ScanBattle

Archive

Earlier articles

Articles that have left the front page. They stay here, unchanged, with the date they were written for in mind.

On site · 19 September 2026

CARDEXPO Austria 2026, and we were in it

The Seifenfabrik in Graz was packed. Pokémon, One Piece, Magic and Yu-Gi-Oh! dominated the tables, with a noticeable share of graded cards in slabs behind glass. Selling and trading happened at practically every stand — anyone who turned up with a binder rarely went home with it untouched.

The hall, late morning.
The far end, towards the entrance.
What came home with us.

The next date is already down in the list. If you go: arrive early, bring your cards sleeved, and cash beats any app at the negotiating table.

Now at the expos

On CARDEXPO Austria 2026 · Graz

On 19 September the Seifenfabrik in Graz opens from ten in the morning for a format many people have never seen. If you only know trading cards from online marketplaces, it is easy to underestimate what works differently at a show.

The organiser brings seven categories under one roof: Soccer, Basketball, NFL, Pokémon, One Piece, Disney and Yu-Gi-Oh!. That mixture is the actual point. Sports cards and trading card games have separate scenes, separate price formation and vocabulary; they rarely meet. Here they stand side by side, and someone who has bought nothing but football for thirty years watches a first-edition Japanese card being assessed.

Read onCollapse

A show is not a tournament. There is no play, or only at the margins; the day is made of tables, display cases, conversations and money changing hands. Anyone arriving expecting a tournament goes home disappointed — and anyone expecting a show is sitting in the wrong chair at a tournament.

Three parts of the programme have no online equivalent. The trading zone is where cards change hands rather than get bought — no shipping risk, no description to interpret. Live breaks open sealed product in front of an audience: entertainment, and the most honest probability lesson this hobby offers. And the expert sessions on grading are why many people come at all.

Practically: if you want to trade or sell, bring your cards sleeved and know what you are looking for — on a busy Saturday a vague intention gets you nowhere. If you only want to browse, come early; the good single pieces are rarely still there in the afternoon. And cash makes negotiating easier than a phone does.

Tickets go through the organiser; the link is up with the listing. Prices change during presale, which is why they are not repeated here.