The meteoric rise of Trading Card Games (TCGs) in recent years has attracted a lot of eyeballs towards the once-niche hobby. Prices for specific single cards have skyrocketed through the roof, and with it, those of the booster boxes in which they come from.

However, this surge in popularity has also attracted the attention of ill-intention scammers looking to make a quick buck, especially in the Pokémon TCG market. By re-shrinking Trading Card Game (TCG) boxes, scammers trick you to believe an item is brand new and unopened.

Re-shrinking is a problem that has plagued the market for years. But what exactly is re-shrinking? And how serious is the extent of this re-shrinking problem? With the recent release of the Pokémon 151 Card Set, we talked to Shinya Asagi, Hobby Authentication Team Leader at SNKRDUNK, and find out how TCG booster boxes are appraised at the SNKRDUNK Base.

What is a Shrink?

A shrink is a thin plastic film that is used to wrap over new items. Shrink wrapping is done not just for TCG boxes but items in everyday life as well, such as T-shirts, perfumes, cookie boxes etc.

This might sound like a very trivial thing. But if you think about it, a shrink-wrapped product gives off the impression that the item is brand new and untouched. An unsuspecting person might not think twice upon seeing a shrink-wrapped TCG booster box.

The Re-Shrinking Issue

Here is a comparison of a re-shrinked and an authentic Pokémon VSTAR Universe Booster Box. Are you able to tell the difference just by looking at the photo?

With time, scammers have found easier and better ways to re-shrink TCG booster boxes. Many scammers replace the original trading cards in a booster box with items of a similar weight before re-shrinking the box. It is almost impossible to distinguish fake from real.

One of the most famous TCG scam cases involves the popular YouTuber Logan Paul himself. In 2022, he spent US$3.5 million on a “sealed” case of Pokémon 1st Edition Base Set Booster Boxes, only to find out that all the boxes inside were re-shrinked, containing only G.I. Joe TCG packs. Yikes.

That is why it’s important that enthusiasts purchase their TCG products from reliable sources. SNKRDUNK is one of the best places to buy Pokémon cards and other TCG products online, with a rigorous authentication process that ensures you get what you paid for. Asagi and his team appraise over 100 booster boxes every day, here’s how they do it:

How SNKRDUNK Identifies Re-Shrinked TCG Boxes

First Appraisal by Hand

Upon receiving a new TCG box, Asagi and team first check the item by hand. Asagi notes how important it is for the team to physically pick up a booster box and check it through by hand the first time around.

While an untrained eye might not be able to tell the difference, an experienced appraiser would be able to quickly identify key differences of the shrink wrap, such as the texture, seam, and finish of the material. Afterward, the shrink will be cross-examined with our database.

As more and more TCG booster boxes arrive at the warehouse, the authentication team has built up a huge database of different shrink wraps used by different TCG brands. That’s right, a database purely dedicated to TCG shrink wraps. These are the measures that SNKRDUNK takes to ensure accuracy during the authentication process.

Specialized Equipment

The authentication process doesn’t stop with just a physical check. Our newly opened SNKRDUNK Base Authentication Center boasts state-of-the-art equipment specifically curated to authenticate every product that arrives at our warehouse.

Asagi and the team utilize a specialized equipment to precisely analyze the shrink wrap of TCG boxes. In this instance, Asagi uses the machine on both the suspicious box as well as the genuine one. While the equipment itself and the actual result are industry secrets that we can’t reveal, a graphical interpretation of the outcome has been plotted below.

The red line represents the suspicious re-shrinked box, while the green reflects the authentic box.

The discrepancies in the wavelengths between the box in question and the genuine one were enough for Asagi to remark: “Ah, I knew it”, from his earlier intuition.

Multiple Appraisals

No matter how experienced Asagi is, it’s still important to get a second opinion from a fellow professional. TCG boxes are run through a second pair of eyes during the authentication process, and through a third or even fourth pair of eyes when a product is flagged to be suspicious.

Even with the best personnel in the world, human error is still possible. That’s why Asagi and his team go through this meticulous process of having more than one appraiser check through each and every item. This minimizes the potential of any lapses in concentration or mistakes, and ensures the accuracy of our authenticity checks.

In the event that the box is still deemed suspicious after running through several authenticators, as well as the “precise analysis tool”, the product will be sent to the final boss, per se.

The Final Weapon: X-ray Equipment

There’s no better way to hammer the nail in the coffin than to use our advanced X-ray machine. Also used for sneakers and other products, we’re the only marketplace that utilizes this highly sophisticated procedure to ensure authenticity tests are as accurate as possible.

Just like how your baggage goes through an X-ray scanner at the airport, products at the SNKRDUNK BASE go through the X-ray equipment during the authentication process. Through this, a three-dimensional graph is generated, allowing Asagi to inspect the contents of the box.

Below are the images generated for the two Pokémon VSTAR Universe boxes. On the left is the genuine product, while the right is the re-shrinked box.

By utilizing X-ray technology, we can see that the contents in the genuine box are neatly arranged, and include the correct number of packs in the right thickness. If the box contains additional promotional cards or accessories, this can be easily assessed as well.

While the X-ray imagery on the right might not seem like much to an untrained eye, Asagi was able to identify that something is clearly wrong with it. The box has been tampered with, and the contents have been replaced with what seem to be thin paper. That’s the final straw for this suspicious box, which Asagi has officially concluded as re-shrinked and unauthentic.

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And that’s how Asagi and the SNKRDUNK Hobby Authentication Team identify and weed out re-shrinked TCG booster boxes. With an industry-high appraisal accuracy of 99.96%*, SNKRDUNK remains committed towards ensuring all products on the platform are genuine. If you haven’t, download the SNKRDUNK App now and rest easy!

More on SNKRDUNK:
SNKRDUNK Base: An Inside Look Into Our Logistics and Authentication Center
How SNKRDUNK Authenticates TCG Products
How SNKRDUNK Authenticates Sneakers