Expansion Pack card back details
Due to a printing complication, there is a slight variance among card backs.
If you purchased your tarot deck before August 2021, the Expansion Pack in our shop here will match your deck and look like the card on the right (dark back).
If you purchased your tarot deck between August 2021 - May 2022, the Expansion Pack at this special link will match your deck and look like the card on the left (light back).
We have an Expansion Pack for everyone and the ONLY difference is the card backs. Some folks have told us they wouldn't have noticed this difference at all. The card fronts, guidebooks, boxes etc are exactly the same.
This is really all you need to know! But if you're curious about how this came to be, we'll share the whole story below.
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Our saga begins back in 2019 when we were printing the Spacious Tarot for the first time. We initially sent our printer the card back image on the left (the 'light back' version) but we decided to slightly change the art before anything went to print. We then sent our printer the file on the right (the 'dark back' version) and asked them to replace the old file with this one, which they did. All tarot decks printed before August 2021 have the 'dark back.'
Flash forward to April of this year. When we received the first batch of Expansion Packs we did a test run, mixing them in with our personal copies of the Spacious Tarot and realized the backs were a little different. For this first printing of Expansion Packs, our printer inadvertently used the 'light back' file that was supposed to have been discarded.
This is why we initially decided to delay the Expansion Pack launch. Our intention was for you to be able to blend the expansion cards in with your tarot deck if you choose to do so. And although the card backs are not super different (some people we've showed said they wouldn't have noticed the difference at all), they are not identical. So we connected with our printer and arranged a re-printing of the Expansion Packs, this time using the dark back.
We thought this would be the end of the saga, but then a new plot twist came into play. We discovered that in addition to the first batch of Expansion Packs, the light back file had also ended up on the latest printing of the tarot deck. This is why we will have a separate Expansion Pack purchase option for those of you who got your tarot deck AFTER August 2021.
It turns out that the Expansion Packs with the light back match the newer copies of the tarot deck perfectly. If we had been using newer tarot copies when we first mixed the cards together, we never would have known there was a concern. But we both use personal copies of the tarot decks which came from earlier printings, so those have the dark backs.
We were surprised to realize the light backs were on some of the tarot decks as well. Even though we'd been selling that version of the tarot deck since August of 2021, we as deck creators never noticed the back was different from the earlier tarot printings. And we've never had a single customer notice the difference either!
This goes to show that the difference in card backs isn't a big deal, UNLESS you are using the two different versions side by side. To be clear, there's no other differences in the decks aside from the card backs. The card fronts, box, guidebook are all identical.
SO THERE YOU HAVE IT - the whole saga explained. Suffice it to say this has been a bit of a headache for us as creators. But we now understand what happened and have a plan to move forward which we believe will work for everyone. We have an Expansion Pack for you no matter which version of tarot card backs you have, and that's what really matters in the end.
If you have questions/concerns that are not addressed here, please email admin@thespacioustarot.com and we will do our best to help.
-Carrie & Annie