Just my two cents, but I’d broaden your view to make bigger margins. You can “profit” on $0.10, but barely, as you need to factor in your time.
If you got paid $15 an hour at a job, then every minute you’re paid $0.25. I am NOT trying to rain on your parade, but I sincerely think there are larger opportunities for far less physical work that you could profit on, Higher ROI on your time will broaden beliefs and make life easier.
Much respect for hopping in on attacking your goal btw. Always respect that and this is the place to get many different perspectives. Happy to have you
@HaiRai and I have sold thousands of bulk cards on TCGPlayer. The juice is simply not worth the squeeze. For example, one graded card that I sold six days ago on eBay eclipsed the annual profit from bulk selling on TCGPlayer several times over. If you value your time, your storage space, and frankly, your sanity, you will not try to go all in on bulk Pokemon.
Definitely give it a try for the experience alone, but know that you will make very little money selling bulk after accounting for your supplies, effort, and time.
I hope this helps a little more than my Austin Powers meme!
I think you do have to take into account cash flow, startup capital, and other factors though. You can make multiples over bulk selling via one graded card sale, but how much was the graded card initially (cost of entry), how long did you have to sit on it (stagnant cash flow), how likely was it that the card would increase in price (market knowledge)? Also how repeatable was the “play”?
I think bulk selling appeals to people because of extremely low cost of entry and increased cash flow. To see your money increase because of work you directly put in can also serve as a motivator. I do think flipping cheap-but-not-penny cards is better than selling super-low cost bulk, though, similar to the progression @Vertemes went through.
(I am probably guilty of spending way too much time selling low cost stuff and probably need to find a better way to do things too )
Sure, that’s fair enough. But I think we may be talking about apples and oranges. When I hear bulk, I think of cards valued at less than or equal to $0.10. There is so little money there, and it is a hypercompetitive space that requires continually topped off inventory.
Let’s take this Litwick from Twilight Masquerade as an example. It is a $0.01 card, and on that $0.01 card, there are over 1,000 stores selling it in Near Mint condition. Most stores require +$1.31 in shipping if you only buy that card, so buyers will want to purchase multiple cards to meet the $5 Free Shipping. This means that you have to be stocked to the gills to make the rest of your inventory of interest, or they will purchase what they need from someone else.
But why would someone buy all of those cards from you with 0 (or low) feedback when thousands of stores with tens of thousands of feedback also carry those cards? And we can’t forget about TCGPlayer optimizer, shuffling buyers to larger stores and TCGPlayer Direct sellers.
If we are talking about cards worth a dollar or more, then yes, there is some cash to be made there. But you still may not make over minimum wage for your time put in, as sales can be sporadic and shipping materials and gasoline are increasingly pricey. And this isn’t taking into consideration the headaches from lost mail, picky or deceitful buyers, etc.
It is a great knowledge building tool to sell cards at any level, but bulk is really not the path to go down if making money is crucial. If your main concern above is cash flow, startup capital, knowledge, etc. then OP could sell modern sealed product like every other person in 2025/2026. That barrier to entry is low and the margins are much higher than selling bulk.
I agree with you there. I think selling essentially penny cards is probably not the optimal way to go. The best way to make bulk like that work out is if you can get actual unsorted bulk and know what the meta-relevant cards are to pick them out to sell separately. But even then, it’s grueling work.
I feel like there are probably enough lower-cost-to-entry points that exist out there that dabbling with penny cards is probably not necessary. Just gotta use the ol’ noggin. Now excuse me while I go pack my $2 sale today.
Doing 50 / 100 pack lots of bulk on ebay or amazon is a much better use of your time than trying to sell individual cards on TCGplayer.
Great ROI, low start up cost, and its a much better way of moving cards than trying to sell them 1 at a time. Unfortunately the trade off is its a lot of graft, but if you have the time and the motivation then its the best way to compound a small start up amount imo
(source: I did this and started my entire collection with £50 this way)
I feel selling bulk only makes sense as a side hustle to another already successful side hustle. Like a whatnot streamer who rips packs and gets free bulk
I’ve been selling bulk since posting and I have about 8000 cards listed and I’m creeping up on 500 sales.
I was looking some stuff up and I found my own thread on google and I was surprised and also a little embarrassed so I want to reply real quick to give an answer to my own question.
I’ve gotten a solid amount of those $5+ orders with free shipping and usually they turn out to be about 20-40 cards.
You can comfortably fit 40 cards in an envelope by arranging them vertically side by side in team bags, and taping them down in a folded piece of paper so everything stays still. I haven’t gotten any returned mail so far, and I’ve received reviews from people that have ordered lots of cards like this so I know that my previous envelopes have gotten there and did so safely.
So far, it’s been SO slow. I have lots of bulk to list and sort, and my strategy is to list everything. I want to buy collections at a % and I’ve been trying to, but people are very stubborn about their collections and usually want market price (Tbh, I completely understand that. The sentimental price of your cards is nothing compared to a “market price”.) so I’ve been trucking along with my bulk cards for now. But like someone’s already mentioned in this thread, cart optimization is my friend. So once I DO get some more liquid inventory, maybe it will help move some bulk and make a few extra dollars with every card. We’ll see. Or maybe I’ll just see, idk.
I think that’s about it. I apologize for my bad grammar and punctuation, I don’t write often LMAO and I’m sorry if this bumps my thread to the top
)
