#’The Queen’s Gambit’ causes chess set sales to surge

Sales of chess sets reportedly have exploded thanks to the hit Netflix show “The Queen’s Gambit,” a series that depicts the rise of a young female prodigy in the 1950s.

Toronto-based toy merchant Spin Master, whose classic games division owns about 70 percent of the US market, has seen its chess sales increase by “triple digits” since the miniseries’ Oct. 23 premiere, while smaller rival Goliath Games has recorded a 1,048 percent surge, NPR reported.

EBay reported a 215-percent spike in sales of chess sets and accessories following the debut of the show, whose fictional chess prodigy Beth Harmon squares off against male chauvinism in the Postwar US in addition to a string of nerdy rivals.

Wooden sets have been most popular on the online auction site, selling nine times better than plastic, glass and electronic varieties, according to The New York Times.

“Six months ago, a year ago, these retailers weren’t saying, let’s load up on chess sets,” toy analyst Gerrick Johnnson told NPR. “Good luck finding a chess set this holiday!”

The coronavirus pandemic had reportedly driven up interest in chess this year as locked-down consumers took up the game even before “The Queen’s Gambit” arrived.

EBay was already selling 60 percent more chess sets than last year, and the number of chess games played online every day had grown to about 16 million from roughly 11 million at the start of 2020, the Times reported.

But the show is also benefitting groups such as the US Chess Federation, which told the Times that it its membership jumped this month for the first time since the pandemic hit.

“The chess community fell in love with the series because it successfully portrays different aspects of chess in all its richness: It’s easy enough to be fun to play, but also complex enough to pose a challenge,” David Llada, a spokesman for the International Chess Federation, told the paper.