I don't know what other business(es) he's in. Do you think he's getting out of striking anything, as opposed to just "Art Medals"? Or does he classify his products like the alternate-design Jefferson nickels as "art medals" too?
"We have decided to shelve our extensive line of Art Medals by removing them from the website." Seems to sum up what they are doing.
I think the Schlag pattern nickels were primarily sold in the Art Medal section as they were new production and not Vintage Stock. Ron is focusing more on his jewelry buyers. Not enough support from the silver stackers and numismatic buyers methinks. Z
Dang, I like those Art Medals, I got turned on to Landis by one of you folks, probably ZoidMeister, on the Schlag silver nickel set, then I got the Buffalo nickels (a mule set! Thanks for the info Z!) and Cosmic Roots (Buck Rogers Spaceship!) and more recently on Ron's birthday sale I bought the 3 Octopus Steampunk medals. I was hoping to have more years to accumulate further neat pieces. Maybe he'll come back to it at some point, I hope so. In the meantime now you guys have me also chasing Carrs (not to mention Pan-Pac and other Commemoratives!)
I could be wrong, but I don't think so. There is literally nothing on the web site right now that indicates they are doing away with art medals this afternoon. They even added a new one. I suspect you received a scam email. I'm just skeptical, but like I said, I could be wrong.
I got the email too. I have emailed Landis Studios in regard to same but haven’t heard back yet. Note, they sell things other than Art Medals, I suspect guitar picks sell better and have better margins than limited run medals that require a lot of time, creativity and effort to make.
I received a really nice response just now from Timothy Grat at Landis Studios, which he has encouraged me to share, the bottom line, which I am very excited about, is that periodically there will be new Art Medals available: As a clarification to those following Landis Studios, I thought I might take a minute to shed some light on our decision to shift priorities at Landis Studios. First off it is important to understand that it is just me and Ron at Landis Studios, and we are coin makers. Ron is a numismatic engraver by trade, for over 40 years, and I have been fabricating coins and medals for 25 years. We aren't going anywhere. With that being said, it is important for a small business to find products that can produce sustainable income. And while the Art Medals were our focus right out of the gate, we have had other value streams that picked up steam a lot faster and have presented themselves as viable, requiring our attention. Listing our collection of Art Medals as singular retail items is no longer feasible because they cannot be produced efficiently at the same time as new items with greater volume take up our capacity. Most of our Art Medals are made as custom pieces. Each one is a hand fabricated blank, hot struck on the screw press, hallmarked by hand with device punches, and finished with a hand-rubbed patina. And as evidenced by the mintage figures posted on each listing image, you can see that we are not exactly taking orders on these in "production level" quantities. We have little choice but to focus on some of the other avenues we have been fostering. One of these projects, partnering with a company we have been producing die work with, is presented on our website here: https://www.landisstudios.net/stampings One of the benefits to this partnership is access to an unbelievably vast collection of vintage dies from defunct stamping houses from the greatest eras of tool and die work. As we produce stampings intended for jewelers, dies that present well as numismatic items will be paired with a reverse that is emblematic of the Potter USA collection. These Art Medals will be made available to our customers as such. This is one example of how the Landis Studios Art Medal production will continue. Which brings me to the elephant in the room...the availability of Landis designs. There are a couple things to consider. As an example, on occasion we attend festivals and trade shows (primarily for our Finger Picks, an important product in terms of our capacity). When we attend these events we also like to showcase some of our Art Medals for sale. When these pieces do not sell at the venue, they will be made immediately available online as limited stock. This will be one area where there will be occasion to acquire some of our pieces. As an important note, before someone says, "then you can just make a thousand of them"...the current mintage figures represent pieces that have been sold in this exact way for a couple years. Secondly, we are not done producing new designs. We will continue to develop new designs for the Art Medal product line, which will be released and sold in the same manner as before; the only change being that the listing will be metered by time and then relegated to the greater collection. Producing medals is a passion and labor of love for us, and we have a couple VERY exciting projects that will be of sole interest to the Numismatic Community brewing as we speak! There will be the naysayers who dismiss this choice, and everything we do as ill-advised, or sly marketing, or at worst, deceitful. And while we need to be clever in marketing, just as anyone who runs a business knows, with Landis Studios what you see is what you get. We opened our website on Friday the 13th, 2020, the VERY day the Federal Gov issued their pandemic proclamation. This is only one example of the great difficulties we have faced running a business during these strange times. We have managed to sell some precious metal collectibles to people who respect, admire, and support our artistic endeavours during a time when such things may not be considered essential. And to you who have!!! We cannot thank you enough!!! At the same time, we have also developed some new markets that will sustain Landis Studios long term. What this means to the Art Medal collector is that our future medals will be true acts of love and creativity, albeit periodically. Please continue to follow our progress and support the arts. Cheers, Timothy Grat Operations Manager, Landis Studios
