There are two true card shops in Akihabara, a Mint/Yellow Submarine store found in the Radio Hall building near the JR station, and Wrappers, found a few minutes away from the rest of the Akihabara action.
Wrappers recently rearranged their store, which I realized when I went looking for some more oddball-ish cards for a trade in November.
So how did the store change? I'm not sure if they got rid of anything or just reorganized the space, but the trading card section is now much smaller, and there is a larger space devoted to CCG cards. I realize that I haven't made a post about this store anyway, but readers of NPB Card Guy's Japanese Baseball Cards probably saw his post (with photos) about the store. I would guess they cut back on some of the complete sets or just reorganized that area, as the boxes and boxes of singles still remain. I'm a little worried they might try to clearance some of it out, though, so I'll probably make a trip again soon to compare. They are still stocking new cards though, so they aren't disappearing anytime soon as a baseball card store.
Here is their current (as of late November) business card:
The Data Card is identified in Engel's 7th Edition as 1989 Mermaid Data Cards (JG 5). I didn't realize I'd missed adding this set to the SCF system until I tried looking it up. It's a 50 card set, that according to Engel was included 1 card per package of Ice Candy or Gumi Jelly.
ReplyDeleteYeah - I forgot to include the brand name. The katakana above "Data Card" says Mermaid, basically. They are some of the least interesting cards I've ever seen, especially for their price. I guess the nod to "modern" technology with the "DATA CARD" font on the back is somewhat amusing, if about 5 years too late.
ReplyDeleteI respectfully disagree - there's ONE true card store in Akihabara and it's Wrappers. Cards are an afterthought at that Mint store, although I did pick up some good items. But you can't really do any serious set building there, unlike Wrappers.
ReplyDeleteMermaid is on the list of sets I need to do a post about sometime.
Akihabara has several card stores, but they have nothing but card game cards; BBM/Calbee/etc can be found occasionally in other places too. Wrappers is certainly well-stocked for set building, especially compared to Mint, but Mint does carry the latest packs and singles at a pretty good price. For those looking for packs/boxes, idol cards, or newer releases, it's convenient and the only Mint store with singles at 30 yen each. It is a hole in the wall, but an important one at that, compared with the other places you can get "cards" in Akiba.
ReplyDeleteI'm headed to Wrappers now - it's Sunday but I think I misread the business card when I wrote the post and they could be open 7 days a week.
Hello Ryan, bet you weren't expecting any more comments on this post from six years ago, but I was wondering if you can recall if Wrappers sold MLB singles back at their old location (& hopefully at their new one, too), as their Twitter bio and categories of posts on their blog/website suggests they don't.
ReplyDeleteBen - I remember them having a tiny handful of MLB cards, but definitely not worth writing home about. I picked up a couple MiLB cards there of players that had come to Japan. I haven't seen that box since they moved to their new location, and I haven't noted any MLB cards in their showcases. I wouldn't be surprised if they had some Ohtani/Ichiro/Matsui cards, but don't count on it. (Mint Kanda, nearby, has some MLB cards in their showcases, and a growing collection of overpriced singles.)
DeleteThanks a lot, have had some success at Card Fanatic, Coletre and Mint Ikebukuro, and thinking of planning a trip in (from Western Kanagawa) to hit a couple of other shops (like G-Freak), but might pass on Wrappers based on this. Cheers.
ReplyDeleteMy reply may not be fast enough, but since you're looking for MLB cards, G-Freak is a better choice than Wrappers anyway.
DeleteThanks again, and I did see it in time... went all the way to Okachimachi on Monday only to find... the owner was taking three days off around Tuesday's national holiday! Will definitely head there again on my next trip in.
ReplyDeleteAh, that's too bad. I should head over there sometime soon myself. It sounds like you had a pretty successful trip, though?
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