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 Replies: 11 / Views: 1,203 |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1436 Posts |
Poll Question
I talked to a friend of mine that said it's not possible to be both a coin collector & dealer because there's a conflict of interest. If a dealer keeps the best coins he obtains for his/her own collection, then they're selling their customers their "culls". This got me thinking about it. What does everyone think?
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1227 Posts |
I say yes, because "I keep the very nicest for myself" is not mutually exclusive with "I have nice merchandise."
You can collect all MS-70 and still sell perfectly reputable MS-65. Nothing wrong with that.
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Valued Member
United States
54 Posts |
Just because they are a dealer doesn't mean they will keep all the best either. Even a dealer can't afford every coin they want.
One man's cull is another man's gem.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
3486 Posts |
Dealers who started out as collectors are the best folk with whom to do business.
They understand the "search."
Dealers who were never collectors are only in it for the money/profit.
Perhaps they might offer something that you want, but they are, in my opinion, a waste of my time.
A collector/dealer, just as oneself, has an area or three in which they specialize and are therefore
a great source of information in these areas.
And in my experience, they just love to talk coins.
Something that a non-collecting dealer will not do.
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Pillar of the Community
 United States
1436 Posts |
mathewvincent, very good point when you said "Dealers who started out as collectors are the best folk with whom to do business. They understand the "search." I definitely agree w/ that.
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Bedrock of the Community
United States
36746 Posts |
Q. David Bowers is both a collector and very successful dealer.
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Bedrock of the Community
13014 Posts |
Theres no conflict of interest between the two. A conflict of interest would be if they were getting incentives elsewhere to sell fakes or manipulate pricing in some unethical way.
Businesses do that all the time. If you own the place you get first crack at inventory or the best stuff. As long as everything else you sell is what you say it is youre reliable.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1302 Posts |
as long as you aren't emotional or addicted to buying coins for yourself you can do both. some dealers save their best coins for shows anyway- or for special customers... so I see no problem.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
539 Posts |
I think others have said this as well but for me it is not an issue of reliability at all as long as the dealer (and it wouldn't matter if they were a collector or not) was not selling fakes. One man's opinion on a grade is just that, his opinion. So unless it is a slabbed coin, the buyer would buy based on his opinion. The dealer reluctance or willingness to sell does not make them a reliable or unreliable dealer
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Valued Member
Philippines
386 Posts |
Quote:
Dealers who started out as collectors are the best folk with whom to do business  And most of my friends now in numismatics where once my dealers before decades ago when I started. |
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Moderator
 Australia
16831 Posts |
It is perhaps not ideal from the dealer's point of view, since it's never good business practice to become emotionally attached to the things you're trying to sell. But the only person who's really affected by that is the dealer themselves.
Most dealers have "special customers" - people who regularly come into the store and for whom they purchase coins and keep coins set aside rather than put in the shop window, because they know those customers will want to buy those coins. If a dealer is themselves a collector, then they are simply adding their own name to the list of "special customers". Ideally, the dealer should pay for his own stock out of his own money, at least as far as the company books are concerned; simply pocketing rare coins out of their own store front raises all sorts of potential problems regarding income tax avoidance, etc.
A problem only comes about when the dealer can't bear to sell coins that they want for themselves, when they can't really afford to keep them either. I know of at least one big-name dealer-collector that has gotten into financial difficulties because of this.
Don't say "infinitely" when you mean "very"; otherwise, you'll have no word left when you want to talk about something really infinite. - C. S. Lewis
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Bedrock of the Community
13014 Posts |
Quote:
A problem only comes about when the dealer can't bear to sell coins that they want for themselves, when they can't really afford to keep them either. I know of at least one big-name dealer-collector that has gotten into financial difficulties because of this. Even then though they can still be a perfectly reliable dealer, just a terrible business person |
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Replies: 11 / Views: 1,203 |
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Posted 08/02/2012 1:05 pm
