Announcing a Monumental Partnership with TCGplayer.com: Win Stuff Every Month!

And now, a huge announcement for 2016!

I’m happy to finally reveal an exclusive partnership between PokeBeach and TCGplayer.com, the largest TCG store on the web!

If you’ve never heard of TCGplayer before, you’ve probably been paying too much for your Pokemon cards! TCGplayer is the most popular and influential card store for card  games like Magic the Gathering and Yu-Gi-Oh. If you talk to players of those games, they’ll probably tell you they’ve purchased the majority of their cards through TCGplayer. That’s because TCGplayer isn’t just a single store – it’s made up of thousands of sellers representing real stores, online shops, and individuals who are all competing to sell their cards for the lowest prices. Since they all have such high visibility on TCGplayer, it’s easy for them to sell their cards, and so you’ll often find cards for cheaper than even eBay!

I have known about TCGplayer since the early 2000s when we were affiliated with “Pokeschool,” one of the many Pokemon fansites I worked on before starting PokeBeach. That fansite eventually re-imagined themselves as “TCGplayer,” which then expanded into other trading card games and became the behemoth industry leader that it is today. But at the core of TCGplayer is still the same Pokemon fans from the early 2000s, just like PokeBeach is still run by the exact same fan since 2003 (that’s me!). :p

Over the years TCGplayer has approached me many times asking if I’d partner with them, but I ignored them each time because I’m mean.  I’ve never run this website for money, so to me, partnerships were unnecessary. But because I’m evil and want to have the best TCG community forever, a thought recently occurred: “Hey, wait a minute! We could use a partnership to give the members prizes! That’ll spice up this joint!” And so after researching TCGplayer’s platform and what they’ve done for other card games, I realized that promoting them will bring more buyers and sellers to their collection of stores, which will increase competition and drive down the price of Pokemon cards in the secondary market. And so it was at that point I realized, “Oh, this could actually help the fans!”

And needless to say, TCGplayer jumped on board faster than I could spew out criticisms of the Hoopa movie. With this partnership, we will be advertising TCGplayer on PokeBeach from now on, thus helping Pokemon fans get the best prices on Pokemon cards. And you, the PokeBeach community, will reap 100% of this partnership’s benefits!

Introducing Community Blogs!

Ever wanted your work to be read by thousands upon thousands of people each day? Do you want to write about the competitive TCG scene? Your experiences running a tournament? Tips on collecting? A memorable TCG experience? Your opinions about this game?

Within the next week, PokeBeach’s front page will now host a brand new “Community Blog” section where any qualified Pokemon TCG fan with a passion for writing can publish their very own articles! All articles will be vetted before they’re published, but unlike our premium articles, we will not be editing them or providing much feedback. Hence why it’s a community “blog.”

In anticipation of this new program, I spent several months reworking the software we use for writing articles so that it’s as easy to use as possible. For example, adding a card link or deck list is only one or two additional keystrokes. It’s very painless to use, and I might even say a little fun! To get started writing an article, please check out this link.

I’ve wanted to do a community blog since at least 2005, but we never had the programmers or layout to pull it off. But now that our premium article program has matured and is performing beyond expectations, I felt now was the perfect time!

Oh, and did I forget to mention…

Each month, the person whose articles receives the most attention will win a booster box directly from TCGplayer! Yes, you heard right! How awesome is that?!

That’s not it, though! TCGplayer has a “Prize Wall” feature on their website where players can redeem points for real prizes, such as booster packs, promo boxes, and booster boxes. Each month’s winner will also get points which they can exchange for even more products!

The first articles will start to appear on the front page once enough people submit them, and January’s winner will be crowned on the 31st! In the future, there will be additional features for writers as well; the “Community Blog” program will become a permanent feature of PokeBeach and will evolve over time. And who knows what else might happen along the way…

And now for something even more exciting!

Introducing Monthly Tournaments with Real Prizes!

Your PokeBeach premium subscription just got a whole lot more valuable!

