Pokémon's first Valentine's Box is a $15 gift for kids, unless the Pikachu gets a love stamp

Pokémon is putting out its first Valentine's Day card product on Jan. 15, a $15 Valentine's Box with 20 three-card mini packs, five sticker sheets and packaging that folds into a mailbox for valentines.¹ PokéBeach reported the box on Oct. 29 and expects love-themed reprints with a special stamp, the same idea as the Halloween Trick or Trade packs.¹ The card list likely won't be known until January.¹

That's 60 cards for $15, or 25 cents a card. Trick or Trade's pumpkin-stamped holos show where reprints like these land, with the Gengar and the Mewtwo from the 2022 packs each selling for about $2 raw on eBay.²

In February 2021, adults bought McDonald's 25th anniversary Happy Meal card packs in bulk while some locations limited how many Happy Meals one person could buy.³⁴ Five years later, the holo Pikachu from those packs sells for about $14 raw.⁵

Last year's Holiday Calendar Pikachu #25 sells for about $4 raw and about $440 in PSA 10.⁶ PSA has given a 10 to just 152 of the 1,216 copies it has graded.⁷ The McDonald's Pikachu comes back a 10 more than a third of the time (3,120 of 8,545), while its PSA 10 sells for about $310.⁷⁵

The January card list is the thing to watch. If Pikachu gets a love stamp, its PSA 10 is the only copy worth chasing.

I'd buy the box for the kids and let them rip it at the kitchen table on Valentine's Day. At $15 it's a cheap card-and-sticker gift, not a box to keep sealed. If a love-stamped Pikachu turns up and pulls clean, send that one to PSA and leave the rest in the mailbox.