It’s a gamble and a roll of a die, or tossing of a dart, to see which event is worth checking out!
It seems more nerdy swap meets are taking place in my hometown, and I doubt a weekly schedule of events is going to work. When everyone wants a piece of the pie, and there isn’t enough to go around, the bakery is going to run out. That’s how I describe what’s happening to Victoria’s collectable scene this year.
Once upon a time in this part of the world, there was only a biannual toy fair, a quarterly comic book swap meet and Cherry Bomb’s Nerdy Days of Christmas. In what was once a homegrown scene, things have changed into something else. There are three newcomers thinking there’s gold to find in them thar hills, and they will be individually revealed further down this editorial.
When this city only has so many nerds who want to give “used” stuff a new home, even the post-secondary crowd living in dorm rooms and temporary spaces has only so much room for more stuff. The problem isn’t necessarily that Victoria has too many collectors. It’s that there are only so many customers, vendors, weekends, and discretionary dollars to go around. A collector who spends $200 at one show isn’t likely to have more money to spend at next weekend’s event.
To begin, we have to consider how Coastal Collector’s Market (CCM) began. As far as I can tell, they were driveway pop-ups that got popular enough to need an actual venue. Its June 7 debut at the SȾÁUTW̱ (Tsawout First Nation) gymnasium pulled in roughly 800 people, about double what organizers Brayden Pedro and Darian Claxton were expecting. That’s a good problem to have until someone said there was a code violation.
Fire officials, bylaw officials, and the venue’s own leadership agreed and kicked them out the door. Fortunately, they were able to hold their second show at the Mary Winspear Centre in Sidney, where all 100 vendor tables for the July 19 date sold out in under 48 hours. Pedro’s own words to Peninsula News Review were optimistic. He said, “The silver lining is obviously we’re doing something right.”
For the summer, they kept using the pop-up formula. When the goods are tiny and easily moved, that’s not a problem. When we’re talking about huge stocks of 3D-printed goods or big toys, that is a huge issue. For the past month and a half, they have been joining forces with other operations, namely the South Vancouver Island Cards & Collectibles Show (SVICS), to make the Ukrainian Cultural Centre near downtown their home. That’s good for locals who don’t want to travel far.
CCM’s move back to Sidney on November 1 shows an inconsistency. They used to say their events were taking place at the end of the month. I am now seeing whatever they can book. Mind you, this date is for CCM only and won’t be in partnership with anyone. That also illustrates the problem with trying to maintain a frequent market that caters specifically to the collector community, rather than operating like a weekly farmer’s market.
Here’s the part I can’t get past, though: Coastal’s debut also happened to fall on the same Sunday as Island FanCon. I noted at the time that Epic Games Victoria and BC Hobbies skipped the con entirely to set up at Coastal instead, and Gauntlet Games, which joined the Coastal lineup in late July, makes three. When established shops pick a brand-new swap meet over an actual event, that isn’t a coincidence worth shrugging off. I’d put my money on a show with three years of presence over something new. When I see shops supporting an event barely out of diapers, that’s when I have to raise an eyebrow. Is it trust? Hard to say. Is it about moving old stock? Most definitely!
Then there’s the incumbent nobody seems to be scheduling around. Cherry Bomb Toys has run the Ultimate Toy Fair at Pearkes Arena since 2008, twice a year, and this fall’s edition on September 19 and 20 is the 34th one. We’re talking roughly 4,000 people, over 200 vendors, and a five-dollar entry fee that’s funded tens of thousands for local charities over the years. They have set a bar the others have yet to meet.
Which brings me to player three: Mythic & Mint Collectibles Market, already on its third go-round, set for September 27 at the Fernwood Community Centre. Admission is free and Collectr, an actual TCG portfolio-tracking app with a couple million users, has put its name behind the flyer. Add it up and Victoria gets three separate collectibles shows within a month of each other!
I don’t think it takes a genius to guess who’s positioning against whom. When CCM and SVICS return on October 10, burnout is inevitable. Also, I haven’t seen the Victoria Comic Book Show return since the pandemic.
Maybe this city has the appetite for these events, and with the holidays near, it’s better to buy now than regret later that the Pokémon enthusiast can’t get their 30th-anniversary Greninja set. I know I’d like to have it, but I’m not waiting in line or paying aftermarket prices for it. The real warning sign won’t necessarily be an empty hall. It could be vendors quietly deciding that one show is enough.
If the organizers talked to one another, they could at least spread things out, differentiate their events, and give vendors and collectors a reason to attend more than one. One could lean harder into toys, another into TCGs, and another into comics and pop culture, while a larger general market remains an occasional destination event. Being selective helps. Otherwise, the people attending these shows will search for a better event. For buyers willing to make the trip, the massive Vancouver Comic & Toy Show takes place Sept 26–27, 2026, at the PNE. It offers plenty of shopping options, along with comic-book artists who often attend with booths of their own.
As a buyer, I am burnt out. I got everything I want, and when I’m in that tier of collecting “new” stuff, a flea market is the last place I want to be. I’ve had my time speculating and collecting comics, and the Death of Superman fiasco is what killed the market. After chasing an elusive and difficult-to-finish Terminator 2 trading card set many decades ago, I was already jaded. Rumour had it that the #1 card didn’t exist in every box bought.
At least trying to get a full run of Magic: The Gathering’s Amonkhet and Hour of Devastation wasn’t as hard, but after that, I became selective. And quite honestly, a healthy market doesn’t necessarily need more swap meets. And once a person owns a 3D printer, buying the model file to print what you saw at a show is satisfying! You can print as many as you need rather than one. I own both a resin and FDM printer.
Victoria’s collectable scene really needs events people want to attend. But when all I’m seeing is the same ol’ same ol’, even I’ll slow down and not show up to a swap meet. Right now, the people organizing these shows are oversaturating the market. To have three tables in a row selling the same product, with very little change in pricing based on the product’s condition, can be seen as problematical. That’s what makes the Nerdy Days of Christmas special. This event is an in-person version of browsing Etsy, and without it showcasing what local artists can do for a nerd, my collection wouldn’t be what it is today!
Instead, all I’m seeing these days is how everyone wants to sell the same piece of the pie. I’m just wondering how long before somebody discovers that the bakery has a finite amount of flour.
When Cherry Bomb Toys Makes Up The Heart of Victoria’s Collectable Scene …
