@two you do not need a brick and mortar to purchase Pokemon products at wholesale. Certain manufacturers require it though like some sports card manufacturers and I believe Magic the Gathering as well.
I started out buying $550-$600 cases back in 2014/2015 and realizing it wasn’t very easy to make money. Once I tapped into wholesale pricing on new product I found it still wasn’t very easy, but became a lot more probable given the ~$480-$500 cases.
This… might actually be pretty damn true. 
Just be an extremely patient buyer. There are still some deals out there, but you have to be diligent and consistent. This is by far going to be the best way to make your money go farther. By being patient you are spending less consistently, and when you do spend it will hopefully be a good deal.
I suggest keeping one pack sealed for every pack you open, and to also grade cards. This strategy will take time and more money but in the long run be much more successful that opening everything and selling raw singles or complete sets.
It sounds like you are wanting to buy Pokemon to make money, using $300 to buy cards and make more from them. I believe alot of the people on E4 are collectors who have bought and amassed a collection organically through interest. From there they have bought and sold cards they have as duplicates or cards they have no attachment/no interest in/not part of their goals to generate some capital to then put back into the hobby.
To jump into the hobby with the sole goal of making money by buying booster boxes/modern product to flip for profits will result in you having a bad time. I suggest getting your goals roughly jotted down so you know what you want from the hobby, set goals, something to aim for. That way you have a direction, rather than saying " I have x amount I want it to increase", why do you want more money? what is the end goal short term and long term.
Until you know that, I think it will be difficult to nail down what you want and where you intend to go with the hobby and collecting. I noticed you mentioned goals,but opening packs and set collecting is a very very broad goal.
Buying packs as cheap as you can, on clearance, with coupons or discount codes, opening them, picking cards you want to keep and then sell the rest sounds like what you want to do,. The thrill of packing ultra rare cards is always a buzz, but I think you would be better buying said ultra rares/holos and what not rather than paying a premium to get that buzz and gambling on packing cards. If that is what you want, then go for it! uts know you will lose money most of the time is opening new sealed modern products. Like the signs and warnings in casinos and betting sites, opening packs and new products should be seen as purely fun and not to make or earn money from.
Just my opinion! Hopefully it helps
How much product does your distributor expect you to buy to get wholesale pricing ?
Do not seek things to flip, the things to flip will seek you 
The more volume the better pricing you get. You could spend very little though. Like ~$500 per quarter if you wanted to. Maybe less. I’m not sure if they necessarily have a minimum where they’d just cut ties with you.
You’d just be more likely to not get the hotter product if it is heavy allocated. If/when desired preorders are in excess of the distributors allocation from Pokemon they’ll likely cut the small orders from the smaller buyers first.
Seems alot of hassle for little gain. As others have said you would have to buy in huge volume to reduce the risk of being in the red if you pull some naff cards with low resale value.
I was watching a Pokerand video the other day where he opened a random booster and valued the cards he pulled with the aim of clawing some of that value back.
On that particular box he estimated he could turn a profit but in all honesty I did feel he was overestimating the value of some of those cards - one card he estimated would fetch in the region of £8 but I’ve seen examples of that card listed at £8 but not necessarily selling for that. More like £5 on the auctions.
If you apply that metric across the rest of the cards you would probably find the total true value of everything alot lower, maybe in actual fact just breaking even on your initial outlay or just under depending on the cards you pulled.
Of course if you pulled that Charizard Vmax you would have made your money back instantly but one of those is not guaranteed in every box.
I’d try sourcing Japanese promos/vintage/full arts in mint condition and grading them with PSA through ludkins. CGC is another grading option that I see selling on eBay a lot these days, moreso than Beckett. English vintage I have found to be cheapest buying graded already, but Japanese vintage/promos can be still found in good condition but you have to buy a lot at once due to Japanese shipping costs. As for modern you should always make money grading mint cards full arts.
Or you can become a flipper… and you’ll make money in the current market, but I like graders as they increase supply and help to preserve cards for the community.
When I initially started looking into buying from distributors, the part that I was hung up on was the distributors I was looking at required some sort of referrals or other distributors you have bought from? At least thats what it appeared they asked for. Would they still sell to me if I was brand new?
It sounds like that likely had something with respect to using a line of credit. Essentially where you’d get shipments throughout the month as you ordered or as items were released and then they’d bill you at the end of the month.
To avoid this you can just pay as you go with a credit card (generally subject to a 2% credit card fee, but offset by a card like the citi doublecash). Shipping to a home address instead of a business address will likely have you paying a bit more for shipping than a business would too, but at least some of them will do it.
Work isn’t work if you’re having fun. An extra work shift may be more efficient, but that feels like work and the only reward is money. If he wants to open and flip a lil, he’s gotta figure out what will work for him like many other collectors here have done.
It’s not impossible to start flipping with low entry capital. For an absolute beginner, get a sense for how much things are selling for by looking at completed listings on eBay and active listings on tcgplayer/trollandtoad. Once you get a decent feel, you can look for opportunities to buy in at prices below market for quick flipping at market price. Also remember to account for eBay fees when calculating possible returns.
We agree:)
based on what you said, it seems these distributors will work with a smaller client, which is good to hear. i always thought you’d have to at least spend in the thousands on a monthly basis. i don’t think i’ll get into the “business” of pokemon, but those numbers seem like a very enthusiastic collector (and friends) could easily order a batch each time and get some good savings. maybe an e4 store?? just for new products for the us collectors.
all in all, it seems the pricing, even at wholesale, does not bring in much initial profit if you were just to sell it directly on eBay, even with a store account. do you do openings and sell individual cards? that would maximize profit, but would add much more work in the form of opening, sorting, listing, shipping, but that’s the game i suppose.
@yz2428 I used to the do the high volume low margin stuff. I’d buy every product that came out and try to buy more of what I thought would be better products. I’d keep up with the TCG meta and sell playsets of desirable trainers. Stock up on sets and products featuring higher proportions of playable cards or promos. Buy heaps of the theme decks and battle decks that had those as well to break down and profit. It was just way too much time for me and the margins are super thin, especially on newer sets when prices are essentially a race to the bottom. I think things have gotten a bit better in this respect since “sportsandmore” doesn’t seem to be fire selling boxes at near distributor pricing ($80-$85) direct to consumers.
These days I mostly just stock up heavier on products that I think I can sell for a decent profit breaking down the major components (hidden fates selling loose packs was a good one) and/or grade the promos / major chase cards to sell down the line. A lot higher margin but a lot lower volume. There are a lot of places to find money in new product.
That makes sense. I had plans to be starting this by now, but life got in the way. I just remember going that process and seeing on the distributor application they were basically asking for references. But, that makes sense if you were trying to run credit with them. As a startup, that can be scary. Just look at Mystical games right now. That is such a mess.