Moxie Card Shop

Import-heavy Des Moines shop stocking Japanese Pokemon boosters, One Piece and Dragon Ball singles you won't find at the big-box down the road.

Walk into the Euclid Avenue suite that houses Moxie Card Shop and the first thing you notice is how much of the wall is not English. Japanese Pokemon boosters, Korean and Chinese print runs, One Piece boxes fresh off an overseas order — Moxie built its identity around being the international shelf of the Des Moines card shop scene, and the inventory reflects it.

The floor plan is compact and deliberately uncluttered. Glass cases hold the higher-end Pokemon singles and chase pulls; behind them the sealed product is organized by game rather than by release date, which makes it easy to compare a Japanese set against its English counterpart side by side. Magic: The Gathering, Yu-Gi-Oh!, Dragon Ball Super and Flesh and Blood all get real shelf space rather than a token box, and sleeves, binders and toploaders sit within arm's reach of the register.

Trade-ins are where the shop has earned its reputation. Collectors chasing master sets — the 151 set in particular comes up again and again in reviews — tend to leave describing the counter as fair to a fault, with staff more likely to talk a customer out of an overpay than into one. That kind of interaction is what turns a one-time visitor into a regular, and it's a big part of why Pokemon cards in Des Moines increasingly means a trip to this address.

Timing matters here. Moxie is closed Mondays and opens at noon the rest of the week, running until 8PM Tuesday through Saturday and closing early at 5PM on Sunday. Weeknight evenings after 5PM are the busiest stretch; a weekday afternoon visit gets you unhurried case time. The shop also runs an active online store and Discord, so restock announcements often hit those channels before product reaches the floor — worth following if you're hunting a specific overseas exclusive.

Parking is straightforward in the strip's shared lot on the north side of E Euclid, and the location sits within a few minutes of I-235 for anyone coming from downtown or the eastern suburbs.