by PSA they grade the most cards and tend to sell for the highest on the secondary Market the downside is

that they are a little more expensive and they'll charge you extra if you have something special like a first edition

Charizard for example a couple more are cgc and bgs also known as Becket both companies grade on a scale of 1 to 10

just like PS say but offer a grade higher than 10 these are pristine 10 or Perfect 10 meaning that these cards are

perfect in every way we'll talk more about these in the pre-grading section in this industry people tend to choose

one grading service and declare their loyalty to them but it's important to remain unbiased and send your cards to

whichever service is best for you a greater reputation is a very important factor people trust PSA and that's why

they have such a high value on the secondary Market there are a lot of young grading companies that are only a

few years old and while they might be very good at what they do they don't have Decades of trust from the public as

a result a 10 from these smaller companies isn't worth the same as a 10 from

PSA but that might not matter to you A specialized label might be the perfect fit for your personal collection and

that's okay it's all about what makes you happy this Factor also comes into play

if you live outside the US domestic options are a lot cheaper but resale value will suffer because Americans

won't recognize the Grading Company and before we move on someone may have told you not to trust one service or another

because they make mistakes to be clear this happens across the board people have tested these companies by sending

them fakes for example someone sent PSA authentic card with fake first edition stamps and they actually graded them cgc

recently graded fake play test cards and in the past graded cards as miscuts even though they were cut up at home with

scissors Becket has been accused of favoritism a lot like a lot this includes one person's submission

receiving 81 black labels which should be near impossible even from a statistical standpoint none of them are

perfect remember this is a service they provide they work for us so if you're looking to

maximize resale value PSA is a grading service for you otherwise it's worth researching each service and deciding

which one Vibes the best with you and remember some popular influencers are heavily invested in one company so it's

in their best interest to recommend them and sometimes slander others okay choosing a card or multiple cards

can be tough there's a lot to think about and it can get expensive the more cards you pick but I'll tell you a

secret it's not that big of a deal I want you to focus on getting your first submission out so you'll be more

comfortable with future grading decisions okay so you're flipping through your binder and trying to find

some cards to send off a few questions I ask myself are is this better in my binder or on display

and is this something I could potentially sell if it gets a 10 it's tempting to only send cards in that look

like potential 10 let's jump back to that Umbreon Pop Report all these 10 grades doesn't mean that all umbreons

are 10 it means most people send it in if it looks like a 10 this is because Umbreon is in high demand and a 10 sells

for big bux you might want to look up the raw value of your card then compare it to the graded value

all we're doing here is a little bit of research to see which cards have the highest return on investment in some

rare cases grading can lower the value of the card this sounds crazy I know but it's true a raw card that looks like a

10 can be more expensive than a graded nine I recently sent in this walking wake EX card it looked like it could be

a 10 but it got a nine and unfortunately it didn't really add any value so I kind of wasted the grading fee this is why

it's important to do your research beforehand but what if you just want to send in your childhood cards regardless

of value this is not only okay it's encouraged no one is going to frown upon the idea of grading a playground

Charizard in fact some people collect cards that get a grade of one there's something special about a card that has

visible signs of being loved these one grades can sometimes outperform twos or threes on the market but if you don't

care about value and you don't typically display your cards then it might be time to ask yourself if grading is even worth

it you're spending money and taking on a small amount of Risk by shipping your card in the mail it might be better to

just admire grading cards from a safe distance I mean thanks for watching the video but if you aren't interested in

grading then don't let others pressure you into it and if you pulled a huge card with

your kids or your partner or something and you're wondering if you should grade it hell yeah grade that puppy and

preserve that memory I think that's an awesome idea listen last year I got my original

