Hi. I am new to CoinTalk forum. I am a collector and am interested in reading a book or online article that gives an up to date and in depth view of the practice of dealing world coins. The pros and cons of the business, how dealers find coins, good business practices, etc. Any suggestions about informative material to read on this subject ? Thanks, M.
to CoinTalk M. I think you are jumping the gun with your inquiry. Before you can start worrying about "good business practices" which pertains to any small business, or where to acquire coins, you need to study the coins you plan to deal in and learn a great deal about them. If knowledge is king to a collector, it's life and death to a dealer!
satootoko, thanks, I have access to a decent amount of information on the coins I am interested in collecting. It's information on the world of coin dealing that I am curious to read. M.
That you are going to have a hard time finding. To the best of my knowledge no such book exists. Business is business and the same basic principles apply to running one as it does to running another. But coin dealing has its own unique requirements as well. First of all you need to know enough about it to be able to recognize a fake from the genuine item. That alone can take years to learn. Then you need to know how to grade coins accurately and consistently - that can take decades for some to learn. Then you need to know the current values of all the coins you may buy & sell, that too can take years to learn and you must keep current as well. Not knowing any one of the above and you will go broke in a hurry. Not knowing all of them - you haven't got a chance.
There are a number of books on coin dealing. The first tht jumps to my recall is "Stories from the Bourse" by the late David Lawrence. A very fun read. There are others, as I remember them I'll add them. Good luck. First become a collector, then a dealer.
Welcome! Glad to have you. I would echo the sentiments of our veteran posters here. I don't call the Krause Catalog of World Coins "the phone book" for nothing-- it's easily as thick as most telephone directories I've seen, and that's just for the 20th Century in the case of the one we own! There are tens of thousands of coins listed in that book alone, and if you were to become a dealer, there is the possibility that any one of those could show up at any time for evaluation and possible purchase. Some of these coins are listed at thousands of dollars, and some haven't changed in value since I first put them away as a child! You would be expected to know much of this off the top of your head, or at least know where to look very quickly, and then you'd have to understand whether such a coin would belong in your store (virtual or otherwise) inventory and whether you could mark it up enough to make a living. I don't mean to discourage you, but I find that the farther I get into this, the more respect I have for knowledgable dealers and fellow hobbyists.
