Im newer to collecting pokemon and one thing i have noticed is that it is really hard to find ex boxes before gold stars were released. You see a lot more boxes of older sets and the sets with gold stars on ebay and relatively speaking the prices for these “rarer” boxes are a lot cheaper than most others of the age. Yes I understand that the expected values out of these boxes are a lot less. I thought that the “dead” period was more of the gold star era. Does anyone know why these pre gold star boxes are so much scarcer?
Is there a specific set you have in mind? It is only a one-year period mid 2003 - late 2004 in which there were ex-series sets before gold stars released. I have not experienced them to be harder to find than ex series sets. FRLG is relatively easier and likely had a higher print run.
mainly talking about ex ruby sapphire, ex sandstorm and ex dragon. i rarely see them these days
EX Dragon is a very tough set to find boxes of (last one I saw on the market was about a year ago IIRC), but both Ruby Sapphire and Sandstorm are pretty easy to find. There are boxes of both on eBay. And packs of all of these sets are plentiful on eBay.
I have been theorizing those 3 sets are a bit rarer than most people realize. Just no one notices because the demand is lower. They are not WOTC and they don’t have gold stars, weird in between.
I dont get why there are so many packs out there when the sealed boxes themselves aren’t numerous at all. Currently only 1 sandstorm and 1 ruby sapphire box on ebay and not many others have popped up on ebay in a while. I feel like i see more 1st ed neo boxes be listed than these.
ex dragon is extremely frustrating to find. ive been looking for one and have had no luck. is it because people are chasing the secret rare charizard from it?
I have also noticed this. Less printed, less sealed boxes remaining, or less people caring or taking note of an increase in value? Maybe all three?
That’s because the print run of most of the EX sets (Power Keepers and perhaps a couple others being exceptions) were smaller than most 1st edition WotC print runs.
Not to mention that the EX boxes were super, super cheap for well over a decade. I bought my EX Ruby Sapphire box for ~$250 back in like 2014. They weren’t viewed as scarce or nearly as collectible as they are now. Very few people kept them sealed.
Another reason for the scarcity of EX boxes, in my opinion, is how fragile the cards are. If you want to complete a NM/Mint condition EX-series set (especially any of the ones up through Team Magma with the original reverse holo foiling), you more or less have to either crack PSA 9s and 10s or crack packs/boxes. Finding NM/MT raw reverse holos from any of the EX sets before Hidden Legends is nearly impossible. Even the nicest ones available will have extensive surface scratching. The grading craze has accelerated the decline in the availability in NM/Mint raw cards. Now all the nice cards are slabbed and priced at huge markups. This is why I think there are very few EX-era boxes left. They were cheap and available until they weren’t – and the allure of opening them has only increased as the availability of NM/Mint cards from those sets decreased.
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Yeah there’s just not a lot of interest in those sets. I don’t think people realize how much they’re worth. And the people that do have them think they’re worth more than they are… funny paradox. Finally got my hands on an ex dragon box last week after looking for one forever. Good luck on your search!
This is part of it, definitely. But another factor I just realized is that the tons of EX-Series packs were included in tins. The first Pokemon tin ever was the EX Series Collector’s tin. The supply of packs prior to that wasn’t forked; all packs were either in boxes or blisters. So I have to imagine that, even relative to the print run, fewer boxes were printed of EX-era sets than of WotC sets.
That is such a strange paradox. Congrats on getting yours! Do you mind sharing the price so I know what market price is around now?
That’s an interesting point that I never thought about and you are absolutely right. I picked up an original ex tin the other week not thinking much about it in that way. With the way the market is its probably the best way to get many packs that arent scaled for a decent price.
Pokemon kinda died for a few years so they really weren’t producing much hence the price point for Ex Dragon,Hidden Legends, Ex deoxys and ex Emerald. It got popular again and more boxes were printed
. In general ex series were low printed. Picked back up during D&P
100%. wowlootseller still has dozens of $200 tins in stock on eBay, each of which contains a FRLG pack and a Hidden Legends pack.
I also recommend buying the multi-pack blisters. I’ve picked up many multi-pack blisters at roughly the value of the total loose packs. Like I got two of the eeveelution blisters, each of which has a Dragon Frontiers pack and a Legend Maker pack, for $250 each within the past month on eBay. For some reason there aren’t really any more EX multi-pack blisters available for reasonable prices on eBay at the moment, though. Tins are your best bet; either the $200 ones or the $500 Turtwig/Piplup/Chimchar 2007 tins, which each have 2 Power Keepers, 1 Delta Species, and 1 Dragon Frontiers pack.
@zorloth, thanks for the heads up on those tins. just added to the watch list right now. I collect more sealed product than singles so i want these badly
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