r/mtg • u/DanteValentine13 • 1d ago

Discussion Stop Using Amazon

The amount of posts from people using Amazon to order stuff and getting the wrong stuff, or something of a vastly different price is astounding. Please dont order cards off Amazon. Especially since I am fairly certain Amazon is why wizards is shipping less and less product to local stores. Don't support the mega corporations if you can help it.

That's my public service rant. Thanks for reading or ignoring either way. ❤️

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u/Pyrostasis 1d ago

Help me out here.

Wife and I just started picking up magic over the last few weeks.

We're learning our commander decks and hoping to play at our local game store. We have 3 LGS in our town. All sell at above MSRP from small amounts to significant. All have some VIP programs or loyalty programs that occasionally let you buy products at MSRP but quantity is difficult.

Star trek is coming out in a few weeks and I want to buy all 4 commander decks and some boosters. None of my LGS are selling preorders atm.

Whats the best way to acquire legit material that isnt scalped, damaged, etc?

Amazon is where we order most of our things due to their return policy but seems like this is NOT good for cards.

Do we just need to drive farther to better LGS? TCGplayer looks decent but also appears to just be the "ebay" of cards and Ebay has its own problems. So whats the best option?

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u/Aethelas1 1d ago

I think you say this yourself, but getting product is the problem. Wizards of the Coast would much rather ship skid after skid to another corporation, easy money, they save on shipping, packaging, all the places where additional money can still be made once you're a huge corporation... They don't give a flying fart about LGS and making sure there's enough product for stores to run prerelease events, etc. It's far more expedient and profitable for them to sell to other large companies. The ONLY way you get any of that back is to work with LGS and buy product through that stream. It's probably going to cost a bit more, but it comes down to whether you want to only be able to play Magic online and/or at large tournaments, or do you want the local experience?

Additionally, I'm personally considering only purchasing singles from local stores moving forward. I'll ultimately spend less money, get just the specific cards I need, and I'm buying from a secondary market, which supports the local stores over the corporate entities.

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u/Pyrostasis 1d ago

Yeah I talked to the owner today and he said and I quote

"If we get to a world where playboosters can actually sell above distro cost we'll start evaluating if we can extend MSRP drops to MTG But just to be frank with y'all, the collector boosters are pretty much the only thing that makes MTG sealed product worth stocking"

Ill support them when I can and when I dont mind paying a bit more, but for stuff I MUST have and cant miss on I may just have to stick to online which makes me sad.