Hello everyone,
Here I am in yet another thread exploring ideas and trends, and in this case, numbers and years.
As someone that grew up with the original Base set, I’ve always wanted to get specific cards that I just didn’t find back when I was a kid. From what I’ve been able to gather, most of these cards and especially the 1st edition shadowless base set cards are near or at all time high prices. So this begged the question for me: should I get them as soon as possible or should I try to wait for a decline in prices further in the future. Instinctively, the answer seemed to be obvious: The supply isn’t going to increase, so it might be best to get them now. The other side of the question, however, is what could happen to the demand.
Essentially I had to come up with a set of assumptions that made sense to me and then look at some numbers and try to draw some conclusions.
Assumptions:
- People aged 4-30 years old back in 1999 were likely those most interested at the time in the cards (this is a very wide age range because it’s hard to get any reliable specific information, and of course there’s always outliers!).
- People aged 65-74 tend to be those with the highest accumulated and expendable purchasing power (Source). Again, there’s always outliers.
- People aged 65-74 are also at the best position and might have the most interest in reliving some of their childhood memories back.
- I looked at US numbers since it was arguably the epicenter of all following expansions of the PTCG to other countries in the following months and years.
- The years in which most people aged 4-30 back in 1999 become 65-74 years old might represent the peak of interest and prices, all other things being equal
First, I determined that those aged 4-30 back in 1999 had been born somewhere between 1969 and 1995.
Secondly, I started by looking at the births per year in the US as the benchmark to try and determine which years had the most people and thus would weight the numbers towards there. (Source)
I decided to focus on the years 1989-1994 as the peak of the trend based on the above chart.
Lastly, I computed the years in which all those people aged 4-30 back in 1999 would be 65-74. The wider range went from 2034-2069, but when you take into account that more births (thus people) were present in 1989-1994, then the range shrinks to 2054-2068, with the absolute top being the year 1990, and those born in that year theoretically becoming the wealthiest and most likely to acquire the cards hoping to relive their memories in the years 2055-2064.
Of course even if all the above is true, it’s a gradual process that builds up over years. But essentially, this could mean that the most affordable time to buy the base set cards I want was yesterday, today, and going all the way prior to 2055-2064, that year range potentially being the most difficult time to acquire the cards, as more people might be inclined to get them, their spending power might be considerably greater than today, and of course the supply of the cards will at best remain the same, and at worst reduce since cards might be destroyed or lost accidentally through time. More demand with equal or lower supply → higher cost
I expect many here might not be interested in this sort of analysis or speculation, but I still thought it was worth exploring and I will be looking forward to your thoughts.