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Daily Record
Daily Record
Lifestyle
Jacob Rawley

Your old Pokémon cards could be worth thousands - but there's an important catch

If you - or your child - played with Pokémon cards at the turn of the century, you might find that you could have some valuable collectables lurking in your loft.

Lockdown brought a lot of people into card-collecting, with Pokémon cards from the 1999 base set now incredibly valuable after soaring in popularity - and can be worth thousands or even millions of pounds.

Retro Pokémon cards were also given a boost by YouTube sensation Logan Paul who bought the most expensive card in the world in 2021.

However, if you find a card that could fetch a pretty sum, don't get ahead of yourself - as experts say its condition can matter as much as its rarity.

Jordan Gorman, 25, Edinburgh, who is the CEO and organiser of the Scotland Card Show, explained that many cards from this period, while rare, won't fetch hefty sums unless they are properly preserved.

He told the Daily Record: "You see the stories of people getting their old binders that are in their family house and they realise they've got cards that are worth thousands.

"You can go and see if you've got those cards but then you'll kick yourself in the foot because you didn't look after them when you were younger.

An Ancient Mew (centre), which was handed out to those who went to the cinema to watch the Pokémon movie, sold for $999 in October 2020, according to PSA (Jordan Gorman/Scotland Card Show)

"Back then in 1999 and 2000, people were playing with them and stuff. But nowadays, people are sleeving them, putting them in binders and grading them.

"Whereas back then it was nowhere near as popular and you just had fun with them, you'd be ripping and crumpling them up when playing with your friends."

A card's preservation can be measured by the 'grade' it gets, with 10 typically being the best and one being the worst.

The value of graded secondhand Pokémon cards skyrocketed in lockdown, in part due to Prime Hydration co-founder Logan Paul. The YouTuber famously owns the most expensive Pokémon trading card sold at a private sale, according to Guinness.

In order to get his hands on a PSA Grade 10 Pikachu Illustrator card, the YouTuber paid $4million (£3,245,920) and traded in his own a PSA Grade 9 Pikachu Illustrator card worth $1.275,000 (£1,034,637).

Youtuber Logan Paul owns the worlds most expensive Pokémon card which is worth $5,300,000 (Youtube/Logan Paul)

While this is an absurd amount of money, it's worth noting that it's only one of 39, so there are very few people that have cards of this value.

"If you look on YouTube, you hear people refer to that as like the Logan Paul hype," Jordan explained. "The 1999 base cards prices shot up so much, and lockdown helped that, but I think it would have gone up anyway with the Logan Paul hype.

"He was making YouTube videos and people were starting to get into the hobby to make money."

Grading is mostly carried out by a firm called PSA, which, at one point during lockdown, had months-long wait times and would set you back nearly £100 - just to have your card's quality assessed. However, Jordan is working with UK grading firm Majesty Grading Company to make the process more accessible in Scotland.

Jordan Gorman, 25, at his most recent card show in Glasgow (Jordan Gorman/Scotland Card Show)

This comes as 58-year-old West Lothian man Gordan White auctioned off his impressive collection last year which sold for almost £194,990. The 137 lot collection featured sealed booster boxes, first editions, promotional cards, ones showing rare errors along with rare cards handed out to staff at Pokemon tournaments.

As is often the case, Gordon was drawn into the game thanks to his children, which ultimately led to Gordon himself becoming involved in a Pokémon league and amassing his sought-after collection.

Gordan White, 58, from West Lothian, has a collection estimated to be between £55,000 and £75,000 (Richard Winterton Auctioneers)

Base set cards, and particularly Charizards can be worth an astounding amount of money. According to PSA, the average price for a graded one is $9,404 (£7,601). If you have a perfectly preserved PSA 10 Charizard, you could be looking at much more, with the most expensive earning its seller $252,000 (£203,689.08) at a US auction in January 2022.

Event organiser Jordan has set up his Scotland Card Show to help bring it back to young collectors, as it will help them learn about how valuable their cards may be if they take care of them.

"Our main thing was to help the community in Scotland come together and realise how big the hobby actually is here," Jordan said. "We made tickets for children free and that's just of course, getting them into the hobby and showing them that if you look after your cards, it can be worth a bit.

"And on top of that picking your favourite card getting it graded is really cool, just to have that physical, encapsulated card."

The Scotland Card Show will be held at the Blue Drill Hall in Edinburgh on July 1 and 2.

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