Japanese starters graded now they didn't all get 10 which kind of sucks but I wanted to display them all next to each

other and I submitted them all at once so they have sequential serial numbers and I think that's really cool you might

not think that's really cool and that's fun because they're my cards this whole hobby is about collecting the things you

like but when you do find a card you like you might want to pre-grade it before sending it

in pre-grading is simply the process of grading the card yourself before sending it away this can help you determine

whether or not the cards might score a grade of 10 this is a very common practice and a skill you can develop

over time we're going to look at four Cate ories centering surface edges and Corners centering is the first thing I

like to look at we're going to observe the symmetry of the card and check if the image is centered on the actual card

stock there are tools you can get that help like this one and there are apps you can use that will calculate it for

you but with some experience you can eyeball it pretty well we're going to compare the top to the bottom and the

left to the right if one side is thick the other side must be thin sometimes looking at the corners can help to get

cgc pristine 10 label or becket's black label the centering has to be a perfect 5050 this means that it's perfectly

centered otherwise you can usually qualify for a regular 10 on centering with a 45 55 split oh and by the way

depending on which service you choose you'll want to check that company's grading guidelines while you pre-grade

they are a little bit different for example PSA is cool with a 4555 centering on the front but they'll

actually allow for 75 25 on the reverse and still give you a grade of 10 next we want to look at the edges sometimes

edges will look nice but other times they'll look rough or frayed unfortunately this is the result of the

manufacturing process so you'll sometimes see this if the card is packed fresh this should lead you to the

corners you should have a nice round shape with no whitening the card stock is white but of course it's covered by

the ink if some of the White shows through on the edges or Corners this is called whitening this is most commonly

found on played cards but unfortunately it can be a byproduct of the manufacturing process as well so again

some brand new cards can have minor whitening finally we want to look at the surface of the card front and back

Hollow foil cards are highly susceptible to scratches so some cards have texture and this is graded as well sometimes it

can be defective from the factory unfortunately so you want to inspect closely and make sure all those little

ridges and valleys are consistent and when we're inspecting the surface you might find it useful to use a magnifying

glass and utilize different lighting this will sometimes reveal small dents or creases unfortunately this kind of

damage will knock the grade down considerably with most grading companies I have a Blastoise set appears to be gem

mint but actually has a very small indentation knocking its grade down severely most grading services are going

to grade each of these four categories on a scale of 1 to 10 and then use those individual values to generate the

overall grade some even put the subgrades on their labels like Becket if they give all four subgrades a 10 then

you qualify for their Black Label one of the most desirable grades in the industry and keep it in mind that not

all cards grade the same a non Hollow doesn't scratch easily so it'll probably get a good surface grade but some other

cards have foil or glossy surfaces which can easily be damaged and each grading company has a

scale on its website so you can make an educated guess at your card's potential grade okay now find the raw price and

the graded price of your card and compare the two don't forget to subtract the grading fee this will give you a

good estimate of your costs and potential profit it listen this is going to feel

intimidating at first but you'll get very good very quickly with some practice pre-grading isn't a necessary

step if you're just doing this for fun but if you're shooting for a 10 then I would recommend it placing your order

and packing up your submission is the most intimidating step pretty much all services offer different tiers or

packages the faster you want your cards graded the more expensive it's going to be but you can get a discount by sending

in more cards once you've chosen the tier that works best for you it's time to back up your cards some grading

services are strict with how you package your cards if you package them in a way that makes it hard to unpack it could be

a liability for the company they don't want to damage your cards if they're forced to use scissors or peel sticky

tape for example if you screw up they might charge you extra or even send your cards back all although I've never

actually had this happen yet each company is going to have different packing rules so make sure you read

their Guides Online alternatively there are lots of YouTube submission guides for each service but if you do this you

are putting your trust in that YouTuber so just be careful out there be aware of that once your cards arrive at the

grading facility you should be able to follow through the grading process online in most cases you won't be

charged until your cards are graded and ready to be shipped back to you by the way you usually have to declare a value

and this is for shipping Insurance since grading a card usually increases its value the insurance needs to cover the

potential loss of your graded card not the raw card if you still find this overwhelming

