It’s Free Comic Book Day!
Cover with the 2015 $20 Canada Superman coin
Free Comic Book Day is more than an effort to get people into the stores to buy comics. The publisher will take the opportunity to tweak a story, start a new story arc, or introduce new characters. They spend a few pages in the free comic book to enhance their stories or introduce new characters. The free comic book may also have an existing story that can summarize the story to convince readers to start reading the series.
Free Comic Book Day is more than a giveaway day. It is a marketing tool for the story writers to interact with the readers and get them attracted to the stories. The publishers and store owners use the giveaway to keep current customers interested and lure in new customers.
Although the publishers will introduce many new stories and characters, almost 90-percent will not last more than a few issues. The publishers know this and are willing to try whatever it takes to ensure that the readers come back for more. Once the readers are hooked, the publishers extend the brand into movies and other collectibles where collectors can purchase the merchandise anywhere.
The comic book industry accomplishes more in one day than the numismatic industry accomplishes in one week. Considering how ubiquitous money is in society, It is any wonder that we can raise new collectors.
2016 Canada Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice $20 silver coin
There is nothing wrong with comics and the comics culture. Comics readers love their characters, especially the superheroes, that they extend their buying beyond the comic book. Why not invite them into your shop to add comic book character coins to their collection.
You may not find coins with Superman, Batman, Captain America, or Spider-man exciting coins, but they are legal tender coins made of silver or gold that excite this crowd. Contact the publishers and see if you can source material to supplement the coins. It could create a partnership that could benefit both collectibles.
It might not be selling rare proof-like Morgans, but it will get people in your shop to look at your other inventory. Maybe they will see the Buffalo nickels and think those Type 1 coins are so cool that they might start a collection.
I have an idea… on Free Comic Book Day, the numismatic community can work with Marvel and DC to create a brass token that would be available to the collecting public. Some to the coin store, get the token for free. Let the publishers work on tokens and medals associated with their comics and sell them through coin stores. Then the coin stores can contact the New Zealand Mint or the Royal Canadian Mint to purchase a supply of comic book character coins and join the fun.
Weekly World Numismatic News for May 23, 2021
Your humble blogger in front of The Arch at the University of Georgia. The last time I was there I had hair!
This past week, I had to make a trip to Georgia for business. The trip required a flight from Baltimore to Atlanta. Travelers must follow TSA and the FAA rules for safety, including masks in the airport and on planes.
Unfortunately, the wearing of masks became a political issue. It’s not. It’s a mask. The idea of the mask is to protect you and to protect others. Masks are an inexpensive tool to reduce the spread of the virus. Nothing else!
During this trip, I learned the difference in attitudes with different people in Baltimore and Georgia. While at BWI Airport, the less than the capacity crowd was very diligent with their masks. Very few people were leaving noses uncovered, and one person politely asked me to replace my mask after taking a sip from my water bottle. It was a sense of community caring, not punitive.
Hartsfield-Jackson Airport was a different story. The number of people prevented moderate social distancing. Everyone packed into the transport trains, and the mask-wearing varied from covering the chin to uncovering the nose.
Arriving in Athens, Georgia, home of my alma mater, the University of Georgia, the scene was different. Walking the streets and the time I spent on campus, you can tell the difference between the students and everyone else. The students were wearing masks and keeping distances. Students working in local businesses were more diligent than the parents that were in town for commencements.
I had the opportunity to discuss the situation with some of the students. They relayed stories about how the students did not take the pandemic seriously until it spread on campus.
The problems are not with the students and those concerned about public health. The problems are with those who see masks as a conspiracy. Many numismatic dealers have indicated they are on the side of the conspiracy theorists.
The attitude of these dealers, mostly older and obstinant, can turn the re-opening of the hobby into a disaster.
The World’s Fair of Money will be limited to 300 tables to comply with Illinois Health Department rules. Currently, there has been no announcement regarding attendance limited. Given the attitudes of the anti-maskers, especially amongst the dealer population, I am afraid that the World’s Fair of Money will become a super spreader event.
You might want to question my assertion because of the presence of the vaccines. While the vaccines provide immunity against the SARS-CoV-2 virus that has plagued the United States for more than a year, combating the variants is uncertain. Research has shown that the vaccines will fight some of the variants, but not all of them.
As people travel, the variants will spread with the people that will carry them. The only way to prevent the variants from ruining the re-opening is to get serious about wearing masks.
Yes, wearing masks suck. As someone with allergy and respiratory issues, wearing a mask is very uncomfortable. During the workday, I will take my dog for a walk when I need to take off my mask. I know that for a year or two discomfort, we can re-open society and hold shows again.
We need to come together as a community and be leaders for the country. Numismatics has the chance to lead. By leading and acting as we care for one another, we can look like heroes to the rest of the world and possibly attract new members.
