A quick little how-to on how to use a technique called "scaling" to quickly make money from trading card games such as Magic, Yugioh, and Pokemon. This is a very old strategy that has been used since the 90's, so most older folks will know it. However, I'm putting it out there for the youngin's.
You will need an electronic precision scale. You can find one cheap off of ebay.
1) Go into a wal mart or target or other store of choice that has lax security.
2) Find the card games. They are usually near the front to discourage boosting, but sometimes they are back in toys.
3) You are going to shoplift as many booster packs as you can. If they are just sitting in a booster box, nab the whole booster box. One might prefer to buy a medium-sized opaque tupperware container (a few dollars) which is then stuffed with booster packs and bought through the self-checkout.
4) At home, weigh each individual booster pack on your scale. Put the heaviest ones in one pile and the lightest ones in another pile. The heavier booster packs contain holo-foil cards, and these are going to be your moneymakers.
5) Open up the heavier packs. Keep the foil cards to sell as individuals on ebay. Sell the unopened lighter packs on ebay as well. Toss the piss cards.
Optional) Buy sealed booster cases. They always contain good expensive cards in a predetermined distribution among the individual packs. Scale out the heaviest packs to get the good cards and ebay the lighter packs. You'll come out with quite a bit of profit.
Comments
Now I play Magic, and since I've always been more interested in playing these card games more than collecting, I've found that the "better" cards aren't always the foil cards.
A legitimate business approach to this might be to just buy whole boxes of cards, and sell each card individually.