Must be that time of year here in Dallas. They are taking out several full page ads in The Dallas Morning News to get everyone come an unload their coins, currency, etc. They show multiple sites around the city to make it convenient for everyone to come an unload their valuables. They must do pretty good to spend that kind of money on advertising. Since Sunday each days edition of the News has multiple full page ads in the "main" section. I wonder if they time it so people think I can start working on my X-MAS money stash. What do these guys do with what they get? Unload them to dealers in bulk quantities?
Yes I bet they do pretty darned good. Its a great business for them to set up at a hotel with the cash they have and pick up material at their price. Its called buying it right. They don't have the competetion from other dealers like they would at a coin show plus the people coming in probably are out to get rid of the coins for whatever cash they can get. With the cash they have its a great business idea, especially in this economy. The overhead would be advertising, staff, hotel costs ,travel, meals, and I am sure whatever security they would need. Traveling with a huge amount of cash and coins can be dangerous. I would imagine they unload the material to dealer contacts or thru some conduit they have with Teletrade or Ebay. Strategically, they would need to buy it right (at a low enough price to immediately flip it for a profit after expenses). Then once the stuff was sold back on the road again to get some more great deals. They are smart IMO bc they are not wasting their time setting up a coin show trying to retail stuff to people who don't have any money or won't pay the money. To be successful at that business it would take lots of cash, knowing what they can flip it for, and buying it right. I have to wonder how much they really clean up. Think of all the better date, high grade gold coins they may have gotten for melt or less. But then all the tons of junk (or worse counterfeits) thats probably walking up before getting a really super buy. The other thing is bullion is going up, so its a win win situation for them.
Quite frankly, I'm surprised they have anyone left to fleece. The pie (of the general public) is split up like this: - Vast majority have nothing of numismatic value, including many that think they do. - A small minority have a lot, are informed and would never go to one of these. - A small minority have some, are uninformed, but will do research and possibly try ebay first. - Very small minority have some, are uninformed, and will do no research. The only possible target group other than thieves looking to dump hot items.
You should visit one in your area.... I've only witnessed a couple of these hotel setups here in Connecticut. I thought there might be an opportunity to buy some US & world silver coins but it was not an option. It was pretty obvious that the buyer wanted time to review all the stuff before selling it for melt to a larger dealer. The sellers would enter and ask something like "how much are you paying for US silver coins" & the buyer would get the guy or gal to hand them the coins for inspection. The couple times I've seen this, the buyers all were acting the same & saying the same lines to their clients such as : "Wow you sure are going to get a lot of money for these coins" "Yep, I'm ging to give you just as much as I possibly can" "Lucky for you that we are buying here today" "We're paying a lot for silver" "We're paying more than anyone else in this area" However, they never told the seller how much they were paying per ounce or per dollar face. They were just taking the folk for whatever ride they could. They would add them up & not inform the seller what they just added up. They would just tell them how much $ he would pay and placed the coins away from the seller behind the counter. The guys acted like the deal was done & the poor sellers were just standing there dumbfounded like this must be how selling silver is done. If the offer was refused (before they paid the seller), then they would say "well what do you want for them". If the customer said anything below melt that day, the guy would almost rudely say "OK its a deal" and put the coins behind the counter & made payment. This one elderly seller said he wanted 14 or 15 dollars for his silver dollars & the buyer said OK I'll give you 14 and put the coins behind the counter. I'm not saying that they all operate this way but the couple times I've been there, it went down in the hotels this way to a few customers.
I have a feeling these traveling buyers will go the way of the milk man. It sounds like they prey on the elderly. Eventually, all of the elderly that are left will be computer savvy, own computers, have internet, and they won't trust anyone. They won't be needed. The gravy train is most likely drying up for these people. Not to mention the fact that eventually, they're going to run out of old silver to melt. Although broken gold jewelry has been and will continue to be recycled forever.
