Hello and welcome to the Casual Chat!

Today we are going to be talking about a topic that those who make games don’t tend to talk to much about, but is definitely something that is on their radar and that is the secondary market.

The secondary, put simply, are those who sell cards that are not officially affiliated with the game or those who distribute or sell the game or pieces of the game. If you go onto a website to buy single cards or an individual model for a game that isn’t from a booster pack or a box or from the company that makes the game’s website or official channels, you are buying it off the secondary market.

This is aspect of the game that is important to the game, but there are some problematic aspects of the secondary market, and there is some crossover to my Casual Chat post Collectible and Game, but this will go into a bit more detail.

The Benefits of the Secondary Market

Now when talking about the benefits of the secondary market, we need to look at the benefits from the side of the consumer and the side of the producer.

The reason why the secondary market is a benefit to the consumer is that it provides more accessibility to getting cards and pieces of the game that they want, rather than searching for it buy buying boxes and boxes of product.

Why spend over a hundred dollars to look for one specific card in a booster box when you can usually spend a fraction of the money buying it directly from someone who is selling it?

Looking at just Magic the Gathering, there are almost 30,000 cards available in the entire games history, and around 25,000 of those cards can be bought for a dollar or less. Of course there are cards that are more expensive that will do the job better than most of the cheap cards, but for those who are on a budget, there is a wide swath of cards that they can buy for extremely cheap on the secondary market.

It is also helpful for people who don’t have access to a game store nearby and any other local stores might not have access to the product. You can purchase single cards online and have them delivered to your home with ease, and while it can be a little more expensive because of shipping costs, it can be much cheaper than opening a whole box to potentially get one card.

When we look at the producer side of the secondary market, the benefits to knowing how much things are will help understand what cards people want to buy.

If you think that a set of cards is solid but needs something that can help people who may be on the fence want to buy your set, you can put in a known card that is selling high on the secondary market to be the catalyst for someone to buy a box to potentially get that card.

This is a concept known as reprint equity, cards that you know people will want to buy to incentivize people to open boxes to look for those cards. Secondary markets streamline that process so that they open tons and tons of boxes and then sell those cards to people who don’t have the time or money to do so.

Boxes are still being bought to seek out those chase cards so the producers can put desirable cards to help move more and more boxes.

Doubling Season is a card in Magic that is extremely popular, and even though the card has been printed in Foundations, a Standard legal set that is legal for five years of the format, is still demanding prices of 25 USD minimum. While it has been higher historically, reprints of an expensive card can bring prices down to being more accessible to people who want the card but couldn’t afford it before.

This however leads to some of the less desirable aspects of the secondary market.

The Downsides

Now with the good, must come the bad, and there are plenty of aspects about the secondary market that are not great.

One of the major downsides of the secondary market is the investor mentality that has spread across many hobbies, and one that makes accessing the game more difficult.

Some people view collectible products, card games in particular, as an investment that will get that individual more money if they sell it in the future. The problem is that these “investors” are holding this product away from people who actually want to use the cards and play with them.

I have no issue with people holding onto a box or two, but the issue comes when people are holding dozens or even hundred of boxes hostage in order to make some money, and that’s even if they do decide to sell them.

This also leads to the bigger issue of the secondary market, and that is scalpers. Scalpers are people who buy tons and tons of product to immediately turn around and sell it at a much higher margin. This is done as a way to feed into peoples FOMO (fear of missing out) so that people who desperately want something will pay well over MSRP to get a product.

There have been plenty of videos online of people running into stores, pushing over other people, kids, and employees to get the newest set of a game and that is disheartening to see.

We can try to combat scalpers by being patient and not buying a set until months after release when it is cheaper, but I know that some people want the new cards now. Hell, I’m guilty of buying into the hype of a set and buying a box at prices that are higher than I would have liked.

In Conclusion

This is an interesting topic to discuss because the adage of buying singles from card stores or individual sellers is a way to make sure you have affordable access to cards, rather than hoping that you might pull a card if you open a box or two or ten.

The problems with the secondary market are the people who use it to prey on people’s desire to have the cards immediately and are willing to pay whatever it costs to get those cards.

The secondary market is also fickle, with cards being banned or unbanned shifting the prices dramatically in either direction, or a random card printed years ago has some sort of infinite combo so that spikes the price.

I do believe that even with some of the problematic aspects of the secondary market, it is one of the most necessary parts of cards games because it helps the hobby become accessible to those who don’t have access to a local card store or don’t have a lot of money to spend.

Thank you for reading, see you all next time!

Peace,

From, J.M. Casual