Have the culture of coin collecting changed?

Been to a few coin shows and talked to dealers over the years. It looks like times have changed.

In the past, dealers would have large varieties to offer at good price. (at down under). Numismatics were more affordable especially precious metals. International postage? You could buy huge pound lots over from the US and it wouldn't break the bank.

If I can recall correctly here are some numbers about 2 decades ago:
Silver: 5-7USD/oz
Gold: 500USD/oz
Platinum: 1000USD/oz
Palladium: 300USD/oz

I recall buying pound lot over from the US and postage was around 20-30 dollars. Today something of that weight might cost more than 4-5 times!

Getting back to topic - choices were more plentiful and there were more choices of precious metals. Fast forward today, you'd hear stories of dealers having to send precious metals to refineries during tough times. Some were in buckets, if not drums. Who knows how much were melted over time. Today's selection are a lot more modern mint base metals. Or if there are any precious metals, it's usually silver bullion and these are now kept in cases. Sometimes gold but not as vast choices as it used to be.

Sadly, it seems thefts are on the rise and local enforcements really don't care much or can't do much about it. I've heard of cases where dealers had to close down as they were robbed in their own shops (!) and now only do their commence online or give it up completely.

Even online commence are not cheap - with all the nonsense tax, tariff, raising prices, inflation, counterfeits, items going missing, etc, it's starting to seem like the good old days of collecting things on the cheap is over.

What is your experience like? Please feel free to share your experience.

 

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Times have certainly changed. You couldn't have convinced me when I began collecting in the 1970's that error coins would be the hot ticket in 2025. But it certainly is. Now my interest is from a historical perspective and I was a perfectly happy collector of worn slick fifty cent IHC's, V-nickels and the like... And fact is, today that market still exists. If a young person wants to jump in and collect with his school lunch money like I did, he can still have a great time. I can remember clear as day looking at St. Gaudens at $300.00 and wondering if I would ever have that kind of money. Now that $300.00 coin is a $2500.00 coin, but has the value really changed considering inflation?

Two things have dramatically changed our hobby since I began. One is the introduction of the TPG's and one could write a college thesis on the change the TPG's have made to the hobby landscape. Most of which, I am not a fan of. The other is the proliferation of Chinese counterfeits. I would surmise that for every one dedicated collector, you will find fifty casual collectors. They may buy a coin to put in their sock drawer to give to their kid down the road. Those are the folks whose heart gets broken and are permanently sullied from the hobby when they discover their coin is fake. That has a terrible downwind affect for the rest of us.

Now to me the heartbeat of the hobby is young collectors and the few shows that I attend are always very kid friendly. I always carry no-date buffaloes in my pocket to hand out to kids at shows. I have to do my part to keep the hobby alive. Not too awful many years from now, I will need some buyers!

 

As for the international postage, I started selling coins on eBay around 2010 maybe. At that time, I could ship a package internationally for around $3.50. Then one day it about doubled to around $7, and it has increased steadily since then. Now an international package is around $17 for the cheapest option, and it goes up depending on weight. It's really hard to sell larger groups of coins internationally because the buyers understandably don't want to pay that. Many other countries are much more reasonable in their shipping charges. Even sending a package within the U.S. has increased from probably under $2 when I started to around $4.50 at minimum now, with a normal stamp doubling in price as well. People complain to you about the cost but what can I do?

 

I posted about this at least 3 times in CT with no replies but since you ask: The biggest change *and threat* to coin collecting, IMO, is an acceleration in the diminishing marginal utility of coins. This is not as "technical" as it sounds. It just means that more and more of the same gives less less satisfaction. It even affects billionaires who want to save the world now because they are bored with money.

The internet has speeded up everything and increased choices. No one has to wait until next month's coin show to look at the same stuff recycled to a different table. Coin buying is open 24/7/365. It's becomes too much, too fast and we risk getting "burned out."

https://www.investopedia.com/terms/l/lawofdiminishingutility.asp

 

See my post about my "new" 1876-S Seated Dime. James

 

I am relatively young to most of you (90's kid), but even in my day I remember there being more physical coin shops. Nearly all my money made in my teen years went into coins. Many coin shops have since disappeared. Here are the main reasons (besides being in college and having to also support a wife and three children) that I have slowed down in collecting:
1. I used to have three bank accounts from which I had a system for coin roll hunting. Now only one of those banks will sell me anything more than a few rolls at a time or even take more than a few rolls at a time. It became so frusterating that I pretty much have given up coin roll hunting.
2. FAKES. There are so many counterfeits, and good ones at that. It used to be that most fake silver was at least magnetic. Not anymore. They are too good in design and even weight.
3. Sorting through nonsense. When I want to buy a particular coin, sorting through all the trash (fakes, overgraded, doctored pictures, etc.) becomes extremely time consuming. I can almost never see the coin I want to buy in hand (lack of physical stores or decent inventory).
4. Difficulty in selling. I try to keep my collection a relatively small one with higher grade examples. That means when one coin joins the collection, most times one coin leaves. eBay takes a high fee (plus shipping), Facebook marketplace does not allow you to sell coins, and Craigslist is FULL of scammers. Unless your neighbor wants to buy from you, where do you sell?

