Hi all, been a lurker for a bit but decided to join up and participate in some conversations!
Anyways, a while back I came across a can’t miss price on a Base Set 1st Edition booster pack. Sadly it’s only 1 but it is in very nice shape, tucked away for many years. Problem is I don’t know what I should do with it… Basically faced with a few options that I can see:
Sell it, been offered up to $350 for it.
Keep it just how it is.
Send it out to be graded.
Open it and have the cards inside graded, whatever they may be.
I haven’t collected anything PSA graded before but I’m starting to turn the corner on the idea of collecting PSA graded cards now. Thinking about sending in a good number to be graded before too long. I hate not having them in a binder but like the idea of preserving and protecting high value cards. Potentially opened and graded the contents could have more value than the pack does being sold outright. But I could loose on that end too if the cards are off-centered or the final card grades.
I’m sure there are a number of others that have faced the same predicament and looking for any advice you may have.
From a collecting standpoint I don’t (currently) collect sealed packs, boxes or the like, just the cards themselves with a focus on WotC.
If you can deal with getting straight 9s for the whole pack then do it. The thing with 1st ed Base is you can hit the jackpot with certain cards in a 10 but you can also get burned with poor pulls and 9s on them. E.g pokemon breeder in a 10 nets about £80-90 whereas a dragonair sold yesterday in a 10 for just shy of £300.
The problem I have with collecting sealed packs is that, unless you have good reason to believe otherwise, they’re probably weighed before you buy them to make sure there’s not a holo inside… which for me kills the appeal of owning the pack (the idea that anything could be inside of it).
Given this reality, I would probably either sell the pack now or hold onto it for a while longer and eventually sell it. Although if it were me in your shoes, I would probably sell now because the temptation to open it would honestly just annoy me. lol
Thanks for the replies so far. I don’t believe this pack was weighed so that’s a plus. It came from someone that collected pokemon upon release and saved one of each early pack (base through rocket). So I’d highly doubt it is weighed at this point due to it’s origin.
On the flip side, I could weigh it but I only have one pack so I have no point of reference. I do have some base longpacks but those would skew the results.
Could be a Lass PSA 10 though… Or wartortle PSA 10 in there… Hell even Bulba, Char or the squirts in a 10 would be solid enough pulls to pay for the pack (with the rest being decent 9’s)
If you’re thinking about money then the answer for sealed products is almost always to keep it sealed, especially if you have only one pack. I’d say there’s an 85% chance that whatever cards you get out of there will not even come close to the value of the pack.
If you want the experience of opening up a 1st Edition Base Set pack, and feel that the experience will be worth it, then totally go for it, just be prepared to pull crap.
No one has mentioned grading the pack, is it not worth grading a english base set 1st edition booster? I guess you would need to be confident of a PSA 9 grade or above and I have heard grading packs is hit and miss. (although all my Chinese 1st editions got 10s ) Thoughts?
I had mentioned that as one of my original options. I don’t know if there is a great benefit to grading it, not really sure where the value sits. I can post some photos of it once I’m back home. To my untrained eye I think it would grade well, but I have no clue what they look at when grading card packs.
In the same boat as you. I sniped an auction for $42 for a base set 1st edition pack the other day from some consignment type person who didn’t know what they had (the normal one or 2 pokemon items, rest was random things). And I really want to open it, but I just know it won’t be worth it.
I went ahead and weighed the pack vs my nearest comparable pack which is a Base Shadowless pack that I got in today. I don’t know squat about weighed packs so I have no clue if the variance is enough to lead to the idea that it contains a holo. Results are in the photos along with photos of the general condition.
I only know a bit about unlimited base set booster weights, I assume they would be comparable. Based on this knowledge I would say don’t open it probably to risky.
I don’t necessarily see anything wrong with it. Now, if he weighed the pack, found out it probably didn’t have a holo, and then put it up for sale while neglecting to mention the fact that it had been weighed? That would be terribly wrong. But otherwise I see no problem.
Oh I didn’t mean this in a negative way toward him. I don’t mind it and I don’t have any problem with it, its a morality thing. But I am talking more about the people who aren’t necessarily part of this community and would use the information for other purposes…
I modified my post to just mention the variance in weights. If anyone has insight they’d prefer to share privately that would be OK by me as well. I figure with scale variance along with any number of other factors what one scale says could be quite different than what another does, especially when working with fractions of grams. But totally respect the opinion of not making the individual pack weights public knowledge.