Care for your fellow numismatist and potential new numismatists. Wear a mask!
And now the news…
May 19, 2021
→ Read more at nytimes.com
May 20, 2021 → Read more at cnn.com
May 21, 2021 → Read more at the-sun.com
Let’s Have a CoinCon
The evolution of coin collecting is here. It is all around you, and if you are collecting using blue and brown folders or plastic holders, you are not part of the evolution or at the periphery of the evolution.
New collectors are collecting based on a coin’s theme. They are not interested in date or mintmark series of coins but want a connection to their collectible. The coins must have a meaning.
A midwest club of sports collectors invited me to speak about coins with sports themes. They had heard of the Basketball Hall of Fame coin but wanted to know more. I gathered my information and joined them via Zoom.
For this talk, I made a list of commemorative coins celebrating sports. This list includes the Baseball Hall of Fame coins, the many Olympic commemorative coins, and the Jackie Robinson commemorative coins.
As part of the discussion, they asked why collectors did not like the colorized Basketball Hall of Fame coins. One club member tried to buy the colorized clad proof from a local coin shop and was shamed by the shop’s owner for wanting this coin. The shop owner said that it was a damaged coin and that it will not be worth much in the future. Rather than selling the collector the colorized coin, he tried to sell a regular proof.
Unfortunately, the “traditional” numismatic feeling is that a coin is a legal tender flat metal disc with a denomination with a date, and some have mintmarks. Within the collection of the flat discs, there may be variation in how the coin was struck, changes in dies, and other unintended alterations the hobby calls errors. But that is not what interests today’s collectors.
One of the club members has been collecting the Super Bowl coins from the Highland Mint. He loves football, and the Highland Mint produces the coins for the Super Bowl coin toss. They sell replicas to collectors. The Highland Mint also sells commemorative replica sets for all of the Super Bowls’ coins. For the years before the Highland Mint’s involvement, they created a coin that may have been appropriate for the game.
After listening to the story and the information about the coins, I called him a numismatist. I told him that he did not have to collect legal tender coins to be a numismatist. By having a niche collection of numismatic-related items and learning everything about them, I said that is what numismatics is all about.
In the process, club members told me about coins that Topps made as a promotion in 2020. Inside special packs, there was a thicker card with a coin inserted honoring the player. Following a quick search, I purchased the two versions of the coin card with New York Mets ace Jacob deGrom and slugger Pete Alonso.
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- Topps Jacob deGrom first issue card and coin
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- Topps Pete Alonso second issue card and coin
I also found a few 1964 and 1971 aluminum coins, sometimes referred to as pogs, for a few previous members of the Mets, including “The Franchise,” the late Tom Seaver. I think I just started a new collection!
1964 Topps Ron Hunt (left) and 1971 Topps Tom Seaver (right)
Towards the end of the meeting, someone asked if I knew anything about the new Rolling Stones Coin. The Crown Mint produces a silver 10 gram, 1-ounce silver, and 12-gram gold coin using the tongue and lips logo for Gibraltar. The silver coins feature colorized highlights.
As we talked about the coins, I picked up my philatelic numismatic cover (PNC) with the Queen coin from the Royal Mint and put it in front of the camera. I also mentioned that the Royal Mint produced a commemorative for Elton John. Although the coin covers are sold out at the Royal Mint, I went to the Royal Mail website and found Elton John and other commemoratives, including coin covers for James Bond.
Queen Coin Cover is created in cooperation with the Royal Mint and Royal Mail (Image courtesy of the Royal Mint).
After the meeting, I was thinking about themed coins and wondered if the numismatic community can partner with other collectibles to create a more dynamic show.
For example, why not partner with the New Zealand Mint, Perth Mint, Royal Canadian Mint, and others that produce licensed comic-related coins and the publishers to create a Coin and ComicCon. The coins will be the centerpiece of the event but invite the fans to add a different flair.
There are so many themed coins that the hobby can set up CoinCons that bring in different themes with the coins as the centerpiece. A Sports CoinCon would feature sports on coins, and the grading services can sponsor autograph signings of the labels. Coin dealers could set up next to sports dealers to sell coins. And the coins do not have to be limited to a sports theme. If the dealer can sell investor coins or other themed coins, they can gain from the experience.
Outside of numismatic circles, silver and mixed metal non-circulating legal tender (NCLT) coins are popular. The mixed metals are not limited to ringed coins. Using metals like gold and niobium to highlight features is as popular as colorized coins.
Other possible CoinCon themes include advertising, art, nature, history, science, and almost anything else. An International CoinCon could set up conference rooms with different themes connected by a single hall to allow collectors to go between rooms to experience other collectibles. The CoinCon can invite auctioneers of each theme to hold auctions during the show, especially if their lots have coins to feature. How much fun could it be to have a science and technology theme in a CoinCon and hold an auction with space-related coins and souvenirs?
