I saw this thread last year when I joined CT: What's your coin-related pet peeve? I love going down the Shipping charge column of eBay seeing: $0.37, $7.45, $0.99, $4.16, $1.55... all for one bill.
My biggest pet peeve right now is the shipment I got 3 days ago. I am not really into British coins, but I have been reading up on collecting British pennies. I thought I'd start small and found a reasonably priced lot of 30 circulated British pennies, with a good mix of early 1900's dates. It didn't cost too much, and the pics looked pretty good, so I bid and won. I knew there would be nothing great in the lot, but I wanted to start off small. I was surprised when the coins showed up shipped inside an Altoid's mints can. (which was inside an envelope). The guy didn't even clean out the tin, so the coins where covered in a fine coat of crushed mint. It's not like it was a huge loss, they were cheap, common coins, but man, come on.
Those who slab low to moderate value tokens (coins as well) when there is essentially no chance of acquiring a fake, and values change little between grades (cwts in unc are commonly worth only about double that of the same token in fine). Seems it is only done because there are enough people willing to pay stupid money for plastic. I've seen XF-45s in plastic sell for double and triple the unc value, and no clue as to why. If I were a seller, I might think differently, but since I only buy, it seems to me this slabbing is only done in an attempt to rip more $$$ from my wallet.
I always wonder what someone was thinking when I see slabbed coins in a dealer's showcase where the cost of getting the coin slabbed is more than the retail value of the coin. My best guess is that whoever sent it in just isn't that good at grading and thought their MS65 was an MS70 or something.
I suppose it is possible to apply my comment to (at least some) regular coinage, but I was referencing exonumia slabs in particular. Exonumia is still a relic of the past (which I find most refreshing) as grade does not carry tremendous weight most of the time. I believe that is due to the relative scarcity of so many tokens. If you want one for your collection, and one becomes available, and you reject it because of a cleaning, a scratch, a hole, high price tag, or whatever, you may never have another chance to acquire that token. That is why those problems frequently play a minor role in much of exonumia. Aside from the slabbers, pretty much members of the exonumia sector do not use the Sheldon scale. Some areas do not use any grading specification at all when listing values, you want one - here is the price. A much different scenario than with regular coinage. Even regular coinage rarities and keys are generally available if one is willing to part with the necessary funds. Don't like a particular 1909-S VDB cent? there are a multitude of others available, just take a look on ebay. In contrast, I have a list of about 40 tokens that are very high on my want list and I would bid "stupid" money for those if they ever show up on ebay, but after nearly 6 years of watching, they have yet to make an appearance. Demand is such that grade has a minor effect upin valuation, which can be a very nice thing. For one, exonumia dealers seem to be a more honest lot than those who sell regular coinage. Be it inherent honesty, or just that the pricing curve shows little incentive for overgrading, I can not be certain. It boils down to I feel that exonumia slabs are strictly selling tools, as I can not percieve any actual benefit other than physical protection, but there are better/less expensive methods than slabbing. Grade levels amongst references and hobbyists are typically Fine/Very Fine, Xtra Fine, and Uncirculated. Even a beginner should be able to comprehend how this system works in short order, and without the assistance of a label in plastic.
The only other benefit I can think of authentication. Some people, especially when buying on a forum like ebay where they don't get to examine the token in person might feel better knowing that the civil war token they are buying wasn't made last tuesday.
Yes, but eBay should only be reserved for the most experienced of numismatists. And, I should add to that, should only be for those who have had many "low-value purchases" under their belt. Any "newbie" should start buying from reputable dealers, who describe their coins properly, and have a reputation. EBay is not for those who are new to the hobby. Also, there is not a lot of CW token counterfeiting. If a newbie were to deal with an established CW token dealer, then his chances of buying a fake would be almost zero. Of course, if that same newbie were to buy the books, do the research, and put forth the effort, then his chances of getting ripped-off would be even less. But, then we wouldn't be able to call him a "newbie", would we?
Cwtokenman, this is to let you know I really enjoy your posts on collecting exonumia. I have a small token collection, and right now I'm sort of "between collections." I more or less have what I want for the items I've been collecting and have been looking for something new to start since the beginning of the year. Right now I'm leaning toward CW and HT tokens because they are old, scarce, cheap, historical, and provide more variety than US Mint issued coins. Regarding the topic of this thread, one of my pet peeves is the high bid/ask spread on coins. For all of its problems, Ebay has helped narrow the spreads a bit and has given the casual collector a fighting chance to sell a few coins at prices that are closer to full retail.
