What's the future of coin collecting?

Is coin collecting a fading hobby?

I started collecting coins as a child in the 70’s. When I was in my 20’s I found many things that interested me more than coins, like bars, women, scuba diving, caving, bicycling, hiking…..well you get the point. The coin collection went into the closet never to be seen again. Until now. The family is raised and out of the house, and I’ve had a renewed interest in coin collecting.

But people my daughters age, the millennials , view collecting as clutter. They don’t really collect much. With digital currencies and credit card transactions, what is the future of coins. I went on Amazon to see what my Morgan’s are worth and there is little interest, Coin prices have been declining. I haven’t been to a coin show since I was a kid. Are there a lot of young people there, or are they more of the over 40 crowd?

Will coin collections go the way of Beanie Babies? Remember Longaberger Baskets? Now selling for a fraction of what people paid for them.

I’ve noticed several young members on Coin Chat. That’s a good sign. So if you had a crystal ball, what would it say about the future of coin collecting?

 

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One possibility is for something new similar to the state quarters.
That gave the hobby a boost.
That got people interested at a low price level.
Later many got interested in other series.
And ASE's may have done the same.

But the Mint (bless their little money grubbing hearts) had to push it.
More issues that were more expensive such as the Presidential $1 series.
Now there's the ATB issues.
IMO that threw a dampener on collecting both by state quarter collectors and by potentially new ones.
And don't get me started about all the commemoratives coming out.
The young collectors are getting blown out.

The Post Office did the same thing back around the 60's.
Stamp collecting is now pretty much a dead hobby.

 

I agree, the state quarter's brought a lot of interest, especially the errors.

 

Your coin collecting sounds like mine: I resumed after nearly a 50-year hiatus.

Some points from your humble narrator. Pure opinion.

1. The future? Who knows. Have fun now. Since I resumed, I have found more collectors than I would have expected.

2. The Mint is NOT a steward of the hobby and has not the foggiest intention of changing its ways -- even if Congress would allow it.

3. The debit card society, in the future, could actually stimulate coin collecting as coins become historic relics.

Anyway, those are some ideas to toss around. Be my guest!

 

Haha, I just noticed I spelled future wrong in the thread title.

 

If the day ever comes when circulating coins are phased out entirely, I can only imagine the collecting frenzy that will result.

 

I hope you are right, Coin collecting is s great hobby, and I'd like to think future generations will also enjoy it.

 

Coin collecting is alive and well. Over my 50 years of collecting it has changed considerably, but my enthusiasm hasn't waned a bit.

 

It may seem now that hardly anyone is interested, but whenever they stop making something, human nature causes people to think that the item is rare.

 

That's great! There are a lot of enthusiastic people on this forum. My concern is, do the younger generation share that same enthusiasm. Let's hope so.

 

Great point.

 

My children could care less, but one of my grandsons is all in.

 

Glad he's on board. Let's hope his whole generation is.

 

Collecting will be just fine. It is certainly changing and shows are having a harder time and numismatic memberships may be down, but the internet has changed collecting in ways that makes it harder to measure participation aside from sales which there are plenty of them occurring everyday.

Prices are down but largely due to a lack of disposable income. The internet itself changed the values of some things as well. When you can get on eBay at literally any time and find 100s of something it's hard for a high value to hold being that common.

As far as kids and the hobby, it has never really been a hobby for teens. They have always been the exception not the norm.

Collecting will change even more in the future but it will survive even if the tastes of collectors don't mirror those of the past.

 

I disagree with this. Me and my friends all collected in our teens. Every Saturday we would go to the bank and pick up some rolls to search. It may not be a hobby for teens now, but it was for me.

 

collecting coins will be around for awhile. things I have noticed are people like me are getting much more focus on what they like/buy. When I first started out I was all over the place. I am going on 20 years of coin collecting now. My misc. collection is slowing down. my focused collections are much more focused than they used to be. have you heard of coin goals before ? I have made a few new ones. aim for what you can afford or save up for what you really really want. Most important is to have FUN doing it. If you are in collecting coins just for investment end of it you will not get as much enjoyment out of your coins.

 

You and your friends were the exception. Personal experiences do not make a trend. That is great you and your friends did that, but it never has and never will be the norm for teens to be collectors. Collecting takes money which most teens don't have and are to busy chasing something else

There's countless collectors young and old that didn't collect in their teens

 

I don't think the hobby will ever disappear completely, but I think it will fade. When, and if, the digital economy comes to full fruition, people won't see or use coins anymore. It will take collectors to introduce people, especially young people, to them. Kids won't have change to fascinate them. They won't come across something interesting in their pockets. This will sound strange, but if the SBA dollar hadn't been released I may have never started collecting. A very young me found that new thing in change utterly entrancing. This made me curious about the other chunks of metal I always carried around. Then I bought a price guide, then I visited a coin shop and so on. No one else in my family, or even any of my friends, had any interest. Pocket change, and only pocket change, led to my off-and-on lifelong hobby.

If coins no longer circulate then people, including young people, will have to go somewhere and buy them. How will they find those places? Not to mention that teens don't typically have loads of money, which more than anything explains why this remains mostly an older person's hobby. To buy really interesting pieces takes income. Coins will also become a historical curiosity. They will all carry dates in the past and lack immediacy. Sure, some people may still become insanely obsessed with them, but I think that will remain a small section of the population, perhaps those interested in history or metals, etc. Of course if gold or silver rise and become more valuable, then precious metal coins may keep their market interest. Precious metals alone could keep the market going, but I see interest in numismatic only items fading over time, especially as the generations roll on. But of course no one really knows. People thought housing prices would rise forever too, but then 2008 happened.

In any case, for the present, coins continue to circulate and who knows if they will ever completely disappear from the economy? It also seems generally true that the younger people I know seem to have no interest in collecting things. That may change as they grow up, but if it doesn't then the hobby will see some really dreadful times.

But, again, who knows?

 

Sadly lots of lifetime collections will be coming to market relatively soon as the baby boomers (a very large collector base) will retire and sell off their sets. I feel like the prices are now and will always be strong for true rarities, but popular series key dates that aren't really rare will drop quite a bit. This could either encourage or discourage new collectors coming in. I know one thing, as long as I'm alive, there will be at least one collector.

 

This kind of touches on the point I was making in the sense this is an antiquated way of thinking. The internet changed everything, literally everything. Kids have been exposed to more by the age of 14 than 70 years old may have ever been at this point in time. The days of having to come across people to find something are long gone, all it takes is a FB post or Insta ect and it can be found.