Your subscription already covers premium articles every week from the game’s top players. It also gives you direct access to each of our writers in the Subscriber’s Secret Hideout, where they’ll fix your decks for you and give you detailed advice.

But now we have something even more exciting to offer PokeBeach’s premium subscribers and regular members: TCGplayer will be offering real tournament prize support for PokeBeach’s monthly online tournaments! As far as I know, this will be the first time in history a Pokemon fansite is able to offer consistent prizes for its fan tournaments. And it’s all thanks to TCGplayer!

Not only will regular members be able to compete and win real booster packs in these tournaments, but premium subscribers will have reserved slots and be able to win double the amount of booster packs plus additional merchandise and booster packs!

• 1st Place: 18x Packs (If a premium member: Booster Box [36x Packs]) + short interview on the front page
• 2nd Place: 14x Packs (Premium: 28x Packs)
• 3rd Place: 9x Packs (Premium: 18x Packs)
• 4th Place: 9x Packs (Premium: 18x Packs)
• 5th Place: 4x Packs (Premium: 8x Packs)
• 6th Place: 4x Packs (Premium: 8x Packs)
• 7th Place: 4x Packs (Premium: 8x Packs)
• 8th Place: 4x Packs (Premium: 8x Packs)
• Skill-Based Win: 5x Packs (Premium Members Only)
• Skill-Based Win: 5x Packs (Premium Members Only)
• Skill-Based Win: 5x Packs (Premium Members Only)
• Skill-Based Merchandise Win (such as a promo product) (Premium Members Only)
• Skill-Based Merchandise Win (such as a promo product) (Premium Members Only)
• * Skill-based wins will follow themes such as “Most Improved Player” or “Most Successful Players with Unorthodox Deck” and will be judged by our panel of premium writers. The theme(s) will be announced with each tournament along with the judging criteria.

The top 8 players will also win the aforementioned Prize Wall points, allowing you to exchange them for even more products! TCGplayer is offering PokeBeach’s members more Prize Wall points than they normally offer through their endeavors with other card games!

• 1st Place: 12 Prize Wall points (Premium: 24 points)
• 2nd Place: 6 points (Premium: 12 points)
• 3rd Place: 3 points (Premium: 6 points)
• 4th Place: 3 points (Premium: 6 points)
• 5th Place: 2 points (Premium: 4 points)
• 6th Place: 2 points (Premium: 4 points)
• 7th Place: 2 points (Premium: 4 points)
• 8th Place: 2 points (Premium: 4 points)
• 9th – 32nd Place: 1 point each

Oh, and 1st through 8th places will also get special trophy badges under their avatars!

Sign-ups for January’s tournament begin tomorrow! For now, each tournament will allow for 64 players on a first-come, first-serve basis, but PokeBeach premium subscribers will always have priority.

If you haven’t signed up as a premium member yet, now is your chance – not only will you have priority slots, but you’ll also get everything else our article program offers! But be sure to act soon, as the subscription prices will be going up one last time in the next few days!

I am truly excited for this partnership and I hope you are too! Every Pokemon TCG fan will benefit from this – not only will TCGplayer’s Pokemon section grow and allow for even better prices, but you’ll have the chance to win all of the above prizes! If you’re interested in selling your cards through their service, you should check out this link. There’s a reason their website is the industry leader for buying and selling cards, so go try them out for yourself if you didn’t already know about them!

Also, from now on you can use our “TCG” dropdown menu to access their online store, where you can see how much individual cards cost from many different sources, price trends over time, and other valuable information. Be sure to check it out!

So PokeBeach members, are you ready to show us what you’re made of? Will you be using your pen as your weapon or your deck?

Be sure to spread the news to your friends! :)

(Note: The Pokémon Company International is not a sponsor or endorser of these tournaments, contests, or prizes, nor does the company or its affiliates have any formal association with PokeBeach. Our activities are by fans, for fans, and are not sanctioned by Pokémon or approved by them.)