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Future of Coin Shows

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  • NJCoinNJCoin Posts: 2,184 ✭✭✭✭✭

    @renomedphys said:
    I like the GAC show in Tampa and hope it works out. Of course, I have my reasons. But to be sure, there were a lot of great dealers present and the layout, location, and hall convenience were all just great. The only negative thing was the attendance, and the effect it had on the mood of the other dealers.

    Kind of like saying you loved a great new restaurant that just opened. Beautiful decor, great location. Only problems were the prices were high and the food sucked. 🤣

  • CRHer700CRHer700 Posts: 1,927 ✭✭✭✭✭

    @NJCoin said:

    @renomedphys said:
    I like the GAC show in Tampa and hope it works out. Of course, I have my reasons. But to be sure, there were a lot of great dealers present and the layout, location, and hall convenience were all just great. The only negative thing was the attendance, and the effect it had on the mood of the other dealers.

    Kind of like saying you loved a great new restaurant that just opened. Beautiful decor, great location. Only problems were the prices were high and the food sucked. 🤣

    It did have a great location.

    God bless all who believe in him. Do unto others what you expect to be done to you. Dubbed a "Committee Secret Agent" by @mr1931S on 7/23/24. Founding member of CU Anti-Troll League since 9/24/24.

  • @wayneherndon said:
    Kudos to a very well done OP that tees up a great topic for discussion.
    The decision to have three shows a year could have more to do with having three opportunities to promote their brand to thousands of collectors and dealers rather than a belief that the market can support three shows.

    Collectors Universe also operates PSA and the sports card and sport memorabilia niche is much bigger than the coin niche. Collectors Universe’s future growth opportunities are almost certainly larger in the sports card/memorabilia area than in numismatics. So, it should be no surprise that Long Beach has taken on a significant sports card/memorabilia focus. While we coin people might see it as a sign of decline it could very well be a sign of design from smart people who know exactly what they are doing.

    Your point about CU and Sports cards is very interesting.

    As for three shows a year, I would ask show organizers the following question:

    "Imagine you are a collector living in city X. Which three shows a year will you travel to?"

    If city X is Miami the answer might be Orlando and Tampa. Then try San Francisco, or Denver, or Phoenix or Salt Lake City or Dallas or Des Moines. Second-rate east-coast cities won't make the cut. Only Orlando is worth the trip.

    So Long Beach and Whitman still want three shows a year? Okay, try marketing one show as a national signature show, while the other two can be regional/local shows with fewer dealers.

    Fragmentation of the market with more shows isn't helpful. All the folks complaining about $38 admission fees in Tampa are admitting it was a local drive-to show. Admission fees don't matter if you are paying $1200 in airfare. But the latter group has zero interest in a third and fourth Florida show.

    The ANA next year is another pre-ordained disaster. 60% of people will go to ANA OKC; 40% will go to alt-ANA in Rosemont. No one will get normal ANA business unless they attend both shows and combine receipts.

  • foodudefoodude Posts: 3,572 ✭✭✭

    The organizers of last week’s Great American Coin and Collectibles Show held last week in Tampa would appreciate any input about the show, especially from those that actually attended the show. It is most helpful to send input directly.

    If you are a collector, please send your input to collectorinput@gmail.com.

    If you are a dealer, please send your input to dealerinput@gmail.com. Further, if you are a dealer, it is particularly helpful to describe your business model and its reliance on Public at a show. For example, is your business model wholesale dealer-to-dealer, retail to Public, or a combination of both? If the latter, what are the approximate percentages of each? Also, do shows in various locations offer you opportunities to meet in person with key clients?

