Ebay Is Now My Main Coin Store. Sigh.

i guess I'm lucky in that I have several coin shops in my area. and by several, I mean 8+. that's not counting the cash4gold places. yes, the shops deal in bullion. however, every shop has more coins than bullion in the store. and 1 store even has a large selection of roman coins, but he's the only one to carry anything other than u.s. coins. sadly, I have to use the internet for 50% of my collection due to this reason.

I live in Modesto, CA and there were three coin shops in town, one is closed now that the owner passed away last year. Of the other two I had gone into the one near downtown the man was so rude and didn't want to be bothered it seemed, this was a few years ago when things weren't as hectic as now. He passed away earlier this year and his wife now runs the shop and she is just as rude as he was. The third "coin shop" isn't a coin shop at all. You go in the front door and it there is a wall with two glass windows with slots under each to put your coins through and the guy on the other side will assess them and make his offer. There are no display cases of coins for a customer to view. I would not patronize either one of them as both of those coin shops have reputations of low balling people.

I have to travel two hours to the coast to Santa Cruz where I lived from 1966 to 1974. My family moved there in '66 just before I turned ten and I enlisted in the Marine Corps in November '74 shortly after graduating from high school. I have known a dealer who began his coin selling career working for one of the two coin shops in town and now he has his own shop. I've known him since 1972 and his shop is a place where collectors can hang out and socialize with each other. The good stuff that comes in goes out almost immediately and with me being so far away and not able to visit his shop as much as I would like I get most of my coins from certain dealers I have befriended at the local coin shows and also from a professional wholesaler whom I get coins on memo to peddle at local flea markets and I get most of my Morgan dollars from him now. I have also acquired some very nice type coins for my 19th and 29th Century type sets from him. He has a very nice Unc. 1867 2 cent piece and an MS-63 1876-CC Seated Liberty dime on hold for me.

A new source of some nice type coins is a woman who sells jewelry and glassware at a flea market I attend, she is selling some of her coins now to help pay the bills for her 30 year old daughter who is a recovering alcoholic. Yesterday I got a very nice NGC XF-40 1853 Seated Liberty half for just $165.00 and I am going to get an NGC AU-58 1858-O Seated Liberty half ($275.00), an NGC XF 1860-S ($90.00) Seated Liberty half that was improperly cleaned, still a very presentable coin, and an MS-63 1884-CC GSA dollar ($170.00) from her next week.

The plastic of the slab is quite scratched and there are no scratches on the coin.






Ed
ANA LN-3175

"I am close to the KC area and I can't find anyhting on coin shows in my area. on in St Louis."

Worst show I ever did was the RCDA in St. Louis. Left a day early and did more business at a flea market.

What's the smallest denomination in a 29th century set?

one shop in LA?

No, one in my city. Alhambra. I'm sure there are plenty in L.A.
There are many cities within Los Angeles County that have coin shops. There is also one in Pasadena, where the Rose Bowl is, but it's small and dirty Very unorganized shop.

I am with biggfredd here. Sounds to me like a COIN dealer who is doing a brisk business and thats all. Wait, its not all.

This dealer is doing a brisk business and the person who usually does the collector grading is DYING. The shop is having trouble replacing their DYING grader. So you are asked to wait a few HOURS for the other folks to pick up the slack of the DYING man. Not unreasonable IMO.

We are lucky to have several dealers in Northern VA alone. We go accross the bridge to MD and there are a good 4 or 5 in resonable driving distance. Then if I wanted to dodge bullets in DC or Baltimore, add even more. So we are lucky.

Our main store, the owner is a crotchety guy, but he warms up as soon as he knows you are a serious collector. I constantly tell him he needs to realize that solely silver and gold transactions are a good thing. they can drive the business far beyond pure numismatic transactions can. So you have a counter full of Maple Leafs, Pandas, Eagles and Britannias to satisfy that.

He complains about customers trying to buy all of his cheaper Morgans. Obvious silver people or bulk dealers. I tell him just say nope and be done with it. He doesn't want to deal with the silver stuff, so he has sold out all his Eagles and wont get anymore. He still does a brilliant business, but he is losing money IMO.

So back to the original point, that dealer is still a coin dealer. They are simply being smart and making money, as is the point of having a business. It does suck that grading guy is dying and isn't there to be that personable guy to talk coins with, but cancer kind of puts a damper on things like that. That doesn't make this dealer just a bullion dealer.