What's your best experience at a brick and mortar coin shop?

There have been several threads recently focusing on bad experiences with local coin dealers. Let's flip the script! Please share your stories of positive coin shop experiences.

 

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I love my LCS. The dealer is friendly and is always ready to talk coins. He loves to introduce people to collecting and gets a ton of traffic through his store as he also sells jewelry and antiques. He buys at fair prices and is open reliably.

 

I've been going to my local shop for about ten years. I collect foreign coins and I get great deals on stuff there since it's not something they specialize in. They all know my name, they've bought me lunch before and given me a box of chocolates at Christmastime. It's a great experience all around.

 

Leaving

 

When starting my wheat cent collection years ago, I took a list of coins I needed still to my LCS and one of the cents was a very common date. He offered to just give me one! I said thanks and bought some other stuff so he would make a little bit!

 

My LCS sucks I've said it many times the few things he has nobody wants and he has to "order in" anything and everything which he never gets around to.

That said. If you do find something you want to purchase, he gives change with common older date coins of little value he takes in.

that's the plus to the experience. Lol.in your change you are guaranteed to see older coins, 40s and 50s jeffersons, 40s and 50s wheat cents, no silver. Sometimes older if it's common or too worn.

 

My best was at a local shop many years ago. I was brought behind the counter to search several hundred boxes and drawers of coins. It was a big mess. After all the sorting was done we had found many really valuable coins mixed in the average stuff. It was a cool treasure hunt I'll never forget.
I bought a few hundred UNC rolls of early Lincolns but have still not gone thru them.

 

I can't remember the last time I was at a B&M coin shop.

 

I must be fortunate. My LCS is awesome. I even consider the fellow and his wife my friends. There were two times I wanted to gift certain coins to several CT members. I emailed him my list with a shipping address. He would ship and we would square up when I made it in. He’s just a fully trustworthy guy that happens to deal coins and I am happy to know him.

 

I've frequented several different brick and mortar coin-dealers in the past few years. Perhaps the best experience I've had with a coin-dealer personally was in Jacksonville, Florida. The staff was always quite attentive and friendly with their customers, and they always treated you the same whether you were a high-dollar customer or a budget-minded cherrypicker like myself. Not to mention, they even offered me a job at one point, but I was unable to take it since I was in the process of moving at the time.

 

my best experience at a coin shop was in 2015 when I suddenly found myself in serious financial straits I took half my collection (mostly morgans and walkers) in for evaluation and possible sale. Two days later the company called me with thier summery and offered me $4200 for the collection! Most were not even graded and I was expecting aroun 3 grand total. No doubt I took the offer paid my responsibility, got out of that jam and pocketed 600 bucks to start the rebuild!

 

The best LCS that I've been to in my 60+ years is Schofield Coin & Hobby in Schofield, WI. Bob Petts is very personable and honest. I brought an elderly friend's large coin collection, that she inherited from her mother, to Bob to sell. He and I spent many hours going through each item in the collection. My friend was impressed with his attention to detail and felt comfort in knowing she wasn't getting taken advantage of. Bob also lets the local coin club use his shop for their meetings.

Over the years I've had a number of bad experiences with local coin shops in other places I've lived. The worse one was in Rapid City, SD back in the early 1990's. Without even going through what I was selling, he made me an offer less than face (the lot included silver and 19th century type coins). That experience left such a bad taste in my mouth I didn't set foot in another LCS for several decades.

 

When we had a LCS here years ago the owner was very personable and was always fair with his prices. He had a customer who wanted 18 coins framed and Jack knew I was good at accomplishing the task. It took me a couple of days to do the job and he paid me with a MS 45 Micro S dime. Worth a lot more than it cost me to frame the coins.

 

I know we're trying to focus on the good - but I'll share a bit of the bad first to establish contrast. I hope this thread is read by LCS folks too, and that they come away with a sense of our appreciation.
1. When I was 12 years old (in the 1970s) in Tulsa, OK, I rode my bicycle to LCS#1 to try to sell a Mercury dime. I got a lowball offer and rejected it. I got on my bike and rode straight to LCS#2. The guy there said, "So-and-so from LCS#1 called me and said you'd be coming." He offered me more and we closed the deal. Moral of the story: if you are colluding to price-fix against 12-year-old hobbyists on sub-ten-dollar coins, you should probably take a look in the mirror. (I quit collecting shortly thereafter and didn't resume until I was in my mid-30s).

2. Now I'm in my 50s. I went to a new LCS a few years ago and told the two guys what I liked and was interested in. One guy tried to sell me on a new US Mint product that was coming out - one of those things with "low mintage" that is sure to go up in value - but I told him I had no interest in that series, nor holding a coin that was exactly equal to all 50,000 others in the mintage. He got passive aggressive, saying things like, "well, whatever you want... I'm just the coin professional, what do I know?" (I haven't been back).

So, I did find a shop in my town that is a big outfit (mainly jewelry, where the coins are in their own area). I got a young guy who deals with a lot of volume, tells me what he can and can't do (sometimes very concisely, since he's busy). There's no place to sit and look through junk bins for cherries, and that's a bummer. But he's honest, I understand the contours of the deals we make, and he doesn't give me the feeling that he's shaking me down.

So - if I found a place that had integrity and respect (unlike the first two shops I mention above) and treat me like a friend, as some of you folks experience, especially if they let me sift through bags of "junk" sometimes - then I'd be ALL IN. (After Covid, that is!) This isn't rocket science: a big part of it is just applying what we learned in kindergarten!

 

Not to de-rail the thread..... Any chance that LCS was near 11th and Garnett?

 

When I lived in Washington State I had the best coin dealers anyone could ever want. I was friends with them. Never met them until I went into their store.

The 2 guys running the place learned what I liked. I could walk in and buy a $300 coin. The following week, the same thing. They put a small box in their antique safe and when they got coins in that they knew I liked, into the box they went until I came in.

I never had to ask how much. It was always affordable and at a good price. I sure miss those guys.

 

LOL.... My dealer gets stuff in that he thinks I would like and texts me photos. I don't know if he is a nice guy.... Or an enabler!!

 

Sounds like a mix of both if you ask me, @Randy Abercrombie.

 

Probably both but cell phones hadn't been invented when I dealt with this LCS.

 

I've had good and bad experiences with coin shops. The bad ones I just walked away from and didn't do business with. The good ones I'll buy, sell and trade with. Most of the shops that I do business with now also have coin and currency machines that I work on so we develop a good working relationship.
The best deals come after I've established trust and friendship with the dealer. They know what I like and will look for or hold product for me. Also I know what they can turn so will trade that product with them. Just remember that they need a profit just to keep the rent paid and the lights on.