I'm Headed to the MidAmerica Show in Schaumburg/Chicago - Anyone Else Going?

The show starts on Thursday, June 25 and goes through Sunday, June 28. Here's a link for more details: http://www.numismaticnews.net/MidAmerica_Coin_Expo/

This will be my first time at this show, but I hear it's a pretty good-sized show, and Chicago is a very good venue, with lots of shopping, site seeing and great restaurants! I know Rick Snow will be at table 437 and my table number is 330, so if anyone else is going, please be sure to stop by and say hi! Here's a list of other booth holders so you can see where other dealers are set up:
http://www.numismaticnews.net/MidAmerica_Booth_Holders

 

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Sure as heck wish I could go.......

 

I plan to, don't know as of now which day thursday or friday morning

 

Another "local" show I won't make.
I'm sure some of our customers from the shop will be there. I'll tell them to go see you and tell you clembo says hey.

clembo

 

That would be great - tell them I'll even give them an "extra" discount on anything they buy!

 

I would really love to go but my wife has me doing something else.

If you're not from the area, take a couple of hours and make sure you actually go into the city, into the loop. It's great in the summertime.

 

Dan
Unfreakin believable your not going. Aside from the coin show aspect, you will miss hanging with 2 Icons of the "coin world", Rick and Charmy. Believe me bud, they are more than coin dealers, they are great guests to have in your city and would make for a great evening over a cpl beers at the local pub.

Anybody within 100 miles of this show should make a pint ( pun intended :whistle: )to attend.

 

Jack, it's going to be hard to live up to all your sweet talking about me and Rick. But Clembo Dan, that is a shame that we won't get to meet you and have a drink or two - I'm sure you have some good coin customer stories too! If your plans change, please be sure to stop by....

 

Do you guys think I'd have good chances on selling some items there?

 

I don't want to take the socks off folks here, but Schaumburg ain't Chicago.
It's just another suburb off an expressway. Concrete and the Woodfield Mall. Nothing you can't find in Ohio. It's what, 15-20 miles from the city. The proximity to the airport is the reason for the location. But find a way to see downtown if you can. Millennium Park, Buckingham Fountain, etc.

 

Since I haven't done this show before and summer being a slower coin season, I'm not sure, but you'll probably have as good a chance there as you would at any of the larger shows.

 

I'll probably end up there sometime friday or saturday.

 

Are you digging the weather so far?
Remember it's not the heat it's the humidity!

 

It's pretty nasty down here too, the humidity is awful. Still, i'm excited for saturday

 

So far the heat hasn't been to bad at all. Yesterday, when we left the show, it was overcast and cloudy and had cooled off quite a bit. Rick and I went to the casino after the show, and I'll post more about that when I get a chance. Look forward to seeing any CoinTalkers - Table 330!

 

So, I'm home now, relaxing on this very warm SoCal afternoon and catching up on my emails, etc. As for the show, it ended up being very successful for me. I mostly sold a lot of certified Lincolns and Indians and some raw material as well, but it seems PCGS coins are still the most popular coins people ask for. I was very busy all day Friday and most of Saturday, even though the crowd wasn't too thick for a show of this size. I think part of the reason I did well was that I was willing to work with each buyer on my prices - which is necessary during these tougher economic times. I also purchased a super nice 1905 NGC MS66 BN, toned of course! And I picked up my 1873 PCGS MS64 RB Double Liberty T-2 from Rick - WHAAA WHOOO! Tomorrow, I pick up my 1880 off center die clash from Bowers & Merena, then they're all off to Todd for his magical photography skills!

Let me say a little something about the hotel. I stayed at the Schaumburg Rennaisance, which was a 5 star hotel - and it deserved every bit of those stars. Wow, it was a stunningly beautifully designed hotel, with sweeping marble staircases, 5 star food (and prices!), the rooms were beautiful, and the bed was so amazingly soft and cozy! They even had a tv hologram sort of "beamed" into the bathroom mirror with its own remote! Pretty amazing, that's for sure.

Now, the casino night! On Thursday after the show, Rick and I went to a casino which is sort of a riverboat about 20 miles from the hotel. Not thinking, we hailed a cab around 5:00 pm. Boy, what a huge mistake! The ride normally would cost around $40, but we ended up paying $70 (incl tip) because we spent the majority of time stuck on the freeway in traffic! I felt like I was back in California!! When we finally got there, we had dinner and drinks at their Fox & Hound pub, and while watching the news, we heard about Michael Jackson's death - wow, that was quite a shock. No matter what you think about him as a person, he was so extremely talented.

Then we headed to the black jack tables but after half an hour, we weren't doing so well, so we headed to the poker room. They only had no limit games so we bought in for a couple hundred and sat down to play. Rick quickly amassed quite an empire of chips, due to his quiet, unassuming way of playing (and bluffing!). I was holding my own, ahead most of the game.

We had a pretty friendly game going, until security suddenly shows up and asks one of the players to get up so they can "talk" to him. After a few moments, they have him rack up his chips, and they escorted him out. Apparently, we were told he was "drinking too much and loosing too much money." Can you believe it! The player wasn't obnoxious or rude or behaving badly at all. Well, we soon learned that this particular casino had a lot of "special" rules, like you can't stand up if you're in a hand or they will muck your cards, and you have to leave the entire room, not just the table, to use your phone, and several others that I've never heard of before. And even some of the players got into "correcting" your play if you didn't follow the rules to the tee! So much for the friendly game.

But Rick and I were still having fun, drinking beer, piling up chips, loosing and winning them back, etc. Later, during one hand, the dealer flopped Q-K-A of clubs. The guy in seat 1 bet and seat 2 folded, Rick (seat 3) folded, seat 4 folded, seat 5 (Tony) called, me in seat 6 folded, as did everyone else. The dealer tuns some red card over, and seat 1 bets again and Tony calls. Then the river card was another K, so seat 1 goes all in, and Tony calls and quickly turns over 10-J of clubs - GEESE - he had a ROYAL FLUSH on the FLOP! The whole table erupted, clapping, hooting, etc. The rest of the casino stopped to see what the shouting was for and many quickly gathered around our table. Wow, I'd never seen a royal flopped before - that was so amazing! And Rick and I are thinking, thank goodness we folded our hands early on! I think the pot ended up being around $200+. (Poor seat 1 went home with his tail between his legs...)

Any way, I ended up having a really good show, making some good sales, and many new customers and friends. Several forum members stopped by to introduce themselves and say hi, and I especially enjoyed finally meeting young Stone face to face. What a nice savvy young man. He's headed to Spain to work on an archeology dig (which is his major at ASU). I know he will gain some great experiences from this adventure, and I wish him all the best.

So that's my MidAmerica show experience - I think I will do this show again next year. Chicago is a great venue, and easy to get to from OC. I will post photos of my newps as soon as I get them back from Todd.

 

Maybe next year I will get a chance to go. I would love to meet you all in person. I haven't met anyone IRL yet.