Van Gogh Museum withdraws Pikachu promotional card after gift shop debacle
The Van Gogh Museum has removed the “Pikachu in a Gray Fedora” promo card from the museum after being surprised by the hustle and bustle in the museum’s gift shop.
Because when the Pokemon x Van Gogh exhibition opened in late September, Pokemon fans and scalpers (mostly scalpers) flooded the Van Gogh Museum gift shop, pushing, shoving, and ripping items out of people’s hands in an attempt to get their hands on the various goods available come.
You can just see it how ridiculous it was here.
Apparently many missed out on the items they wanted, and of course scalpers loaded up their haul online for an exorbitant amount that very same day.
“The Van Gogh Museum and The Pokemon Company International take the safety of visitors and employees very seriously,” the statement said. “Recently, a small group of individuals created an undesirable situation that led us to make the difficult decision to remove the Pikachu in Gray Fedora promo card from the museum. This allows visitors to experience this special Pokémon collection, paintings and view the rest of the museum in a safe and fun way.
If the Van Gogh Museum had studied how Pokémon fans and scalpers behave personally, the museum probably would have implemented a lottery system, like Pokémon centers in Japan do when releasing special merchandise, to avoid exactly this.
For those who missed it, the official Pokemon Center store should have the same goods for sale online. But on the day the items came out, everything sold out within minutes, the website crashed, and some customers were banned from the site because they thought they were a bot. Others were lucky enough to add items to their cart place, enter their credit card information, click “Buy” and then “Boom” – sorry about your luck, we’re sold out. Others had their orders canceled and when they contacted customer service they were told the order was canceled because they had “violated the terms and conditions.”
Most people blamed the site’s problems in dealing with the influx of visitors, while others blamed scalers for deploying bots that were able to bypass the site’s security feature. Others generally blamed the company.
The Pokemon Company has released an apology, but for many fans it rang hollow. However, the store offered more of the Pikachu Pokémon trading card in the gray felt hat, but this also sold out pretty quickly.
For those who missed it, it is unfortunate that The Pokemon Company will no longer be producing additional items after the sellout. It is notorious for only producing a certain amount of goods and rarely, sometimes if ever, produces more of an item after it sells out. Personally, I have no idea why this is, but it’s strange considering companies like to make money, and as popular as Pokemon is, the company is missing out on bringing more money into its coffers. But what do I know? Nothing.
