Saturday, August 24, 2013

From the Vault 20

In case you missed it, Magic From the Vault 20 released on Friday and is currently selling for $199 to $299 per box.  There was sum interest in the set, just like there has been with every other From the Vault set, but interest skyrocketed when WOTC announced a foil reprint of Jace the Mind Sculptor. Since an original foil of Jace sells for upwards of $700 and a non-foil version goes for $120 to  $150, you can see why people got a lot more interested in the set.

WOTC traditioally heavily allocates the From the Vault sets, with stores getting either 10 or 20 copies, really boosting the demand.  I know of a number of stores that kept their entire allocation to use as prizes and rewards, while others sold some at MSRP, deciding who got them through various methods, while still others opted to sell their entire shipment on eBay or Amazon for what the market will bear.  Some stores, like ours had few if any complaints about the allocations while others recieved upwards of 100 calls about them.  In some cases, when the customer found the price the store had on the FTV20, they threatened to call the police.  Not sure what the police would do in this situation but I guess the customer thought it sounded good (Incidentally, the police could do little, since no law is being broken).

From what I understand, WOTC looks at the annual release of the From the Vault set as a "thank you" to retailers for supporting their products and running events.  The company deliberately releases a highly desirable product at a low MSRP, fully expecting retailers to either increase the asking price (laws of supply and demand at work here) or to use them to generate business in other ways.  However stores choose to use them, retailers tend to look at the annual FTV as "Christmas in August".

No comments:

Post a Comment