Coin Collecting is Here to Stay

Discussion in 'Coin Chat' started by calcol, Oct 29, 2019.

  1. calcol

    calcol Supporter! Supporter

    Folks worry because they perceive that most coin collectors are middle age or older (like me). I don't know of reliable statistics on this, but it's been the case long before there were personal computers and the internet. Many years ago when I was in my teens and 20s, I had absolutely no interest in collecting coins. And I can't recall any friends or acquaintances who did.

    Most young folks will become older, and there are more young folks than ever. For virtually all of them, their interests will change as they age. And many will become coin collectors. There are a lot reasons for this: more wealth, more time, more knowledge, more appreciation of history, etc.

    The main changes brought about by the internet are: 1. much more information on coins is available with less effort and expense, and 2. coin collecting can be done with much less in-the-flesh interaction with other folks. Declining club, auction and show attendance and declining magazine subscriptions are not necessarily an indication of a decline in coin collecting. Instead, folks are buying, selling, getting info, and interacting with other collectors via the internet. The time we spend on the internet is time in days gone by that we would have spent reading paper, going to shows and auctions, or going to club meetings.

    The decline in use of physical money may cause a decline in some aspects of the hobby. Hard to search rolls if there aren't any. But for most aspects of the hobby, things won't change. I collect coins most of which are of precious metal and produced long before my birth. Coins like this haven't been made for a long time ... one of things that makes them appealing. And old objects just get older and rarer, which makes them more desirable to collect.

    I won't even try to predict whether as a percent of the population, there will be fewer or more collectors in the future. However, I feel confident coin collecting will remain in the class of popular hobbies indefinitely. :joyful:

    Cal
     
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  3. 352sdeer

    352sdeer Collecting Lincoln cents for 50 years!

    Good insight @calcol thanks!

    Reed
     
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  4. -jeffB

    -jeffB Greshams LEO Supporter

    Ah, I miss having Kurt here to point out at length that this is BAD and WRONG and EVIL. Won't someone please step up in his place?
     
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  5. calcol

    calcol Supporter! Supporter

    Yeah! I could to with a good thrashing or trashing or .... o_O

    Cal
     
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  6. tommyc03

    tommyc03 Senior Member

    I don't remember Kurt ever trashing me but he sure did get his boxers in a bind more often than not. For someone who abhorred the internet he sure spent plenty of time on this site. As far as publications go, after Numismatic News was sold I lost interest. Mostly all ads and very little numismatic substance. I am reupping my Coin World sub to satisfy my cravings though.
     
    Randy Abercrombie likes this.
  7. Collecting Nut

    Collecting Nut Borderline Hoarder

    The only reason I feel a loss in the hobby is due to the crap that the US Mint is producing.
     
  8. Inspector43

    Inspector43 Celebrating 75 Years Active Collecting Supporter

    I cut all ties to Coin World. Like most publications, money is more interesting than truth. They know that some advertisers are putting out information intended to lure the unsuspecting to purchase worthless product, such as, First Strike coins. CW knows that some of the labels don't mean anything but allows the advertising anyway.
     
  9. Conder101

    Conder101 Numismatist

    I never read Coin World for the ads. The whole time I've been collecting I've only purchased from an ad in a publication a couple of times.
     
  10. CoinCorgi

    CoinCorgi Tell your dog I said hi!

    Some relatively recent stats on cash usage (infer what you want in terms of the affect this has on the hobby)...

    https://www.frbsf.org/our-district/...despite-slight-decline-in-usage-by-consumers/

     
  11. ewomack

    ewomack 魚の下着

    I've said it a few times here: the hobby will be in trouble when the old guys stop showing up, which is apparently happening to sports cards. As long as new generations of old guys (and hopefully more women) keep buying coins and going to shows, things will be fine.

    But the future never holds any guarantees. So who really knows?

    The hobby should really focus on appealing more to adult women. Everything about the hobby has a male tinge to it, with some exceptions. Women would expand the hobby more than all of the efforts to children will. A child of ten may or may not end up collecting coins later in life. Adult women really seem like the untapped potential.
     
