What’s going on with TAG?

[mjohnatgt]

Originally Posted by varjakpaul

FedEx isn't some scam shipping company.

What he was referencing was FEDEX's max payout limit for collectibles, which is $1,000. They will sell you much more, but will not pay out on it for this type of material. You'd have to use private collectibles insurance to cover more than $1,000 with them.

[rfgilles]

Originally Posted by Rjcollings1973

Just wanted to be able to reply again in 6-12 months When Khal says he told you so.

Welcome to the Hobby hope you stick around when TAG is defunk.

TAG has now graded 100,000 cards. You can reply now.

[KhalDrogo]

Originally Posted by rfgilles

TAG has surpassed grading 100,000 cards

https://taggrading.com/blogs/news/ta...e-pokemon-card

How many of them were Karn’s submissions?

[Scottish Punk]

Watching some gemrate data on them, they seem to be moving into being exclusively pokemon graders. Only a few thousand a month not pokemon. The 10k, 11k whatever of pokemon, do we think that is all the same person? Private collector or going into a repack product? They don't show up on ebay.

[discodanman45]

Originally Posted by Scottish Punk

Watching some gemrate data on them, they seem to be moving into being exclusively pokemon graders. Only a few thousand a month not pokemon. The 10k, 11k whatever of pokemon, do we think that is all the same person? Private collector or going into a repack product? They don't show up on ebay.

Most likely a repack product. Same thing can be seen with CGC pop reports with Omega Mystery Boxes. Is it Sean Bassik? There seems to be some connection with his employees saying he is involved. Will we see a TAG Omega Mystery Box in a few months. Pretty likely IMO.

[collective]

Originally Posted by Scottish Punk

Watching some gemrate data on them, they seem to be moving into being exclusively pokemon graders. Only a few thousand a month not pokemon. The 10k, 11k whatever of pokemon, do we think that is all the same person? Private collector or going into a repack product? They don't show up on ebay.

So TAG is putting up numbers similar to CGC on the sports side?

[rfgilles]

Originally Posted by Scottish Punk

Watching some gemrate data on them, they seem to be moving into being exclusively pokemon graders. Only a few thousand a month not pokemon. The 10k, 11k whatever of pokemon, do we think that is all the same person? Private collector or going into a repack product? They don't show up on ebay.

TAG is being followed on Gemrate? I don't see it there.

[rfgilles]

Originally Posted by collective

So TAG is putting up numbers similar to CGC on the sports side?

They have graded ~66K sports cards to date, ~83 TCG, ~150 K total cards graded at this stage.

[rfgilles]

Originally Posted by rfgilles

They have graded ~66K sports cards to date, ~83 TCG, ~150 K total cards graded at this stage.

Graded Pokeman at 93.5k, so TCG up >10k last week.

[hoi_ming]

Originally Posted by discodanman45

Most likely a repack product. Same thing can be seen with CGC pop reports with Omega Mystery Boxes. Is it Sean Bassik? There seems to be some connection with his employees saying he is involved. Will we see a TAG Omega Mystery Box in a few months. Pretty likely IMO.

Pokecollect sells Pokemon cards on Whatnot and his store; he's been selling lots of TAG slabs on his streams.

he's on the TAG discord and has said there is significant demand for Pokemon TAG slabs. I've also seen cardeconomist sell on YouTube, and another streamer seem on TikTok.

I know NEO can't fathom this demand and sees that there are no listings in eBay and concludes it's for mystery packs. There may be some mystery packs possibly, but there are also sales happening on other platforms.

[hoi_ming]

Originally Posted by rfgilles

TAG is being followed on Gemrate? I don't see it there.

Gem rate gives this to NEO on YouTube and NEO will discuss these numbers in his monthly video about grading numbers.

TAG numbers are not published on the Gemrate website though.

[rfgilles]

Originally Posted by hoi_ming

Gem rate gives this to NEO on YouTube and NEO will discuss these numbers in his monthly video about grading numbers.

TAG numbers are not published on the Gemrate website though.

Good to know. Thanks.

[hoi_ming]

Originally Posted by rfgilles

They have graded ~66K sports cards to date, ~83 TCG, ~150 K total cards graded at this stage.

To provide additional context, I track the numbers weekly if anyone is interested

These are as of Jul 15 (morning). The numbers have increased by now.

[rfgilles]

This is great thank you. Glad to see that TAG is getting some traction.

[hoi_ming]

Originally Posted by rfgilles

This is great thank you. Glad to see that TAG is getting some traction.

My pleasure.

[discodanman45]

Where are all these Pokémon cards going? This seems very, very strange to me. No growth in any other category, but exponential growth in Pokémon.

[rfgilles]

Originally Posted by discodanman45

Where are all these Pokémon cards going? This seems very, very strange to me. No growth in any other category, but exponential growth in Pokémon.

To the person who submits the card I'm guessing.

[hoi_ming]

Originally Posted by discodanman45

Where are all these Pokémon cards going? This seems very, very strange to me. No growth in any other category, but exponential growth in Pokémon.

I responded above to your other comment, but yeah there are at least some sellers selling Pokemon TAG slabs in their streams.

As to why there is limited growth in other categories, I speculate part of it is due to the lack of ability currently to grade thick, vintage, and mem cards. Sports folks would want that in place. Also the current lack of liquidity in the sports world, you can start to get PSA comps for TAG slabs, just takes longer.

