SELL YOUR DUPLICATES, GROW THE HOBBY

While enjoying a health walk on Sunday, I pondered the present marketplace for Liberty Seated coins and the potential impact on growing Liberty Seated Collector Club membership levels. LSCC membership has been consistently at 650 for the past several years. Though the LSCC leadership team continues outreach efforts, the club size remains constant. Why? One of the reasons, I surmised, is the limited availability of quality Seated coins in the marketplace. There are more Liberty Seated collectors striving to build quality sets than there are surviving examples to populate those sets. This fact that Liberty Seated coinage supply is limiting the size of the collector community became evident during the past several months.

Let's look at Morgan dollars, Indian Cents and Buffalo Nickels. These designs and denominations drive a huge amount of the overall numismatic marketplace with collectors numbering in the thousands. One visit to a coin show will reinforce this point as these coins are available from most dealers. The key date 1893-S Morgan has a mintage of 100,000 and is not a rare coin as 10-20 will be easily seen at the Denver ANA, maybe more. But walk the Denver ANA bourse and try to find key and semi-key date Liberty Seated coins in Very Fine through AU grades. This challenge will be substantial with only 2-3 speciality dealers being potential sources and the balance of the bourse being a long arduous search.

This thought process leads me to believe that Liberty Seated coinage supply must increase to enable a growth in the number of collectors of individual series. The issue is most acute for Seated quarters, halves and dollars with half dimes still attempting to garner respect and Seated dimes date and mintmarks being in a reasonable demand and supply balance. Die varieties are a completely different story for Seated dimes as popularity continues to increase.

Where are all the quality Liberty Seated coins? Obviously, they are in collector hands. Let's examine that situation further based on my personal experience of building a 1600 piece Seated dime die variety reference set.

Collectors go through a learning process when engaging a new collecting objective. They dabble and buy some initial pieces to learn the series. Then come the books or other information sources followed by more purchases towards a collecting goal. With time, collectors transition from being novices to advanced collectors and upgrading takes place. The number of coins in the collection continues to increase. Duplicates begin to pile up with some hesitation on how to divest these coins without losing money against purchase prices. Collectors must also admit their early mistakes. Some collectors are so in love with their coins that it breaks their heart to contemplate selling their duplicates.

Die variety collecting further exacerbates the market supply situation as die variety collectors may own 5-10 or more quality examples of a certain date. This takes a substantial toll on the available supply.

Key and semi-key date hoarding is yet another issue as certain individuals attempt to corner the market for certain dates and drive prices upward. Most individuals who attempt this strategy fail to recognize how to release their accumulations without impacting new higher pricing levels.

Conclusion? To enable the next generations of collectors, the marketplace must have a stable supply of quality coins. The larger the supply, the higher the confidence that a collector can select a Liberty Seated denomination and feel secure that a date and mintmark set can be completed in a reasonable amount of time. Collectors must remain active with their hobby else they will lose interest and move on to a "more collectible" series. If collectors take valuable time out of a business schedule to attend coin shows and walk away with few purchases, then their excitement for the hobby wanes.

To enable a vibrant marketplace for Liberty Seated coinage, advanced collectors should actively sell their duplicates to allow less experienced collectors to access and expand their own collections. The movement of quality duplicates from advanced to less experienced collectors is a critical process to ensure a healthy market and hobby. Advanced collectors should be thinking long term as to who will be available to purchase their prized collections when the time does come to divest. If advanced collectors starve the marketplace by holding back duplicates, then the available number of collectors to purchase their high grade specimens has been limited. It is in the best interest of advanced collectors to nurture the formation of a healthy collector base to absorb their high end collections when the time comes.

These are my thoughts on a Tuesday morning. What say you on this topic? Please email your comments and feedback for inclusion into a forthcoming edition of the Daily Blog.

To read the complete article, see:
Enabling a Broader Collecting Community: The Case for Selling Liberty Seated Coinage Duplicates (http://www.seateddimevarieties.com/DailyBlog.htm)

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