By now, you’ve probably seen the footage of people fist-fighting over Pokemon cards. A newPokemon 151premium collection box called Blooming Waters showed up at Costco earlier this month, two weeks before its release date at other retailers, which sent resellers into a full blown frenzy. There are multiple videos out there of people at Costco acting like the survivors of a zombie apocalypse fighting over bean cans, but the most famous clip is the oneposted on Twitter by streamer Disguised Toast.
In the video, a guy is holding two boxes of Pokemon cards while someone tries to rip them out of his hands. As they wrestle, the box holder throws an elbow right into the would-be thief’s face. A woman and another man attempt to intervene while a dozen or so customers stand around watching. Someone yells for the police. There don’t appear to be any Costco employees around.
Customers Behaving Badly
The clip has close to 4 million views on Twitter because a famous content creator posted it, but I’ve seen several other fight videos that were even more brutal than this one. Probably the most disturbing is the one wherea guy trips and falls, and instead of helping him up, everyone around him tries to grab the boxes out of his arms. Shiny cardboard really brings out the worst in people.
Over the weekend I saw a lot of takes from Pokemon fans about how disappointing this whole situation is, but I did not expect to see a take from GameStop’s Twitter account. In a quote retweet of Toast’s video, GameStop said “We support battling Pokemon, not battling over Pokemon. Blooming Waters arrives at GameStop on February 7th with a 2 per customer limit. Do better, @Costco.”
I never thought I’d write these words, but I agree with GameStop. There are plenty of things Costco could have done to prevent violent chaos from unfolding, but it’s clear that multiple stores did absolutely nothing. Setting a pallet of cards down in the middle of an aisle and opening the floodgates is the exact wrong way to sell a product like this and the leadership at Costco should have known better.
The boxes could have been behind customer service, or people could have been let into the store a couple at a time. These people are responsible for their own behavior, but there’s such a thing as herd mentality to consider. Costco was completely reckless here and these stores are lucky that customers and employees weren’t hurt.
Slow Down, GameStop
With all that being said, where does GameStop get off taking the high ground on this one? I can’t think of another retail store that has a longer history of mistreating people than GameStop. Does it really think enforcing a purchase limit on Pokemon cards makes it better than Costco, the home of the $1.50 hotdog? I don’t think so.
Ya, Costco probably shouldn’t have let customers brawl over Pokemon cards. AlsoGameStop shouldn’t underpay, overwork, and terrorize its own employees. GameStop shouldn’t havegutted Game Informerbefore eventuallyshutting it down completelyand raiding its office of gifts from publishers. GameStopshouldn’t have leaked customerdata orrecorded their phone calls without permission. All of that, and I haven’t even mentioned how badly my generation got ripped off on trade-ins at the God-forsaken store.
I’d tell GameStop to do better, but to be honest, I just want it to shut up and go away.
