韩国媒体报道宝可梦卡牌交易与零售联名热度升温，但缺少可交易增量催化

A Pokemon boom is sweeping through South Korea's retail industry. As Pokemon trading cards emerge as an investment asset drawing adult collectors, demand that spans generations is pushing the intellectual property into holiday gift sets and department store traffic-driving content. The heat is spreading to other animation IPs such as One Piece and Yu-Gi-Oh.
Pokemon card transaction volume on the resale platform Karrot rose 1,114% over the past three months from May 28 to Aug. 27 compared with a year earlier, according to industry sources on the 28th. Search volume over the same period climbed 513%. That means an already established market expanded more than tenfold again in a single year.
The numbers at trading platform KREAM are even steeper. Trading card game transaction value on KREAM from January to July grew about 208-fold from a year earlier. Transaction volume rose about 131-fold, and the average transaction price increased 59%. The IP driving that growth is overwhelmingly Pokemon. In July, Pokemon cards accounted for 77% of total TCG transaction value and 88% of transaction volume on KREAM. In effect, nearly all of the card market's growth came from Pokemon.
As Pokemon's popularity has grown, interest in other animation IPs has risen alongside it. One Piece card transaction volume over the past three months jumped 10,605% from a year earlier and search volume surged 3,233%, according to Karrot. Pokemon remains far larger in absolute terms, but One Piece dominates in growth rate. On KREAM, One Piece TCG transaction value in July expanded about sixfold from May to account for 20% of total TCG transaction value, making it the second-largest IP after Pokemon. Among products released in the first half of this year, the biggest gain over the release price also belonged to a One Piece card, which traded at more than 16 times its release price. Yu-Gi-Oh cards posted a gentler rise over the same period, with transaction volume up 85% and search volume up 81%.
Overseas, Pokemon cards have long been treated as an alternative asset rather than a collectible. A prominent example is Logan Paul, the YouTuber turned professional wrestler. In July 2021 he acquired a Pikachu Illustrator card for a total of $5.275 million, or about 7.3 billion won, combining $1.275 million worth of cards he held with $4 million in cash. The card was awarded to winners of an illustration contest run by the Japanese children's magazine CoroCoro Comic in 1998, and only one copy has received a top grade of 10 from the grading service PSA. When Paul appeared on WWE, the world's largest professional wrestling stage, wearing the card around his neck, the notion that cards are assets took hold with the public.
That global demand is also feeding into sales by Korean sellers. First-quarter cross-border sales of trading cards by Korean sellers rose by a double-digit percentage from a year earlier, according to eBay. The top-selling item was the Korean-language edition of Pokemon cards. The structure is one in which the cards are relatively easy to obtain in Korea but scarce abroad, commanding a premium. A Ditto promo card distributed free at last year's Pokemon Town event in Seoul sold for $4,090, or about 6.2 million won, after receiving a top grade, while a 2012 Rayquaza EX promo Korean edition sold for $14,796, or about 22.6 million won, at PSA grade 10.
Offline retail channels are moving quickly to meet that demand. CU has assembled 20 products using the Pokemon IP for this year's Chuseok gift set lineup. Alongside three fruit and beverage sets including the Pikachu Apple Set at 29,800 won and nine toy products, the lineup extends to camping goods such as the Snorlax Tent Package at 149,000 won and golf ball sets. What stands out is that the IP has moved beyond merchandise into fresh food and hobby goods, the mainstays of holiday gifting.
Shinsegae Department Store ran a five-day experience event for the arcade game Pokemon Tag Star on the Open Stage on the first floor of its Gangnam store. Thirteen game machines were deployed, with a general play zone operated separately from a beginners' zone for children aged 13 and under, and visitors received a special Pikachu tag and a trainer ID card for free. Handing over the first floor of a department store, its prime location, to a character experience space is evidence of how highly Pokemon's drawing power is rated.
An official at Shinsegae Department Store said, "We are presenting game content that everyone from adults to children enjoys," adding, "We plan to continue offering customers differentiated experience content through collaborations with a range of popular IPs."