Road Report

April 24th: Day 2

Good morning coin collector, coin dealer, industry professional or random person who accidentally found this blog while googling coin operated laundromat and welcome to our Thursday installment of the RR.

Which will begin with a description of our hectic morning which included email answering, blog writing, spreadsheet updating, gym visiting, failed breakfast eating (since we could not find anything we wanted in the coffee shop and had no time to sit in the restaurant) and finally a mad dash to the bourse floor where we discovered two things:

1. Most of the other dealers were again already there, and
2. There was a check waiting for us at the table for our share of a coin we split with another dealer on Wednesday which he had already sold earlier Thursday AM.

That second one a surprising and most welcome result I would characterize as an example of the “I’m Cleaning My Oven Phenomenon”, referring of course to the 1970s ad campaign for Easy-Off oven cleaner in which a person could go about their daily activities while this magic stuff is hard at work scouring and scrubbing for them.

Which would be the first of many lovely outcomes on a day in which acquired another 25 or so cool coins variously by outright purchase, carefully orchestrated trade and deft consignment.

Including some very nice US type in copper, silver and gold, a bunch of choice world coins and one weird esoteric piece of a type I have always liked but could never find in any kind of presentable shape. Until now.

Sales were good too, including coins in all categories from colonial to esoteric, from a few hundred dollars to the mid 5-figures. Including two other fancy items we owned with two other dealers which they sold here.

In and around which we submitted coins for grading, picked up the few that were done, did some impromptu appraisals at the table, were asked for our opinion of various coins and generally did a lot of standard coin dealering activities.

Including consigning a complicated, multi-part, entirely raw collection of Mexican War of Independence coins on behalf of an astute collector who had assembled it over many years when prices were way lower than they are today in what has become a pretty hot area. So he and we have high hopes for that group.

In other words, it was typically productive day for us at a CSNS show and a good example of why we all like coming here so much.

With the action continuing right up until 6, at which time we headed to the hotel bar for a drink before we piled into a collector friend’s car and drove to Wildfire, a nice local restaurant we first tried here last year.

And then again got back to the hotel late, caught the tail end of the NFL draft and then immediately fell asleep after another looooong day here in Schaumburg.

Where we will be ready to do it all again on Friday, and blog about it right here on Saturday AM. So you might want to keep an eye out for that –

April 23rd: Day 1

Team CRO got to the airport early on Wednesday and immediately remembered that it was school vacation week in Massachusetts, which thus explained why there was an enormous crowd of young people and their parents / chaperones gumming up nearly every single aisle, ticket counter, security screening, restaurant and gate.

But we fought our way through, eventually found a place to eat breakfast, scurried onto our plane and arrived in Chicagoland unscathed and on time.

Then zipped over to the Renaissance Hotel & Convention Center here in Schaumburg, where we were delighted to find out that our room was ready, ditched our bags there and headed straight to the already-opened bourse floor for what was left of PNG Day.

PNG Day? Yes, the pre-show event held by the PNG where we could set up our table early, get situated, do some wholesaling and generally iron out any glitches in the matrix.

And we were glad we did, since we discovered that the table lamp clamps provided by the show were the shoe equivalent of child’s size 4, and the edge of the tables were a men’s 13 EEEE. So we needed to find a solution which we did in the form of the last few giant replacement clamps available, which of course every later-arriving dealer here will need and not be able to get.

So we were well illuminated when we were told right off the bat that the expensive coin we split with another dealer at the very end of the New Hampshire show Saturday was already sold here this AM.

A good start to a day during which we sold a bunch of coins, bought some extremely cool ones, delivered some coins purchased off the website by some local collectors, schmoozed excellently and fielded one curious question when a collector came to the table and asked if our company was owned by Rare Coin Wholesalers. I have no idea where one would get that notion based on anything we have ever done, said, listed, etc., but I assured him that CRO is 100% owned by MaryAnn and me.

That aside, we were generally very productive until 4 PM when the limited entrance PNG day ended, and full scale dealer set up began.

Affording us a whole new group of tables to pore through and more cool coins to find in a room that rivals the January FUN show for grand scale and dealer variety. So your author raced around and found some more nice coins among the tables that were mostly in the process of setting up.

And then all of a sudden it was 6:15 PM, so we headed out for an excellent dinner with a group of dealer and industry friends who all get together at this show every year. Returning to the hotel late and collapsing after what had been by then a 20 hour, 18,363 step day.

But do not worry, we will be rested and ready for a full day on the bourse floor on Thursday, and then blog all about all of it right here first thing on Friday AM.

Until then, then.