The estimate reflects demand for such early Pokemon examples: £25,000-35,000.
On offer at Richard Winterton Auctioneers in Lichfield on July 27, the 102-card set has actually 103 cards as there are two different versions of the Pikachu, numbered 58a for Red Cheek Pikachu and 58b for Yellow Cheek Pikachu.
The cards are housed in plastic sleeves from which they have hardly ever been removed and are in excellent condition. They come together with a vintage 1990s official Pokemon trading card binder with the classic slogan Gotta catch ’em all! on the cover.
Nigel Brookes, vendor of the complete base set of the first edition Shadowless Pokemon cards estimated at £25,000-35,000 in the Richard Winterton auction on July 27.
The vendor is Nigel Brookes, a 33-year-old self-employed sales consultant who grew up in Streetly, West Midlands. The collection was bought in 1999 for his 14th birthday as a special present. Unusually for the time, it was acquired online directly from the Wizards Of The Coast shop in the US.
Time to bid
The auction house says it is anticipating global interest, so “with this in mind, the live, online-only UK auction has been specially timed to assist collectors across the globe”, being sold at 4pm. This means the sale will happen at 8am in Los Angeles, 11am in New York and at 12am on July 28 in Japan which is currently eight hours ahead of the UK.
A portmanteau of ‘Pocket Monsters’, Pokemon has become one of the world’s biggest and most popular media franchises ranging from video games, trading cards and anime to movies and apps.
The Pokemon Trading Card Game based on the Nintendo franchise was first published in October 1996 by Media Factory in Japan and by Wizards Of The Coast in the US.
Each card depicts a Pokemon from the video games; players assume the role of a ‘trainer’ and battle each other by deploying their pocket monsters.
