This previous weekend a Reddit consumer going by LATIN0 posted a picture of what they estimated to be six pallets of Magic: The Gathering card (opens in new tab)s that had been dumped at their native landfill. What can be a treasure trove to a devoted participant was taken as a curiosity by LATIN0, who solely knew the sport existed from a decade of Reddit use. In order that they snapped an image, dumped their trash, and moved on with their life. Later, they posted the quirky image to Reddit alongside a number of extra footage (opens in new tab) of opened sealed packs.
All with out figuring out that the retail worth of these pallets and containers was, at a conservative bent, one thing to the order of $100,000. Relying on contents, nevertheless, that might simply have been greater than $250,000 value of MTG playing cards, containing because it did a mixture of Secret Lair, Fashionable Horizons 2, and Unfinity playing cards spanning 2019 via the top of 2022. That greater determine is that if extra of the dear playing cards like Fashionable Horizons, which retail for close to twice the worth of an everyday MTG pack, or the nicer Secret Lair playing cards had been current. Both manner, it would not matter now—you’ll be able to’t take stuff from a landfill, so virtually all the playing cards bought left there by LATIN0 and their coworkers.
Naturally folks flipped out to a very unreasonable diploma, demanding extra footage, an evidence, and that the individual that they had by no means met return and seize all of the playing cards they might. By LATIN0’s return the subsequent day, spurred on by web strangers’ estimations of the huge fortune at hand, the playing cards had been via what occurs to the whole lot at a landfill inside 24 or so hours: Run over by a bunch of bulldozers, then buried in additional trash, then run over a number of extra instances for good measure. The outcomes had been absolute carnage (opens in new tab). (NSFW for Magic: The Gathering gamers.) LATIN0 later up to date their story (opens in new tab) with solutions to the frequent questions folks had been asking.
There was after all rampant hypothesis about the place, or why, this small fortune in retail product had been trashed. The more than likely reply is that it was a product a transport firm held as a result of they had been unpaid that was finally disposed of—which occurs on a regular basis. That or a warehouse product that had been rejected by a big purchaser like Goal after somebody had an accident with a forklift and/or a raccoon broke right into a warehouse and peed on it or what have you ever. Additionally occurs on a regular basis, with employees totally unaware of no matter it’s they’re throwing away.
For others this was an indication that the rampant rumors round Magic: The Gathering previously yr or so have been true, and that Wizards of the Coast really is overprinting playing cards to spice up income. That got here to a head late final yr amongst controversy over the $1,000, 60-card Anniversary Set and a serious financial institution devaluing Hasbro inventory whereas assessing that it was “killing its golden goose” (opens in new tab) with how Magic was being handled.
Anyway, no, this in all probability is not an indication that retailers do not see the worth in carrying an overstock of MTG playing cards and would relatively simply write them off and toss them in a dumpster. Our society is simply monumentally wasteful on this precise manner.
As somebody who used to stay close to a landfill, no, there isn’t any probability you’ll be able to go get these playing cards nonetheless. The landfill folks will yell at you. You’ll in all probability get run over by a bulldozer. Even the better-preserved buried specimens are like as not totally soaked with scorching rubbish juice. Particularly in Texas, the place it’s going to already be reaching a balmy 80F/27C on the day by day.
Given the relaxed nature of LATIN0’s perspective about this catastrophe, Redditors within the replies known as for a lot of unreasonable issues, to which stolid LATIN0 responded: “Please do not threaten me, that is Texas.” A sentence which makes me proud to be a fellow Southerner.
For his or her half, LATIN0 displayed very good wabi-sabi about the entire thing. “I am not mad I did not take any containers however I want I knew what they had been value after I took a photograph and seeing them on the bottom. I solely know of MTG due to Reddit posts I’ve seen over time,” they mentioned. What is the subsequent step, then? LATIN0 says “I am going again to work like everybody else.”
Anyway, only a nice reminder that not one of the issues we care about on this earth are everlasting and we are going to all sooner or later return to the constituent atoms of which we had been made.
For ease of linking, right here is the unique Reddit put up (opens in new tab) and the replace (opens in new tab), with a primary (opens in new tab) and second (opens in new tab) gallery of pictures.