Sell Me a Sasquatch

Sell Me a Sasquatch is the U.S. title and theme chosen in BOARD GAMES 3: What’s in a name? for the Planet Money and Exploding Kittens card game inspired by The Market for Lemons. In the source, the game turns Asymmetric Information into partial-information trading: players can hide parts of deals, bluff, distrust one another, and create party-game disorder from a serious economics paper.

The title matters because it makes the product more than a ruleset. “Sell Me a Sasquatch” gives the game a memorable sales phrase, a collectible creature market, and a cover-art direction that Jamie Wolanski reads as promising for Retail Shelf Appeal. The source also treats the name as a constraint because Sasquatch may not be equally recognizable in international markets.

Who decides what big box sells? Our GAME got us answers follows the game after naming into retail acceptance and production. The episode says Erika Beras pitches the game in a Retail Line Review, buyers question audience, player count, two-player fit, and price point, and two major U.S. big-box retailers later accept the game full chain throughout North America with a first order around 100,000 units. It also reports a $19.99 suggested retail price, packaging upgrades, manufacturing in China, and later availability at Target, Walmart, other board-game retailers, and the NPR Shop.

Key Claims

• The game’s economic core is adverse selection and hidden information, but the retail product needs humor, theme, and a quick promise.
• The Sasquatch direction beat generic object-swapping and car-pun alternatives because it felt more coherent and fun to inhabit.
• The title connects Product Naming As Positioning to Cryptid Theme Legibility: the product sounds like a playful market before the buyer understands the mechanics.
• The source presents the U.S. title as decided while leaving European naming or localization as an unresolved Cross-Market Naming Friction problem.
• The follow-on source turns the game from a named product direction into a mass-retail object shaped by Planogram Gatekeeping, Retail Price-Point Product Scoping, and Mass Retail Production Deadline.
• Listener playtesting and creature submissions become part of the final product story, not only pre-launch feedback.

Connections

• Planet Money and Exploding Kittens - show and game company behind the project.
• The Market For Lemons and Asymmetric Information - economics concept converted into gameplay.
• Product Naming As Positioning, Retail Shelf Appeal, Game Mechanic To Retail Product, Retail Line Review, Retail Price-Point Product Scoping, and Mass Retail Production Deadline - product-development and retail concepts illustrated by the game.
• Cryptid Theme Legibility and The X-Files - cultural memory behind the theme.
• Target, Walmart, Matt Adelman, and Tori Welch - retail and manufacturing context added by the follow-on source.