Storing Sealed Cards

[tetsuo42]

I was wondering about people's opinions on storing sealed packs of cards a la Euro Land packs, or sealed individual cards like Powder Keg.

I just got a sealed pack of FNM Counterspells, and was wondering about the best way to store them besides keeping them in a box.

Oh, and uh, value and longevity wise, would it be better to keep them sealed minty fresh, or opened and sleeved?

cheers

[mintcollector]

I was wondering about people's opinions on storing sealed packs of cards a la Euro Land packs, or sealed individual cards like Powder Keg.

I just got a sealed pack of FNM Counterspells, and was wondering about the best way to store them besides keeping them in a box.

Oh, and uh, value and longevity wise, would it be better to keep them sealed minty fresh, or opened and sleeved?

cheers

Well I am not aware of any product that can store a pack of cards safely. Any packaging around a card will not fit well in any conventional storage on the market. This point specifically being the Euro land packs. A single sealed card like Powder Keg should fit in an Ultra-Pro page ok, although it might be a pretty tight fit especially since the card can shift in the wrapper as you try to fit it into a page. There is a French member on the boards who collects sealed packs of cards, erl00, and Eric might be better suited to answer this question. He does not post as often as he once did and I can only guess if he is still even reading this board.

As far as your question on sealed versus loose cards....this is subjective to personal opinion. There are people who do like to collect sealed product like this and opening the pack might be a travesty to them. Given though, there are fewer collectors of M:TG who go to these lengths and as such there may not be a good market for this and might be harder to tell if the cards will be considered worth more sealed or loose. A quick example of this is that lets say you have a card worth $5. A sealed pack of 10 technically would be worth $50. Now since it is sealed, is it really worth $50, or it is worth more or less? The reason I say this is often bulk lots of cards fetch a lower price that either a playset might as the people who are interested in something like this will include dealers or resellers. Most collectors do only care to have one of each card, although some might find the sealed pack attractive if they are interested in that sort of thing. Sorry to be so wishy washy on this, but this is definitely an area that can go different ways and have different outcomes depending on whom you are dealing with or speaking to.

[hammr7]

The key to any packaging is to keep the contents clean, keep the contents from moving around, and protect the contents from scratches, dings, and other problems when being handled.

I have found a number of options for small stacks of cards. If presentation isn't important, a starter deck box is often perfect. For very small stacks of cards, the old portal demo boxes (the ones that only hold about 20 cards) can be used. I also will utilize the plastic bags from 100-packs of the penny sleeves. The ones I buy have a zip lock. If you want something a little nicer for long term storage, many office supply stores have small plastic bags containing an adhesive flap. These have been used for some of the recent token set offerings from Crazy Clown and Neo-Token.

Finally, for oversized items I will often use regular zip lock bags, available at most grocery stores. While they tend to be oversized, they do the job and are easily modified to whatever size I need with regular adhesive tape. It isn't elegant, but it does the job.

[tetsuo42]

I'm going to try the starter box thing - I know I have random ones as spacers in various card boxes.

Of course, the question will become moot if I decide to open up the pack and show it off in a binder - unfortunately I'd probably be the only person who would look at the binder anyways.

thanks again