    Greg Allen Coins, LLC Show Schedule: https://forums.collectors.com/discussion/573044/our-show-schedule-updated-10-2-16 Authorized dealer for NGC, PCGS, CAC, and QA. Member of PNG, RTT (Founding Platinum Member), FUN, MSNS, and NCBA (formerly ICTA); Life Member of ANA and CSNS. NCBA Board member. "GA3" on CCE.
  • scubafuelscubafuel Posts: 1,850 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Great comments WH. I will add my thoughts as a longtime collector in the Denver area.
    1. I will travel by plane for a maximum of 3 shows a year. With Denver being a huge hub it’s easy to get anywhere. But I have time and family constraints, and also I don’t want to see the same stuff! Coins just don’t turn over that fast and I will almost certainly be viewing the same inventory if I go to shows less than a few months apart.
    2. I will travel by car (less than 2-3 hours) to any show bigger than 30 tables. So local shows are fine AS LONG AS I KNOW ABOUT THEM! Sometimes they are not well advertised, even when an ad would cost nothing, like posting it to every board.
    3. I think a good system would be 3 awesome national shows per year, spaced relatively evenly, (winter FUN, ANA rosemont, and spring or Fall Baltimore?) with the rest being well advertised regional shows in high density areas for mostly local collectors.

  • WalkerfanWalkerfan Posts: 9,318 ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited September 17, 2024 1:04PM

    Coin shows have lost their luster for me. Here are some reasons why:

    1. Travel, food and lodging are expensive and hectic.
    2. I rarely meet interesting people or forumites. And, the dealers that I talk to are not interested in discussion, education or socialization. They just want to sell you something and move on.
    3. I rarely see anything that I really want to buy and it’s mostly overpriced.
    4. You are a target for criminals. I carry, but I’d rather just not put myself in that position in the first place.
    5. Bidding and buying are much easier, comfortable and more successful for me from home or at the office.

    If you love shows, then God Bless you, and I will not begrudge you. But, They are just not for me, anymore. Especially, at this point in my numismatic collecting & investing experience.

    Sometimes, it’s better to be LUCKY than good. 🍀 🍺👍

    My Full Walker Registry Set (1916-1947):

    https://www.ngccoin.com/registry/competitive-sets/16292/

  • lilolmelilolme Posts: 2,655 ✭✭✭✭✭

    @wayneherndon said:
    The Calendar is Harder than it Looks

    Having covered location, it is now time to turn our attention to the calendar. With 52 weekends in the year and roughly a dozen national shows one might think it would be relatively easy to schedule them all in a way that avoided cannibalizing other shows and give dealers time to refresh (themselves and their inventory). Yet, calendar reality for a national show is actually much more complex.

    .
    Agree and as I posted in another thread.

    https://forums.collectors.com/discussion/comment/13789740/#Comment_13789740

    Show Schedules - I read one comment or more on how the 2025 ANA being on August 19 - 23 and the new GACC show being on Sept. 23 - 27 was putting two shows on top of each other. I chuckled a little on this one as they are a month apart (finish to start). For as long as I can recall the 'major' shows (Long Beach, Baltimore, FUN, ANA, CSNS) have had two shows inside of this one month time frame. Actually a month can be a decent amount of time between them. So I thought I would put together a list of these show for 2025 to show what I am indicating (hopefully no typos). Note: with the above there are 11 shows and the GACC adds 2 more. So they often wind up being within a month of each other and even a week.

    2025
    Jan 9 - 11 FUN

    Feb 20 - 22 Long Beach
    Feb 27 - March 1 ANA National Money Show

    March 27 - 29 Baltimore
    April 1 - 5 GACC show
    April 23 - 26 CSNS

    May - empty

    June 19 - 21 Baltimore
    June 26 - 28 Long Beach
    July 10 -12 FUN summer

    August 19 - 23 ANA
    Sept 3 - 6 IMEX (does this count?)
    Sept 23 - 27 GACC show

    Oct 23 - 25 Long Beach (never recall it being this late, normally Sept)
    Nov 6 - 8 Baltimore

    Dec - empty

    https://youtube.com/watch?v=_KWVk0XeB9o - Ruby Starr (from 'Go Jim Dandy') Piece Of My Heart
    .
    https://youtube.com/watch?v=D0FPxuQv2ns - Ruby Starr (from 'Go Jim Dandy') Maybe I'm Amazed

    RLJ 1958 - 2023

  • @lilolme said:

    @wayneherndon said:
    I read one comment or more on how the 2025 ANA being on August 19 - 23 and the new GACC show being on Sept. 23 - 27 was putting two shows on top of each other.