Thanks for the compliment cloudsweeper, I do get a bit passionate about tokens at times, and its nice to hear of someone checking them out and developing some interest in them. Before I started this last job, I used to put on an occasional talk in the local jr/sr high schools in history class and present the info from a numismatic viewpoint. It seemed like most of the kids paid attention and could relate to historical events fairly well from a money perspective. The best part was handing out late 1600s to early 1800s tokens/coins (just culls as I sometimes passed out nearly 100 in a day) to everyone in each of the classes, and asking them to think about the hands that were passed thru, and what purchases they had made. That was my big attempt at making history class a bit more bearable, and perhaps stir some interest in collecting as well, but I digress. I would echo your reasons for interest in tokens, and would add that they are much more "personal" than government issues. I rather enjoy reading the background info on a particular person/token issuer, kind of a short trip back into time for me at least. I definitely lean towards the CW tokens, obviously. Hard Times tokens can get a bit pricey in the upper grades, and unc ones do not show up all that often (on ebay). But I was never one to be overly picky as to a certain minimum grade requirement before purchasing, and some are simply not available in high grade. Either type can provide hours of enjoyment. I feel CW tokens provide more opportunity to discover a new variety than HT tokens though if that floats your boat at all. Stuporman, Jody pretty much hit the mark with the authenticity issue. Fake cwts are pretty scarce, and most of the ones I have seen were made while these tokens were circulating. These were usually poorly done base metal castings with a copper or brass wash to color them. All that I have seen were mimicking very common tokens. These would hardly fool anyone. Interestingly though, many of these crude fakes display considerable wear, with little of the original coloring left. That makes me think that because coinage was in such short supply (a few months after the war started, there were only about 8 coins in circulation per person, and that is including what was sitting in the banks. Banks at the time were paying up to a 30% premium for turning in coinage) that it really did not matter if it was a fake, as it could still be used. The tokens themselves I suppose could be considered as "fake" money, but their use was very widespread. I actively persue fake cwts, and I only manage to pick up one or two per year on average. Buying cwt slabs to prevent buying a fake is IMO about like using Sasquatch repellent. You may never buy a fake cwt, and you may never see a Sasquatch, but does the "protection" deserve the credit? I suspect you may not be overly familiar with cwts, as many are not, but if you have the time and inclination, peruse the cwt section on ebay and let me know if/when you find a fake cwt that is not described as such. There are many instances with regular coinage that I would certainly admit authentication is a valid issue. But as I had mentioned before with the numerous basic types of errors (early cwt slabs I would guess had somewhere near a 25% error rate on the label, of course not counting their misuse of the numbering system nor grading issues), how could I have much trust in them. To put that in a regular coinage perspective, what if 25% of NGCs slabs of normal Lincoln cents had errors such as calling it a Washington quarter or an Indian Head cent, or if the label indicated it was made of brass, or obviously had the wrong year or mint mark, or incorrectly spelled "Lincoln", or indicated it had a reeded edge, etc. If about 1 of every 4 slabs had such obvious errors, would you find that to inspire confidence in their abitilites? Granted, they seem to do a better job currently, but when they first hit the scene, there was several occasions when I had posted long listings of their errors for what few auctions were ending that given day.
Thanks for your comments. This certainly seems like a very interesting and somewhat overlooked corner of the collecting world. I also like the fact that tokens seem to provide a little more "freedom" in deciding what to collect since the usual date/mintmark approach [which I don't like] doesn't apply. And the design variety makes a group of tokens far more interesting to look at in my opinion than an album full of, say, indian head cents where everything is basically identical. I'm going to look into the token world more carefully.
Mine is buying coins that were not advertised as cleaned and they have wizz marks all over the coin that I get which are not pictured in the photo
With me it's not the coins or the prices or the type or anything really directly with coins. It's the idiots that I know that belittle coin collecting, stamp collecting, etc. I am really old and have lost almost all my irritability but when I hear people I know start with coin collecting is a big fake, I almost blow my top. I hear things like The Antique Raod Show program is a fake, if you collect coins there is no place to sell them, all coins are only worth what is written on them, people that save coins are feeble minded because you can make more money by puttingyour money in a bank. A dime dated 1960 is the same as all dimes dated 1960. The only money to be made with coins are the people that sell books about them.
People who says those kinds of things seem not to be making the distnction between coin collecting and investing, assuming the only reason people collect coins is they hope they will be worth more money someday. If somoene doesn't understand why someone would collect coins or anything else for its own sake, there's no way you can explain it to them. They will either "get it" or they never will. Oh well. My enjoyment of coin collecting or any other hobby or pastime is not dependant on whether others agree with me that it's worthwhile.
This just, for some reason, annoyed me: For 10-35 coins(such a broad range), $40.25 just to get it to your house. So, 10 coins is $40.25, but 35 is too. I clickable
"Thank you for calling Elusive Coins. We are open from ten until five Tuesdays through Saturdays, unless we are closed. The 'See you on Monday' sign in our window is our little joke. If this is your twelfth attempt to reach us, please leave a message. We will return your call on Monday."
