When it comes to Sailor Moon and free swag, the 1990’s was truly a glorious time for fans who love promo merch. Almost every collaboration that Sailor Moon had ensured that there would be free gifts. One of the most popular promo gifts in the 90’s were trading cards and sometimes coasters. Since my favorite idol group, Three Lights, is getting a resurgence of popularity from Sailor Moon Cosmos, I thought it would be fun to have an update on Sailor Moon Sailor Stars promo trading cards.
Updated to the Gallery are the following 1990’s trading cards swag:
Sailor Moon x Nichiryo: Nichiryo is a food company in Japan, best known for their packaged bread and pastries. In 1996, they gifted fans with two Sailor Moon Sailor Stars prism cards; both with exclusive illustrations. I scanned in the pastry wrapper and cards. I do not have the seals however, that were bonuses. You can view the seals at Minnicards. The Nichiryo promo cards these days are extremely rare and can cost quite a bit to obtain.
Sailor Stars Aiko Animation VCD Bromides: Aiko Animation, the distributor of Sailor Moon Cantonese dub in Hong Kong, included promo bromides in the release of the Sailor Stars VCDs. These are thick glossy cards that were not for sale. To obtain one, you must buy a Sailor Stars VCD and it would be included inside. Not all Sailor Stars VCD included bromides. Out of 17 VCD volumes, only 10 would have bromides. These days, the bromides are impossible to find.
Sailor Moon x Marumiya Curry: Marumiya company had multiple collaborations with Sailor Moon; Each time, fans were guaranteed trading cards or coasters. In 1996 and 1997, Marumiya released their Sailor Moon Sailor Stars curry boxes with promo coasters. The coasters are adorable and can be found pretty easily.
I feel like I have been waiting forever to write this post but its super worth it! I finally have the full set of the Sailor Moon Amada Pull Pack PP Cards scanned and uploaded into the gallery. This is huge for me because the Amada PP set has so many cards (consisting of 766 cards + 12 Special Cards), it took me years to scan all of it in. Amada is one of the largest printing companies in Japan and they definitely went all out printing Sailor Moon cards when the show was broadcasting in the 1990′s. I want to use this post as an opportunity to highlight some of my favorite cards from this massive card set.
Sailor Moon Amada PP Set 1 Prisms #1-6
Set 1 actually has 2 different sets of prisms. First set is cards #1 through #6, and the other is cards #43 through #48. Its the first prisms #1 through #6 that are pretty rare and costly. In fact, there is only one Queen Beryl card in the entire massive Amada PP collection, and here she is in card #5.
In Set 6, Amada surprised the fans with 8 gold foil cards. I love these cards because aside from the etching of the Sailor Senshi in front of the gold foil cards, in the back are these beautiful color prints of the girls. They are unfortunately easily damaged and fairly hard to find, so if you have these, protect them with plastic sleeves!
Amada surprised the fans again in Set 8, where they released it with 8 silver foil cards. Same as before, the front of the silver cards have special etches of the Sailor Senshi. The back has beautiful color prints. Again, they are easily damaged. I admit that my own set is starting to show some cracks in the back of the cards. So protect them dearly!
The Sailor Moon Amada Zenin Gold Cards are extremely extremely rare. Their numbers are sandwiched in between the PP13 and PP14 card sets. They were special prized cards that can be redeemed by mail from Amada, and came enclosed in a small special cardboard file. These days, the Sailor Moon Zenin Gold Card sets are worth every bit as much as the rare 22k Sailor Moon 5th Anniversary Gold card, and can command anywhere from $2500 up to $4500 or more. Wow!
Sailor Moon Amada PP Set 14A Silver Cards #686-693
Amada released another set of gorgeous silver cards in PP14A. However, different from previous silver cards, these were printed using a different method. It has color images overset on top of the silver foil. These cards look really beautiful and are also pretty rare now (I know you guys don’t want to hear that from me LOL).
The Sailor Moon Amada PP Set 14B prism cards are absolutely gorgeous. These days, because each card can command up to $35 in cost, obtaining a full set can be costly. But many card hunters still do it because look at it! When you put the entire set together, it is seriously eye-candy. The illustrations are beautiful.
Last but not least, Amada released a set of Special Cards. This set is full prism and revisits some of the best designs for the cards, mostly during the period of Season 3. The Special Cards are hard to find these days. I haven’t seen the prices for these go through the roof yet, but I almost think its because people don’t really know about these cards. So grab ‘em if you can! There are only 12 cards to this set, so it is very possible to complete.
I hope you guys enjoyed my stroll through memory-lane with the Sailor Moon Amada Pull-Pack PP Card set. I really enjoyed collecting it, and it did take a few years for me to complete both collecting and scanning. Because it is such a massive set, it may be a hard goal to complete if you are to start now. But if you embark on your own happy journey to do so, please use the gallery as a reference guide for you.
Amada did go on to produce other cards that came with toys, stationary items, Hero cards, and also Memorial Cards. But I will save those topics for another post, on another day. Enjoy everyone!
