WINNIPEG – One Winnipeg vendor is in shock after tens of thousands of dollars worth of his Pokémon cards were stolen. Kenan Hyseni, who owns and operates Mulvey Market, said high-end, valuable products were stolen from his shop after a trading event he held last weekend. He believes someone snuck in, hid inside the market, waited for staff to leave, then stole the merchandise before fleeing. “I got a message from my building saying that someone was leaving the premises and tripped the alarm just 10 minutes before midnight,” he said. “We saw from the video that he had a massive blue backpack and as soon as I saw it, I knew that it had to have been Pokémon.” He said sealed Pokémon products and specialty collection boxes were among the items stolen, totalling around $70,000 in losses. “There’s some boxes that were worth $4 or $5,000 and then there were some cards that were $3 to $4,000, as well,” he said. “I’m still going through all of my inventory when it comes to the cards, because the cards are the more important, the more expensive part of the whole collection.” Unless the product is found, Hyseni says he won’t be able to recoup the costs that were lost in this theft. He plans to bring in more security measures, including more surveillance and security staff, but in this circumstance the thief was already inside the building. “There’s no way anyone can get into the market from the outside because there’s alarms and everything all over the building,” he said. Terri Settle, owner of Terri’s Trinkets and Toys in Winnipeg, said her shop was ransacked by thieves who stole roughly 7,000 Pokémon cards, about 3,000 Yu-Gi-Oh cards, 7,000 sports cards, as well as action figures and Lego sets. “I think I lost about $6,000 in merchandise, which for a big-box store wouldn’t be anything, but for a little store like mine, that’s substantial,” she told CTV News on Sept. 10. “I absolutely think that I was targeted for the Pokémon cards.” Pokémon heists occurring across Canada The recent thefts in Winnipeg are just the latest in a string of Pokémon heists across Canada. Surveillance footage caught a thief stealing thousands of dollars worth of Pokémon cards at a hobby shop in Nanaimo, B.C., last week. A Vancouver trading card shop was targeted in early August, where the owners said between $60,000 and $80,000 worth of Pokémon cards were stolen, including at least one card valued at nearly $19,000. Other thefts have been reported in Ontario and Quebec. ‘Gold for thieves’ Pokémon cards have skyrocketed in value, making them a desirable target for thieves. “It’s literally become gold for thieves in the last little while,” said Bruce Winder, who is a retail analyst in Toronto. “The collector market for Pokémon has absolutely surged from a price perspective, so would-be thieves are seeing an opportunity to steal from stores, even from people who are selling online.” He says collectibles, like Pokémon products, are hot around the world right now, but trends like this change overtime. “It’s really an equation, when you think about it. (Thieves) think, ‘what’s the value of the merchandise I can steal? How hard is it to steal it? What’s the consequences to steal? And can I move it quickly and easily to get cash?’” he said. “Anything that falls within that equation, where it has a massively high value, coupled with the ease today of converting some of the stolen product into cash, makes it an attractive pastime, or I guess, career, unfortunately, for a number of people.” The Retail Council of Canada (RCC) says retailers are enhancing protection by locking display cases, limiting sales-floor inventory and implementing new security technologies, including body-worn cameras. “(The) RCC is also calling on the Manitoba government to strengthen transparency and accountability for illicit sales on online marketplaces, with nearly half of illicit sales now through online platforms,” said John Graham, Prairie region director of government relations for the RCC. “The United States and European Union require greater transparency from high-volume online sellers and help marketplaces and authorities identify and address the resale of stolen goods.” Bouncing back Hyseni says he will bounce back from this theft but says it’s frustrating to see a product, which is already so difficult to come by, disappear so quickly. “Unfortunately, Pokémon has become a product that a lot of thieves, a lot of criminals are going to try and get their hands on and the best way to prevent this is to protect each other within the community,” he said. “If you see something, if you hear something, speak up. Contact your local authorities. Contact the stores that were hit, that were affected, and that’s the best way to kind of help one another with this kind of climate right now.” With files from CTV News Winnipeg’s Danton Unger
