Strolling around the streets of Bengaluru is always an adventure, whether you’re new to the city or used to it. With new cafes, food carts, and offbeat experiences to discover and experience, you may think you’re already used to the unexpected, but when Vibhuv Reddy’s ‘Paxi’ rolls down the roads of Koramangala, most people do a double-take. After all, it isn’t every day that you see a sleek navy blue Volvo covered in stickers of Charizard, Pikachu, Rowlet, Snorlax, and Dragonite.
Parking what he likes to call a ‘Paxi’ in different areas of the city every other week, the 23-year-old, like a proud owner, throws open his trunk, displaying the spread of Pokémon cards he sells – a sight that would send any hardcore Pokémon fan into a tizzy.
“Every collector starts off wanting 1 or 2 cards, but slowly it turns into more than you expected. I was spending way too much on Pokémon cards and needed a way to sell them,” he laughs, adding that when he started, his collection was around 500. “Initially, the idea was just to have a shop. But since we (including volunteers) are trying to grow Pokémon card collecting in Bengaluru as well, we thought, why not set up our inventory in our car and drive around, just to see who’s interested. People are always curious when they see us driving by,” he adds. It turns out quite a lot of people are, with most of Reddy’s collection selling out in a week, and one reel about him on Instagram getting upwards of 30,000 likes.
Ranging from ₹50 to ₹45,000, Reddy’s Pokémon cards include those in three different languages – English, Japanese, and Korean, with a focus on vintage and rare cards. “I like to focus on cards that came out between 1996 and 1999, because that’s when Pokémon cards started being released. They are also rare in varying levels – those that were released on the first day and those that were released in the first year. I have most of the non-first edition cards that are rare and valued around ₹30,000, but not those that go up to ₹5 lakh,” he explains.
The costliest card in his collection is a ₹45,000 one called Gangar VMAX. “This is a modern one that came out during the Pokémon card boom amid the Covid pandemic when prices skyrocketed. The texture is intricate and beautiful, so that it feels like holding a piece of art,” he adds.
Reddy is a recent graduate of Philosophy and Math from a US university. What drew him to the card game was both its aesthetic appeal and simplicity of play.
“Most people are familiar with the characters, and the game has a very simple mechanism. But there is so much individuality and so many ways that you can communicate within the game – it’s easy to get into. I think I was also fascinated with a lot of the art for many of the characters,” he says, attributing this as the same reason young people have been drawn to his Paxi pop-ups.