A CoinCon is not collecting as we knew it yesterday. Today’s collectors want a connection to what they collect. All hobby businesses must understand that this is the present and future of collecting.
Weekly World Numismatic News for May 16, 2021
It has been a long 16-months. During that time, a virus caused a worldwide pandemic still being felt in much of the world. Thanks to science and the government removing barriers that slow the development process, the pharmaceutical industry found vaccines to reduce infection rates.
The increase in vaccinations and the reduction of infections has government easing restrictions that shut down the country for three months in 2020. As the restrictions ease, coin shows are appearing. Small shows have been running for a few months, but last week, the ANA announced the World’s Fair of Money would go on.
Over the last six months, hobby and other spending have dramatically increased. The demand for goods has outpaced the supply. Big-ticket items like housing and vehicles are experiencing low inventories as people leave their homes and spend money. I regularly pass a few used car lots on my way to work, and their inventory is the lowest I have seen.
Numismatics is also seeing a surge. Even though analysts note that lower sales of bullion coins from last year, the demand for collector coins has caused prices to skyrocket. Services that monitor online markets say that the 2021-W American Silver Eagle Proof coin price is averaging $140-160 or 100-percent over their issue price.
Because silver is in high demand, dealers are charging high premiums over the spot price and sellout out of their inventory. When I recently looked at buying circulated coins whose value is tied to the silver spot price, the premiums were the highest that I have seen.
It has been a long time since silver coins were this popular. There is no telling how high this market will go with the expanding market for non-circulated legal tender (NCLT) and bullion coins drawing people into collecting.
And now the news…
May 10, 2021 → Read more at jpost.com
May 11, 2021 → Read more at axios.com
May 13, 2021 → Read more at theglowup.theroot.com
A Good Step For the Future of the NLG
Last week, the Numismatic Literary Guild (NLG) announced the appointment of Dr. Ursula Kampmann of Lörrach, Germany, to their Board of Governors. It is an announcement that has more significance to the numismatic community than captured in a press release.
Dr. Kampmann is an accomplished numismatist with a significant international following. I “met” her through CoinsWeekly (coinsweekly.com), an English language website that reports numismatic news from all over the world. She contacted me about a post I made, and it led me to become a regular reader.
CoinsWeekly looks at the entire world of numismatics, not from a single country. There have been articles that cover special issues, the appeal of coins minted outside of the United States, and even criticizes U.S.-based numismatic news for their myopic view of collecting.
The appeal of having Dr. Kampmann working with the NLG is to inject her experience outside of the United States into the hobby. The hobby needs new ideas and to break out of its old ways to grow; having a view outside of the United States border will have a significant impact.
Dr. Kampmann is not so much of an outsider as one might think. Readers of CoinsWeekly will recognize that the stories understand the U.S.-based hobby but have constructive criticism based on what is happening in the rest of the world.
She can help influence the authors and writers of numismatic content to understand the hobby more broadly than the myopic U.S. view. There is a big world outside of the U.S. borders producing coins that have great appeal to many. Those of us who write about numismatics must learn to think beyond collections of discs that all look the same.
Dr. Kampmann’s appointment appears to be the first move by new Executive Director Charles Morgan, editor of CoinWeek. Morgan, who is also known for wanting the hobby to break away from the mindset of the blue and brown albums, appears to be off to a good start. There is a lot we can learn from our European counterparts. I hope the U.S.-based writers will take this opportunity to grow.
Weekly World Numismatic News for May 9, 2021
There were two other news items that collectors should be aware. Last week, the ANA held an online Candidates Forum. Only one of the candidates did not attend.
The forum demonstrated two types of candidates: the status quo and those who want to do something. The status quo candidates refused to think outside of the proverbial box and look to continue using the same methods that have not advanced the ANA beyond its current state. The others have different ideas to move the ANA forward.
Few of the candidates have ideas discussed in the past but taking advantage of the current climate. These are the candidates that need to be elected to the ANA Board of Governors. A full review of the Candidates Form is forthcoming.
Another bit of news was a May 4 conference call by the U.S. Mint with members of the media. Even though I asked questions they answered during that conference call the previous week, I was not invited to participate. There are additional questions that the U.S. Mint did not address, which I sent via email. The U.S. Mint has not answered those questions.
I will wait a few days for the U.S. Mint to answer my questions before explaining how they do not care about the collectors and what I suggest the community can do to correct their behavior.
And now the news…
May 2, 2021 → Read more at washingtonpost.com May 4, 2021 → Read more at kitco.com May 4, 2021 → Read more at northjersey.com May 6, 2021 → Read more at sciencedaily.com May 7, 2021 → Read more at barrons.com
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