E-Bay and the Price of Myachis

by Crazy Ivan

Right now, if you go to E-Bay and search Myachi you'll find a few gems.  There's a mint condition Black Belt, a Made in Mexico Zebra, a Dodge still in the blister and even a three pack that includes a PS2, a Sobe Flames and a Black Butter (with a Myachi wristband thrown in for good measure).  There's also plenty of commons and NBAs offered from the various E-Bay stores that carry Myachi.

I'm sure a lot of people go to E-Bay for their regular Myachi purchases.  If not, these "E-Bay Stores" wouldn't keep reordering.  But that's not what this article is about.  This one isn't about the commons on there, but rather the rares.  And more specifically, the uber-rares.

See, there was a time when if you wanted any particular Myachi bad enough, all you had to do was ask Myachi Man for it enough times.  Heck, Pinky managed to talk him into giving me an Iridescent Rainbow (although it took her about 3 years).  But now Myachi Man's supply of ubers is too small to risk giving any more away and most of the paper tags that are still in circulation have found their way into the hands of some really tight-fisted collectors.

The result, as the rules of supply and demand would predict, is that you end up with Myachis going for extremely inflated prices.  Right now, the mint condition Black Belt on there is sitting at $51 with 3 days left on the auction and only 2 bids.  If it went for under $80 it would be cheaper than the last Black Belt I saw on E-Bay and if it goes for under $125 it won't be the most expensive Black Belt I've seen on E-Bay.

On one hand, this is a sure sign of the continued success of the company.  Myachi doesn't sell rare Myachis on E-Bay so we never see any of that money, but the fact that there is a demand for long retired sacks is a positive commentary on the increasing popularity of the game.

But on the other hand, it means that a lot of collectors and Myachi fanatics find themselves priced out of the game altogether.  While some collectors clearly have the desire and means to pay upwards of $100 (and on a few occasions upwards of $500) for a single Myachi, most don't.  Most collectors are kids who are relying on the generosity of their parents or their summer-job savings to pick up new Myachis and if they're faced with buying one sack for $50 or 10 sacks for $50, they'll most often take the latter.

Understandably, a lot of Myachi Maniacs have been frustrated by the outrageous inflation in collectible Myachi prices that we've seen over the last 4 or 5 years.  It all but guarantees that they will never get their hands on the really rare Myachis that they want for their collection.  Even those of us within the company feel that.  I know that my paper tag collection isn't going to get much bigger as long as a paper tag Myachi can fetch $200+ on E-Bay.

But there's another angle to this, of course.  The people who are frustrated are on the "wanting" end of the equation.  This means that the people on the "having" side of the equals sign are smiling from ear to ear.  Keep in mind that the dude who is auctioning off the Black Belt probably didn't pay more than $10 for it.  Heck, they might not have paid for it at all since most of the Belts were given away rather than sold.

So if you find yourself frustrated by the continued growth in the price of collectible sacks, comfort yourself by looking at the Myachis in your collection.  As you watch them, they are slowly growing in value.  What you can buy today for $5, you might be able to sell in five years for $100.  That's a pretty good investment (which might be a good way to talk your folks into buying you more Myachis).  In fact, consider this:

Cost of a Black Belt in 2006: $10
Cost of a Black Belt in 2011: <$51

That's a five year increase of over 500%

All I'm saying is that if the stock prices for your Fortune 500 companies had done the same thing, we wouldn't be dealing with any economic crisis.