Coins We Love: The ANA WFOM Is Like Thanksgiving… BUT With More Coins!

ANA Wrap-Up

So, the ANA World’s Fair of Money, for a large dealer, is kind of like inviting your in-laws over for the Thanksgiving weekend along with 20 of your best friends, all of whom have traveled from far away. Chaos reigns and priorities are difficult to line up. But somehow it all needs to go smoothly, no lamps get broken and, oh yeah, you have to make sure all of the beds are made, you have air mattresses for the nieces and nephews and you almost forgot to tell your wife that you had also invited all of your neighborhood over for turkey and football…whoops. Also, we forgot the Cowboys are playing the Commanders and the weird uncle is from Dallas (no offense intended to Cowboys fans). So, how did it all work out for DLRC?

Two weeks before the show, we pull a wide range of coins that represent the DLRC brand and inventory well to display in our showcases. We try to avoid any duplicates, if possible, and focus strongly on eye appeal. In some cases, like Baltimore, we also focus on coins over whatever the local tax threshold is ($1,000 in some states, but thankfully not an issue in Pennsylvania — but, no currency there!). After we’ve pulled those coins, we re-price them to our best numbers to make life easier for the customers in attendance and for the show staff. This generally takes at least a full day or two between several people. After the “retail” coins are chosen, we go through the inventory to pull out coins that we think are better for wholesale avenues. These might be coins that are in “vanity” holders, pieces we took in trade that aren’t very eye appealing, or coins that we just generally don’t want to place with customers. These coins get priced with the intention of not returning home with us and we exclusively show these to dealers that we have relationships with.

After all of this, we pack our show supplies. We ended up having about 2-3 suitcases of “stuff" to prepare our booth, several suitcases of empty boxes, a painting that we were auctioning on behalf of the ANA, and whatever other trinkets we are bringing to the show. Oh yeah, and a huge lightbox that looks like a set of golf clubs wandering through the airport. It looks more like a military relocation event than a coin show when you see us go through the Norfolk airport.

We arrived in shifts to Pittsburgh, starting on Saturday, to get the early deals. I would say that we were generally happy with the results, though not overwhelmed early on. See, when you go to the ANA show, the general feeling is that the folks that aren’t on the constant show circuit generally “like” their coins a little more and the prices trend a bit higher than normal. As a result, you have to be aware of your precarious position and avoid the inevitable traps. We did our best and that resulted in some quality purchases, especially from the late night appointments. One of our favorite early customers ended up buying more than expected and while we tried to carry our weight in the purchases, I’m afraid we didn’t do what we had both hoped. We closed the windows and turned off the grading lamps around 11pm that night.

Sunday involved an early morning meeting with one customer while the rest of the staff had arrived and set us up in a conference room for the day. We met various clients throughout the day, venturing from hotel rooms to conference rooms to the downstairs Starbucks where we guided customers upstairs. One of our better deals for the week came about in the conference room towards the end of the day. One of our favorite sellers had mentioned that they wouldn’t have any coins for the ANA as the summer had been a bit odd. But, lo and behold, they arrived at 4pm with 6 boxes of coins for sale. We finished our day off acquiring as many of those items as we could and prepared for the actual show setup on Monday.

Monday was the ANA’s Dealer Day. We arrived about 30 minutes before the show and noticed some problems with registration. Unfortunately, things didn’t go very smoothly and it was 2 hours later before we were able to enter. Thankfully, most of the others had the same issue, so we didn’t miss out on much. But, we were able to enter the bourse, set our tables up, and move forward. Considering the delayed start ,it worked itself out eventually and it was a successful day overall. To be frank, I have little recollection of the evening, but I think it was a quick trip to Cheesecake Factory (no cheesecake, mind you) and an early bedtime. 

Tuesday was a full day for the regular show setup and was rather unremarkable. Yes, we sold quite a few coins and bought even more…but the best purchases for the week had already occurred, so it’s hard to find anything really meaningful to recap. The show did kick off officially at noon on Tuesday and the public attendance picked up the show quite a bit. Near the end of the day, I do remember asking the team “What day is it?” This did not bode well for Wednesday (or the rest of the week!). The evening was capped by a nice PNG Board meeting at a local restaurant down the street. I made the mistake of walking to dinner about a half of a mile…let’s just say I wouldn’t advise that, due to safety concern,s ever again. The return to the hotel was certainly by way of Uber. 

