Calgary Family Finds Sealed 1999 Pokémon Booster Box Reportedly Worth About $48,000 at Thanksgiving

On Thanksgiving, Kirk Ledene went down to his parents' basement in Calgary because his mother had asked him to sort through some of the old boxes he'd left there. He came up with a wooden box he had built in shop class. Inside were a few hockey trophies and some items he'd bought at an auction house where he worked in the early 2000s. Buried among them was an unopened box of Pokémon cards.

He carried the haul upstairs to show his kids. The trophies got a look, he said, but it was the card box in his hand that made their jaws drop. A quick search online suggested it was a 1999 Wizards of the Coast Night booster box, the kind that could be worth tens of thousands of dollars. From that moment, Kirk said, it became something like a piece of fine china: don't touch it, don't breathe on it.

His wife, Colleen, was not immediately convinced. She recalled that the only topic at Thanksgiving dinner was this stupid box, and that at first she thought the whole thing was silly. Over time she came to see it as a life-changing find.

The world of collectible cards was entirely unfamiliar to the family. They began by contacting auction houses. Their son also posted a TikTok about the discovery, which brought messages from interested buyers on social media. After a lot of searching and messaging across platforms, the couple found Edward Heikali, who runs E&A Collectibles in Los Angeles. Heikali started the business in 2020 and focuses on sealed vintage items, exactly like what the Ledenes had.

Heikali put the box's value at around US$40,000, and said it has been climbing steadily. CBC's headline figure of roughly $48,000 is the Canadian-dollar equivalent. He explained that prices for such boxes follow basic supply and demand, along with the chance that the cards inside are themselves valuable. He said stories like this are common, and that much of his business involves helping people who stumble on such items and then track him down.

Choosing a buyer and deciding whether to ship the box or travel with it was a lot to weigh. Kirk pointed to logistics, customs and tariffs as things the family didn't know much about. In the end they trusted Heikali. He sent along the forms needed for customs, which told them he had done this before, and the fact that he runs a business rather than being a lone buyer added to their comfort. They shipped the box to him by UPS.

Now the Ledenes are waiting on a wire transfer. Heikali says he will look to resell the box, probably to a collector who plans to open it, or to a business that would open it on behalf of its customers.

For the couple, the timing felt right. Colleen described it as a bit of an answered prayer, given everything going on in their lives at the moment. They haven't settled on what to do with the money, but a down payment on a new house, a family trip, and a dinner out with Kirk's parents, to thank them for never throwing the box away, are all possibilities. The next thing to watch is whether the transfer arrives and who ends up opening the box.