How buying graphics cards became a quest for Edmonton gamers and crypto miners

At the crack of dawn on a cold winter morning, a long line of people had already wrapped around the Best Buy in south Edmonton. They came with chairs, food supplies, propane tanks, and some with tents and sleeping bags. 

The electronics retailer opens at 11 a.m., but many in the lineup had been there since the night before. 

It wasn't Black Friday or Boxing Day. It was a regular November day, except for a specific group of people for whom it was a drop day for graphics cards. 

Graphics cards are separate components added to devices that generate images to a display device like your computer screen. They are most popularly used by video gamers and most recently by crypto miners. 

"It was a little ridiculous for anybody who has a full time job or kids or responsibility," said Kevin Alexander, a crypto miner in Edmonton, who stood in two lineups in 2021. 

Even after standing in line for a few hours, he did not end up getting the card he wanted.

"Unless you came 12 hours prior and camped out the night before, you weren't one of those people with the golden ticket," he said. "You were just getting the scraps that were left over."

Throughout the pandemic, the demand for graphics cards soared, followed quickly by their prices.

The reasons? More people staying at home and playing video games, supply chain issues which caused a shortage in semiconductors — microchips needed in graphics cards, global shipping congestion and the rise of crypto miners.

Some crypto miners will use around a hundred graphics cards for their operation.

Allan Kambeitz, vice-president of computing and digital Imaging at Best Buy, said in his 22 years at the company, he had never seen supply demand issues like this. 

"Every stick of inventory we could get from all of our partners was being bought up as quickly as we could get," Kambeitz said.

Currently there are two primary suppliers of high-end graphics cards in the world: Nvidia and AMD. Companies like Best Buy would get shipments of these cards and immediately sell out.

Kambeitz said the demand for graphics cards was so high, scalpers had created bots to overwhelm the store's system to buy the cards up as soon as they came online.

"This was pretty troubling for us because we didn't want our inventory being sold into the hands of bots or people that were going to just resell them on other markets," he said.

It was then that Best Buy started having special monthly releases at their stores so only people who were actually using them for personal use could get their hands on them.

The shortage also caused a spike in prices. Normally, a midrange series of graphics card would cost $500 to $600, but after the pandemic, prices shot up to $1,000.

Higher end cards that originally cost $800 were selling double that price, according to Paul Tucker, service manager at west Edmonton Memory Express, a computer parts store.

Inventory 'still hand-to-mouth'

However, as of early March things seem to be improving. Tucker said they started getting steady shipments of cards three weeks ago. 

"We don't know exactly why, but all of a sudden they're just pulling them out of wherever," he said. 

The rise in inventory has also seen a drop in prices, although they are still not at pre-pandemic levels. 

But Kambeitz said that while supply is somewhat catching up to demand, it still has ways to go.

"Inventory is still hand-to-mouth," he said.