Wednesday was another full day at the show and the public attendance was better than the previous event in Pittsburgh and was far better than we expected. In general, the collectors that filled the bourse floor were actively searching for coins for their collections and created quite a buzz during the day. By the afternoon, we had once again lost track of the day and we started feeling the ramifications of being away from home for a few days too long! There were no important ANA events to write home about, except for the PCGS Awards Reception. We received an award on behalf of the Hansen Collection and enjoyed watching the induction of our friend Laura Sperber into the PCGS Coin Facts Hall of Fame. The speech was given by Kevin Lipton. For those of you who know these folks, you know it was quite an entertaining event! Congrats Laura! That evening, I attended the National Coin and Bullion Association Dinner where I received an award for leading the tax exemption fight on coins in Virginia. That was quite an honor and a fun evening with several of our friends in attendance.

Thursday was a busy one. Somehow, the coffee downstairs propelled our feet back to the busy bourse floor and we hit the ground running. We had several meetings with vendors, the Coin of the Year Ceremony for the ANA, and then the ANA Member Awards event in the afternoon. I was honored to present my friend Devin Hipp a Glenn Smedley award for recognition of his service to coin education as well as the 60-year Club Membership award to my local coin club, the Tidewater Coin Club. I was supposed to attend another dinner Thursday night, but I simply couldn’t make it. The marathon was nearly over, but I didn’t have a final sprint left in me to be social. So our team ended up having a quick dinner in the restaurant at the hotel…and it was a real joy to hang out with our folks. We don’t get to do that often enough as an extended team and it’s always fun getting to know each other a little more on a personal basis. Fun fact: Amethyst, our marketing guru, spent 4 years in the Navy as a Diesel Mechanic. I think that fact shocked our colleague/team member/friend Bob Mellor, the coin grading instructor/NASA Launch Director. The final sprint was packing a suitcase for the return home the following evening.

Friday: Wow. Busy. ANA Board Meeting from 8am until noon or so followed by more time on the bourse floor. Friday, on the wholesale side of things, is a day of wrapping up details, some final visits with clients, and cleaning up checks and invoices. On the retail side, we’re still visiting with clients, customers, and friends. I would venture to say by 2pm the floor thinned out dramatically and while there were still people going up and down the aisles, the quantity had decreased sharply and things were starting to slow down. We ended up packing up the supplies, displays, and coins, and allowing the team to depart once the day had closed. After spending 7 days in Pittsburgh, it was time to go home. Our team had fought the good fight valiantly and deserved some rest. We do hear (and feel for) the folks who asked about dealer attendance on Saturday…unfortunately, it’s just not a viable solution to keep everyone away from home after the school year has started back, when Monday is going to come so quickly, after a week away from family. It’s a “Catch 22” for dealers, and when the show is in a place like Pittsburgh, it’s not easy to convince the rest of the family to take a vacation for a week to the coin show. 😊 Trust me, I tried! Thankfully, the show next year will be earlier in August and, for those of us who have to deal with such things, will hopefully come before the school year begins. But we’ll long for a place that’s actually a little more interesting to attend in the future! 

Overall, the show was a fantastic success. The coin market activity was incredible beyond our expectations on both the buying and selling side. The convention center in Pittsburgh is FANTASTIC (I’ll even forgive them for being a Pepsi property), the new purchases are great, and the “energy” of the room was simply thriving. Now we have to get our house back in order and prepare for the Fall. We were planning on attending the Long Beach Show next week, but now that we’re still recovering from the ANA, it’s simply too close for us to attend. We need an additional week off to catch our breath. So, our next event will be a few weeks off and we’ll see how things are going then. Until then, we’ll conclude this XL (extra long) version of the CWL and wish you all a wonderful Labor Day weekend!

Numismatically Yours,
John Brush and Your Friends at DLRC

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