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  12. CoinCorgi

    CoinCorgi Tell your dog I said hi!

    Internet - BAD!
    Amish Coin Auctions - GOOD!
    Amish electric chair - INEFFECTIVE!
     
  13. Randy Abercrombie

    Randy Abercrombie Supporter! Supporter

    It’s funny you mentioned this. Last Friday I attended a sizable coin show and was surprised by the number of women walking the tables. Even more so by the number of women running tables. I was proud to see it.
     
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  14. Jwt708

    Jwt708 Well-Known Member

    I am also a firm believer the hobby will be fine. How people collect and enjoy the hobby will change.
     
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  15. coleguy

    coleguy Coin Collector

    Frankly, I don't see how it matters. There will always be coins and those who collect them for various reasons, so thats all that matters. I also collect rare maps. There might be a few hundred of us in this country, yet there is no shortage of maps to be bought. So long as there remains one person buying something, there will be 100 ready to sell to that person.
     
  16. baseball21

    baseball21 Well-Known Member

    To be fair the market has shown that does matter for many years now. I get that a lot of people especially older and long time collectors don't like all the fancy labels but the market is what gets to decide if something is worthless or not.
     
  17. The Eidolon

    The Eidolon Well-Known Member

    I think there have been a number of generational shifts which will change the shape of our hobby:
    1) Many brick-and-mortar stores are going out of business. At least in my area 2 of the 3 local shops have closed or moved in the last year. The 3rd is run by a 76-year-old man and probably won't outlast him. So rising real estate rents in cities and suburbs will drive out many local shops. Internet will replace this to some degree, but is less useful for low-end coins due to shipping and transaction costs.

    2) More sophisticated counterfeiting (esp. Chinese) has made buying coins of unknown pedigree risky. Thus the value added by third party grading services, who can attempt to confirm authenticity. This is most useful at the high end.

    3) The generation who lived through the shift away from silver coins (1964 in the US) is getting older. This created a large pool of potential coin collectors, but I don't see a comparable modern event to bring in new collectors en masse. I'm amazed at how many coin collectors never set foot in a shop, but collect only from current circulating coins or possibly modern coins from foreign travel. Series like the state quarters have had some success in attracting new collectors of coins found "in the wild," but I think the market will saturate as the novelty wears off. Appreciation potential for modern coins seems poor due to large mintages and low value of the underlying metal as an inflation hedge. The very highest grades may be an exception.
     
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  18. baseball21

    baseball21 Well-Known Member

    Silver and gold aren't an inflation hedge but that's a different conversation.

    Regardless I never understand why so many thinks the metal matters? I get that is an old school way of looking at things but it makes absolutely no sense. If you want the metal buy bullion. It just flat out doesn't matter if there is 10-20 worth of silver in a coin you're spending 70, 80, 200, 2k etc dollars on. The numismatic premium is multiples of the melt value.

    I do however fully understand the natsolgia aspect where people want to collect their child hood coins or the older ones. That said though "clad moderns" have been around for over 50 years, to new/younger/future collectors to the overwhelming majority of them they're just coins
     
  19. Inspector43

    Inspector43 Celebrating 75 Years Active Collecting Supporter

    I suppose "worthless" was pushing it. My point is that new collectors are being mislead and those sources we trust to get them advised are not doing a good job. There is only one "first strike" and the mint keeps it. Most of the other interesting labels don't mean much either. "Early Release" means that it was one of the last to be put in storage. First In - Last Out. The next generation of collectors needs this information unless they are resolved to collect labels. And, many people are. We owe it to them to know how to budget and why.
     
  20. baseball21

    baseball21 Well-Known Member

    You really just kind of proved what I was saying though. Some of the people that don't like the labels (eventhough it is a presentation aspect no different than an album or chest or plastic holder) just start saying the collectors that do like them are being lied to or collecting labels and talk down to them.

    People can have person preferences, but the market gets to decide values and until something drastic changes the values are set. People have a right to collect what they like even if others don't.

    There are advertisers in the magazines that do mislead people and take advantage of them and some would probably surprise a lot of the old school group
     
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