The horde of people that descended upon the Van Gogh Museum yesterday to snatch up as much merchandise as they could was the first sign that the Pokémon x Van Gogh collaboration might be a bit more chaotic than expected. While there was hope that all the fracas might die down and give everyone a chance to get in on the fun, unfortunately, it doesn’t look like that’s going to be the case.
Initially, it seemed like The Pokémon Company’s plan was for people to be able to easily find multiple pieces of merchandise from the special Pokémon x Van Gogh Museum collection online at the Pokémon Center, even if you couldn’t make it to the actual exhibit in Amsterdam. This afternoon, though, The Pokémon Company announced that its online store is already completely sold out — seemingly for good — despite the collaboration having only just begun a day before.
“We understand this is disappointing to many who were looking to our official email and social media channels for guidance on how and when to purchase,” the company said. “We are actively working on ways to provide more ‘Pikachu with Grey Felt Hat’ promo cards for fans shopping at Pokémon Center in the future.”
We apologize to all the fans eagerly awaiting our Pokémon Center x Van Gogh Museum release today.
— Pokémon (@Pokemon) September 29, 2023
Due to overwhelming demand, all our products from this collection have sold out. We understand this is disappointing to many who were looking to our official email and social media… pic.twitter.com/KM3ZCO1EQZ
Though we reached out asking whether there might potentially be a restock down the line, The Pokémon Company did not get back by the time of publishing.
It never exactly made clear when the Pokémon x Van Gogh swag — an assortment of painting prints, tote bags, card sleeves, and a holographic promo card — would become available this week. On Friday morning, pieces from the collection began popping up with no warning, leading to rushes on the website that led to numerous hiccups that made it hard to add things to a cart and almost impossible to get through checkout.
As unfortunate as all of this is, none of it comes as a surprise given how much more prevalent the scalping of Pokémon products has become recently. In the past, The Pokémon Company has apologized, said that it intended to take steps to combat the scalping problem, and then followed through by doing things like reprinting card sets.
A reprint of the “Pikachu with Grey Felt Hat” promo card appears to be on the way from the sounds of The Pokémon Company’s statement, which is something, and the museum’s exhibit is obviously still available to the public. But for those who were hoping to get their hands on a piece from the rest of the collection, it’s looking like the hunt just got a lot more expensive.