 

I started collecting about 25 years ago. I seriously doubt that in today's climate I would have ever started.
With counterfeits flooding the market as well as thousands of people being totally uninformed about the value of common coins thinking they can get rich off pocket change. It really has become a jungle out there.
We've always lived in a ripoff culture but it just took a while for it to hit coin collecting .

 

Try Great Collections. james

 

Here is a post of mine that became a "Featured Article". It represents coin collecting in the 40's, 50's and early 60's.
https://www.cointalk.com/threads/building-a-twentieth-century-circulation-collection.385921/

 

@Jeffjay . Like most things it is a matter of perspective. Today's collector has the same responsibility to do their due diligence when looking for coins as has always been.
It is also true that sometimes you will still occasionally get taken.
The closest I came to ending my coin collecting career was around 1983. Back then it was "all coins raw", "Usually sight unseen" thru things like Coin World. I sent more than a thousand dollars to a Coin World advertiser for a trio of Barber coins by denomination. The advertisers had a full page ad and bragged of both "More than a Century of experience among the 3 dealers" and belonged to all the big name organizations.
Long story short, I received 3 heavliy damaged coins. The 3 dealers all acused ME of being a crook and swapping out coins on them. Here is what the company rep, "Dennis", who they all swore was beyond reproach, said to me. "You would think you were the first person in the world to get the old bait and switch.
Crooked people were not invented last Tuesday. Every age of coin collecting has it's pro's and con's. Personally, I will stick with verified sources such as Great Collections and Heritage because they do much of the vetting for me. Jasmes

 

I think that the proliferation of TPG's have brainwashed newer collectors, them thinking that you "have to" submit ANY coin for certification in order to be a collector. I also despise Ebay for allowing fakes/counterfeits and outlandish prices from dealers asking 1000% more than a variety (or made-up variety) could ever be worth. I think that newbies believe the "asking" prices are what a coin would be worth. If a dealer's description takes more than 3 sentences to tell how/why his coin is special, then you need to know where the delete button is.

 

Randy, I'm afraid I have bad news for you...



It was a $2500 coin last year this time.

Yeah, inflation stinks, but my dollars haven't lost 30% of their general buying power in the past year. The price of gold is spiking, plain and simple. It will fall again. I just don't know when, how far, or how much higher it will go first.

 

I should get out of bed and read the papers!

 

You really, really shouldn't. Trust me.

 

I realize it's always been buyer beware but there seems to be more rip off dealers than ever. They have completely ruined the hobby for many.

 

My local fish wrap went from 50 cents daily to $4. Folks buying it are spending $120+ (I don't know how much Sunday goes for) a month. More than enough for an interwebbie connection and all the indoctrination posing as news that anyone could stand.

 

Some of you have already mentioned the two main things I see that has changed, especially over the past 5 years or so - the proliferation of counterfeits, and horribly bad information being spread on social media and now AI (Actually Idiocy). It seems everybody getting into the hobby now thinks they're going to "get rich from pocket change", and greed has overrun the hobby. When I started out, all anybody did was try to fill an album. It seemed like almost anyone quickly recognized a damaged coin, and what a better one looked like to swap into an album. Nobody gave a single thought to finding some sort of "error", and if they did find a real one, it was seen as inferior anyway. Wishful thinking meant that you dreamed of finding a 1909-S VDB. Nobody was interested in "error" coins, nor toned coins either. Blast white ruled. I still find most toned coins to be unattractive except when lit up just the right way, but now they command crazy premiums. That's my brain dump on the subject.

 

What I remember most about the 80's was standing in line all the time at the PO returning over graded crap to someone.

 

I don't believe that greed or get rich quick in coins today is anything new. Robert Bilinski and George Haylings were writing about it in the late 50's.

https://www.coinworld.com/news/us-coins/investors-owe-him-a-nice-pat-on-the-back.html

https://www.coinworld.com/news/us-coins/investment-book-authors-advice-was-not-so-good.html

 

We still subscribe to ours, because they still maintain a reporting staff that does actual investigation. They've rooted out quite a bit of stuff that local powers would have preferred stay hidden. But I'm not seeing their path to long-term survival, for the same reason you stated.