using a middleman service is an option too recently GameStop has become a retail middleman service this is nice

because all you have to do is drop off your cards and you can basically Piggy back off of GameStop's

discount the downside to using GameStop or another middleman service is that you're putting your trust in someone

else and that's a decision you have to make for yourself but even after all this you

might be holding a card and wondering to yourself is this worth grading having your card graded is kind of silly you're

paying someone to have an opinion then encase it in plastic and then all of a sudden you can sell it for a lot of

money but it's also pretty cool to send your card away and have it come back feeling

like a little trophy you can put on display if you want to try it out I'd say go for it all right so grading can

get toxic well no let me elaborate the grading Community can get toxic once cards get graded more money is involved

and things tend to heat up if you're a beginner I would suggest grading with any company just to get the feel for it

don't send anything too valuable just yet I think it's important to break the ice with your first submission and then

you're going to suddenly understand a lot more and you'll be able to make educated experienced decisions the next

lesson is going to be pretty intense I'm going to run two videos back to back that explain Rarity symbols which is

historically complicated and confusing in this hobby the first video covers current Rarity symbols that were

introduced with the scarlet and violet series they switched things up then the second video jumps back to 1999 and we

carefully go over each symbol introduced over the past 30 years some people seem to love these videos and frequently

thank me for making it so easy so I hope that works for you a common Pokemon card has a small filled in black circle like

this as the name suggests it is the most common Rarity and each booster pack will net you a handful of them common cards

were introduced in 1996 when the TCG itself was first released you'll notice that Commons are made up of basic

Pokémon that have not yet evolved although there are exceptions to this Commons are usually non Hollow but can

be found as a reverse Holo another self-explanatory Rarity uncommon is slightly less common than common it is

represented by a small black diamond shape you'll usually get a couple of these per booster pack once again this

Rarity has been around as long as the cards themselves you'll notice that uncommon can be a basic or even involed

Pokémon and that most trainer cards are uncommon Rarity is not just for collectors when you're building a deck

for the trading card game you typically want between two and four copies of each card so Rarity is also designed with

card accessibility in mind okay this is where things get interesting the rare Rarity uses a black star like this and

be careful not to confuse this with the black star promo symbol which we will Circle back to later booster packs have

a guaranteed rare which means you'll always get one in a booster pack unless it's replaced by a higher Rarity a rare

can be Hollow or reverse Holo they used to be available as non- holos but this changed in 2023 with the scarlet and

violet expansion if it is a reverse Holo it will be in the reverse Holo slot not the rare slot of a booster pack by the

way the Japanese version of the trading card game do not use the same symbols instead they have English letters to

denote the Rarity C is for common U is for uncommon and R is for rare next up we have double rare which uses two black

stars as its Rarity symbol the Japanese TCG uses two RS these can replace the rare card in a booster pack and as the

name suggests are of a higher Rarity than rare if you've pulled any EX Pokémon lately you'll notice that they

are double rares double rares and every Rarity moving forward will be a hollow now some EX cards actually do have

texture on them but this doesn't change the Rarity symbol in any way it's still just a double rare it should be no

surprise that the pink star is specifically for the pink cards okay officially it's magenta not pink but you

won't see it anywhere other than the ace spec cards which are actually pretty hard to come across the Japanese TCG

uses the Bold magenta letters a c e as a rarity symbol you'll also noce notice that these cards are textured and have a

very specific Hollow pattern the gold star Rarity is called an illustration rare but the Japanese side of the TCG

calls it an art rare and uses the letters a r as a rarity symbol you'll instantly notice that these cards look

different the illustration goes right from the top of the card all the way down to the bottom these are pretty

versions of cards that are already in the set for example you might notice that Pokémon 151 has three chars ex or

that temporal forces has four walking wake ex all of the cards text is identical they have the same HP the same

moves but a different Rarity and card number this is done so the trading card game players can easily get cards for