Treasure Hunting at UKGE 2025
- Amy
- Apr 30
- 2 min read
It’s that time of year again the UK Games Expo is just around the corner, and I'm buzzing with excitement.
This year is extra special for us because it’s Zara’s first ever UKGE, while I’ve been a few times before. I know my way around the NEC halls, the queues, and how dangerous that vendor hall can be to your bank account.
What is the Bring & Buy?
If you’ve never been, the Bring & Buy is essentially a second hand boardgame marketplace run by volunteers. People bring their games, set prices, and over the course of the weekend, thousands of boxes change hands.
How does it work?
Selling
Register your games on the UKGE website before 10am on the Friday of the show. Remember there is a cap of 60 items (x20 each spread over 3 days).
Label up! Bring you games to the Bring and Buy. Volunteers will print out labels for you to put on the games (see opening times below).
Book them in by going to the booking in desk and they will scan your games and take them into stock.
Collecting your dosh. You return to collect any money owed to you and any games that did not sell.
Opening times for UKGE Bring and Buy
Booking in items only: Thu 6:00 pm - 9:30 pm
Booking in items and sales: Fri 9:00 am - 6:00 pm
Booking in items and sales: Sat 9:00 am - 6:00 pm
Booking in items and sales: Sun 9:00 am - 3:00 pm
Best buying strategy
Go early. The queue can be long, especially on Friday morning, but early birds do catch those out of print worms.
Price check as we go. We’ll have BoardGamePrices and BGG open on our phones. Just in case the nostalgia kicks in and makes us overpay for Mouse Trap.
Bring a decent tote bag. Even better why not Shop & Drop? For only £3 you get half-metre square storage box to hold all your items collected throughout the day.
Be Cash ready. The Bring and Buy is exclusively cash only.
With that being said if you see two slightly frantic twin sisters clutching a suspicious number of games and muttering about shelf space, that’ll be us.
Bring on UKGE!
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