10 ways people are cashing in on the Pokémon Craze!

Selling your accounts (£5-£1100+)

As we all know people are prepared to pay stupid amounts of money to level up in games, but this Pokémon Craze has lead to eBay becoming full of Pokémon accounts up for grabs and amazingly they’re selling for large amounts of money.

One UK seller sold his ‘Pokemon Go Account Level 21 with 1 730 CP Max Pokemom Plus’ for £1100, the listing stated:

“What you’re purchasing is my account, which I have put my time and effort into, which makes this a whole lot easier for you! … I’m just a broke college student in debt, and every penny helps.”

An important thing to remember is both buyers and sellers risk having their accounts disabled as Niantic’s terms of service for Pokémon Go state:

Use the Services or Content, or any portion thereof, for any commercial purpose or for the benefit of any third party or in a manner not permitted by these Terms, including but not limited to (a) gathering in App items or resources for sale outside the App, (b) performing services in the App in exchange for payment outside the App, or (c ) sell, resell, rent, or lease the App or your Account.”

Also, most likely these will go against eBay T&Cs, especially if you don’t physically ship anything.

By setting up stores selling stickers / merch

Similar to quite a few of these on the list, set yourself up in a popular location selling things you’ve purchased from sites like AliExpress or other things people want.

[Source]

Selling old Pokémon cards

Pull out your old collection and you might just find the price of the cards are worth a ton more than just a few weeks ago. Check eBay ‘Sold Listings’ to get a rough idea on prices.

Becoming a Pokémon Trainer (£15p/h)

Professional Pokémon trainers are springing up across the US (& probably UK), charging $20-30 an hour this could be an easy part-time income playing a game you love anyway!

Arthur, a 26-year-old lifelong Pokémon fan’s ad read:

I can focus on catching a specific species of Pokémon to evolve for you. I can focus on training up your Pokémon to get your local gyms on lockdown. I can focus on catching Pokémon of a specific type. And of course, I will gladly walk out of my way to find new Pokémon to add to your Pokédex.

Ivy St Ive, a journalist and Pokémon fan’s ad read:

I will walk around in 1-4 hour shifts signed in to your account capturing every single Pokemon I come into contact with, activating every Poke Stop I pass and walking nonstop to help hatch your eggs. I’ll even send you hourly updates while you’re at work/class/on a hot date informing you of any really exciting things I’ve come across for you.

[Source]

Setting up water stores

You probably would be breaking some sort of UK law but popular city spots would have a massive footfall and you could easily double your money

[Source]

Selling your Pokémon ‘Tamagotchi’ AKA Pocket Pikachu AKA Pokémon Pikachu

Selling for £17-£100 these devices encouraged you to go outside as it also counted your steps. 

Setting up full blown Pokémon stores

This awesome girl setup the best-themed store ever, swap Lays for Quavers and you’re good to go.

[Source]

Selling Pokémon figures

You might be able to buy these on the cheap and sell them for a profit in one of the above stores or just whilst you’re walking (attach to bag and put a sign on)

Other Pokémon games on other consoles

eBay is again full of other games that are selling for higher than normal amounts, if you have a game in a box somewhere now might be the best time to pull it out and sell it.

Pokémon companies cashing in

Niantic (owners of Pokémon) are supposedly making $1.6M per day (in the US alone) from in-app purchases of power-ups and virtual items but this will soon be increased as sponsored locations will soon be appearing inside the app, so time to learn how to code your own app.

Even other companies are heavily promoting their services with Pokemon add-ons or themes, for instance, one Pizza restaurant in the US purchased a Lure (in game) and reportedly saw a 75% increase in footfall to their restaurant, maybe go around to local companies and set them up for a fee.

Other stores and restaurants are offering discounts depending on your in-game level, which of course increases people visiting you + word spreading of your brand.

Pokémon taxi-driver / walkers

Bahri Takyuz from London charges up to £25 an hour to take up to four people all over London to catch Pokemon in his Vauxhall Astra.

“There are a lot of Pokéstops around central London. It’s absolutely rammed,” he says. “People will want to go into central, to the parky kind of areas, where you can find stuff you can’t find in your local area.”

A Pokémon driver

If driving around people isn’t your thing walkers are now a thing as well, one walker in London, Narcis Radoi, will walk up to 6 miles charging between £1 and £5. (One way to gain Pokémon is to try to hatch them from eggs. They can only be hatched by walking a certain distance in real life, with the game turned on.) [source]