Our First Week on Whatnot: What We Sold and What We Learned

We've spent years building KoheiTCG around one idea: get collectors the Japanese Pokémon product they actually want, from booster boxes to graded slabs, without the guesswork. This month we brought that same lineup to a new stage — Whatnot — and our first week of live streams exceeded what we expected walking in.

What went live in week one

Our opening streams leaned into the two things our community asks us for most: grails and fresh product.

Graded slabs. We put some serious hits on camera, including a PSA 151 Charizard, a Birthday Pikachu, and a 25th Anniversary Umbreon. These are the kinds of cards that don't sit in a listing for long on a static marketplace — watching bids move in real time, with buyers reacting live, is a completely different experience than a fixed "Buy Now" price.

Sealed booster boxes. Abyss Eye and Mega Dream were the stars of the sealed side of things, alongside steady interest in the Starter Deck 100 and the Mega Gengar Starter Set. These are approachable price points, and they gave newer viewers an easy way to jump into their first purchase with us.

Rip and ships. We ran rip-and-ship breaks on both Abyss Eye and Mega Dream, which turned out to be some of the most fun moments of the week. There's an energy to watching a box get opened live — and shipped straight to the buyer's door — that a photo listing just can't replicate.

Why this mattered

Selling live meant we could show the condition of a slab up close, answer questions about a set on the spot, and let the chat get loud when a Charizard bid climbed higher than anyone expected. It's a different muscle than running a Shopify storefront, but it's a complementary one — the two channels feed each other. Someone who catches a stream might head to koheitcg.com afterward to browse the full catalog, and Shopify regulars are starting to tune into the shows to catch things they won't find anywhere else, like the slabs.

What's next

This was just the first week. We're planning more rip-and-ship formats, more graded pulls, and more of the sealed Japanese product our community has been asking about. If you want to catch the next stream, find us on Whatnot, or keep browsing new arrivals right here on the site.

Thanks for shopping — and watching — with us.