In Pokemon there less of a flipper's mentality and the fact that TAG can grade any TCG card is very appealing. I think the Pokemon community really likes the clean slabs and pokecollect is selling TAG slabs at or above PSA comps most of the time. I think also TAG is pushing marketing for Pokemon given the initial strong reception from the Pokemon community, so that all combines to lead to the growth.

My opinions

[rfgilles]

Originally Posted by hoi_ming

I responded above to your other comment, but yeah there are at least some sellers selling Pokemon TAG slabs in their streams.

As to why there is limited growth in other categories, I speculate part of it is due to the lack of ability currently to grade thick, vintage, and mem cards. Sports folks would want that in place. Also the current lack of liquidity in the sports world, you can start to get PSA comps for TAG slabs, just takes longer.

In Pokemon there less of a flipper's mentality and the fact that TAG can grade any TCG card is very appealing. I think the Pokemon community really likes the clean slabs and pokecollect is selling TAG slabs at or above PSA comps most of the time. I think also TAG is pushing marketing for Pokemon given the initial strong reception from the Pokemon community, so that all combines to lead to the growth.

My opinions

Yes, I think the commercial they did is probably helping regarding Pokemon.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypFBWYszEc8


I don't think it is terribly surprising that Pokemon is leading the growth for TAG, or that different segments (customers) are adopting TAG at different rates. If you look at the latest Gemrate data, the most graded sets of TCG for PSA are exclusively Pokemon. Also, 91% of cards graded by CSG were TCG.
https://mailchi.mp/gemrate/june-2024...p?e=1a39af32ca

[discodanman45]

Originally Posted by hoi_ming

In Pokemon there less of a flipper's mentality and the fact that TAG can grade any TCG card is very appealing. I think the Pokemon community really likes the clean slabs and pokecollect is selling TAG slabs at or above PSA comps most of the time. I think also TAG is pushing marketing for Pokemon given the initial strong reception from the Pokemon community, so that all combines to lead to the growth.

I would argue that Pokemon has a bigger flipper mentality right now. The mystery box phenomena in Pokemon is reaching unprecedented levels. I think whoever is grading the majority of these is going to start a mystery product soon.

Selling above PSA comps is a supply constraint right now, not a demand issue. For how many Pokemon cards being graded, hardly any of them are hitting traditional marketplaces.

The Pokemon community also has much larger influencer voices than sports cards. I think these big influencers are hoarding TAG slabs and will capitalize ion it when the time is right and they get their followers to buy it up like Omega Mystery Boxes. Just my opinion.

[hoi_ming]

Originally Posted by discodanman45

I would argue that Pokemon has a bigger flipper mentality right now. The mystery box phenomena in Pokemon is reaching unprecedented levels. I think whoever is grading the majority of these is going to start a mystery product soon.

Selling above PSA comps is a supply constraint right now, not a demand issue. For how many Pokemon cards being graded, hardly any of them are hitting traditional marketplaces.

The Pokemon community also has much larger influencer voices than sports cards. I think these big influencers are hoarding TAG slabs and will capitalize ion it when the time is right and they get their followers to buy it up like Omega Mystery Boxes. Just my opinion.

We shall see. Anything is possible, since we don't have all the details.

[rfgilles]

Originally Posted by discodanman45

I would argue that Pokemon has a bigger flipper mentality right now. The mystery box phenomena in Pokemon is reaching unprecedented levels. I think whoever is grading the majority of these is going to start a mystery product soon.

Selling above PSA comps is a supply constraint right now, not a demand issue. For how many Pokemon cards being graded, hardly any of them are hitting traditional marketplaces.

The Pokemon community also has much larger influencer voices than sports cards. I think these big influencers are hoarding TAG slabs and will capitalize ion it when the time is right and they get their followers to buy it up like Omega Mystery Boxes. Just my opinion.

I'm not following here. Are you saying people are paying more for a TAG slab than a more available PSA slab?

[discodanman45]

Originally Posted by rfgilles

I'm not following here. Are you saying people are paying more for a TAG slab than a more available PSA slab?

Yes. There could be multiple reasons for this.

1. There is a Pokémon card someone wants to buy. There is 1 TAG slab and 1000 PSA slabs for the same card. Even if the demand of PSA slabs are higher, the low supply and a few dedicated TAG collectors could easily inflate prices until more slabs are available.

2. Market manipulation is much easier for TAG slabs. A couple of fake sales can easily be used to give the optics of higher sales.

Looking at past sales of TAG Pokémon, it is very odd. BIN's are stupid high and auctions are way below PSA. I think the people that are saying TAG is selling higher are looking at only BIN sales, neglecting all auctions, and comparing them to PSA auctions.

[discodanman45]

Originally Posted by hoi_ming

We shall see. Anything is possible, since we don't have all the details.

This is very similar to when CGC pop report with TCG started to explode. TAG is the perfect Mystery Box product. Especially with them putting each card in a foil bag, makes it a more professional mystery product with less work for the submitter.

Looks like this is in the works.

https://taggrading.com/products/label-each-mystery-pack

[hoi_ming]

Originally Posted by discodanman45

This is very similar to when CGC pop report with TCG started to explode. TAG is the perfect Mystery Box product. Especially with them putting each card in a foil bag, makes it a more professional mystery product with less work for the submitter.

Looks like this is in the works.

https://taggrading.com/products/label-each-mystery-pack

I just saw this today too. Yeah mystery packs definitely a possibility. But both could be true, mystery packs and actual demand for TAG slabs.

I'd be pretty happy for TAG to reach CGC levels, hell, TAG is coming in on BGS numbers.