I bought a few packages in the “Biedronka” store in my country. I took them together with this box. The store sells 100% original packages, but I have never seen such a booster box outside this store.
I wonder if larger stores receive packages in such boxes?
It’s practically impossible for this to be a fake box. It’s the largest chain of stores in my country with over 3,500 stores. Unfortunately, apart from what you can see in the pictures, the box does not contain any other elements.
This is the lowest-quality looking box that I have ever seen if it truly came from TPCi. Perhaps pfm is right and this contained tins or something like that.
But I would be shocked. It looks awful and probably wasn’t storefront-facing.
Amazon and Walmart sell fakes my man, this is clearly a fake. If it were a case of X product it would either be a basic cardboard box with a sticker of the contents or it would have graphics about the product like this:
Well stores don’t print the products they sell and nothing is stopping a supermarket from selling authentic cards and counterfeits.
Here’s the red flags that I see on the box in question:
No set logos, yet it has the PTCG logo
It features Pikachu & Charizard (the most popular pokemon & frequently featured on other counterfeits)
Pikachu & Charizard aren’t terastallized which would be expected for a 2024 product
The box is the size of a booster box, if it were much larger than it could be a display piece (I would still have my doubts)
The graphics on the box are low effort, look at how busy other booster boxes are
Doesn’t feature a “Play Pokemon TCG Live!” logo
On your last photo, there should be a space between “Nintendo/Creatures Inc./GAME FREAK inc.” like this “Nintendo / Creatures Inc. / GAME FREAK”, followed by “Manufactured by The Pokemon Company International” (in English or a foreign language)
The store only sells original packages, so this is not true.
I understand the rest of the arguments. Then I wonder why print fake booster boxes and put legit booster packs in them? And do it in the whole country?
At that time, cards were sold in several sets. I have the impression that the Pokemon Company printed cheap boxes specifically for shipping purposes. Since you couldn’t buy booster boxes in the store, only single booster packs. Maybe it was a cheaper option than printing normal booster boxes.
I will ask the chain of stores personally and we will see what they say
Packs are 100% legit for sure. I know how to recognize fakes. I pulled that 2 cards for example. Magikarp is in PSA now, but you can easy say cards are legit
@Fusion it’s possible that they ordered some product from overseas and were bamboozled with fake boxes. After getting their money back, they used them to store packs?
Rather than speculating, why not just ask the store owner?
As I wrote above, I will send an email to support today. However, this is not LGS, but a huge company, so I don’t even know if they will answer me tbh. But i will try.
A quick glance at it so its not for sure but the art is the same style that one would see on fake packs that take art from multiple sets or sources. Given that it has a copyright of 2024 it would have to be a newer product but pikachu and charizard don’t appear with any art like this and the closest set would be 151 from 2023 or crown zenith also in 2023. If it is real, the split in the front would denote possible split of product styles that were included (decks usually had this and would be split in the middle based on the deck specifics). Lack of details on it is usually a tell for not authentic but if you want to still dig for possibility of authentic then possibly something like knockout box display, prerelease shop kit, or similar product.