    Would GACC have chosen Rosemont if ANA hadn't chosen OKC? The problem isn't the amount of time between the shows, it is the venue choice of Rosemont is clearly aimed at making GACC into the alt-ANA and splitting attendance.

    There's a lot of competition between Long Beach and Baltimore time-wise, which doesn't matter for regional collectors, but does matter if top dealers don't have enough business to show up for either.

    June rivals December for the worst month of the year for shows. Graduations, weddings, vacations, barbeques, etc.

  • lilolmelilolme Posts: 2,655 ✭✭✭✭✭

    @hedgefundtradingdesk said:

    @lilolme said:

    I read one comment or more on how the 2025 ANA being on August 19 - 23 and the new GACC show being on Sept. 23 - 27 was putting two shows on top of each other.

    Would GACC have chosen Rosemont if ANA hadn't chosen OKC? The problem isn't the amount of time between the shows, it is the venue choice of Rosemont is clearly aimed at making GACC into the alt-ANA and splitting attendance.

    .
    While that may be the your 'clearly aimed' thing, my post was and is about other posts in various threads indicating that the time between ANA and GACC was a short time - but in terms of show schedules it is not as shown and I agree with wayneherndon.
    I will pass on the other stuff. :)

    https://youtube.com/watch?v=_KWVk0XeB9o - Ruby Starr (from 'Go Jim Dandy') Piece Of My Heart
    .
    https://youtube.com/watch?v=D0FPxuQv2ns - Ruby Starr (from 'Go Jim Dandy') Maybe I'm Amazed

    RLJ 1958 - 2023

  • wayneherndonwayneherndon Posts: 2,356 ✭✭✭
    edited September 19, 2024 6:12AM

    Marketing and Promoting a National Show

    There are four categories of people a national show must attract to be successful. Different marketing channels and approaches have different results with each group. So it really needs to be a multi-faceted effort with a strategy, or group of strategies, for each target category of participants.

    Dealers—The dealers who rent tables at a show are essentially the people who are paying for the show. Their bourse fees account for the bulk of a show’s revenue. So, they are a critical group in order to cover the show’s expenses, marketing, and (hopefully) a profit for the organizer. Beyond bourse fees, most of the additional revenue a show collects also comes from this same group of dealers in the form of sponsorships, advertising, and other a-la-cart fees. Fortunately, this is also the easiest to market to of all the groups. National show dealers all come together in one place at some show every few weeks. So marketing to them is essentially a trip to the show and then walking down the aisles stopping at each booth to hand out flyers, applications and share the show spiel. It is harder to say no when the bourse director is standing there pitching the show in person. These dealers attend shows to make money. So, the prospect having another weekend buying and selling inventory is often all it takes to sign them up. Regional dealers and local dealers in the show’s geographic area can similarly be recruited in the same fashion.

    Early bird – Early birds are sometimes serious collectors who are willing to pay a fee to get into the show early but generally speaking these are other dealers who don’t want the expense of a table, probably aren’t staying at the show for more than a day or two and are there primarily to do wholesale business (buy or sell) with the dealers who have tables. As other professionals in the business they typically spend way more than collectors annually and can also be a good source of fresh inventory for the dealers who rent tables. They are generally the bigger spenders or sellers at shows so getting them to the show is very important to help the tabled dealers get their numbers up. The early bird fee is typically a lot more than the price of collector admission (if there is even an admission charge for collectors) yet way less than what the tabled dealers pay. So, while they are a decent add-on source of revenue for the show, they don’t come anywhere near paying the show’s bills. Marketing to them is a bit harder to do but not as necessary. They are also there to do business so simply getting enough of the dealer group above is often all that is needed to attract this group.

    Collectors – This group doesn’t bring the show much revenue, even when there is an admission fee. But they are critical for revenue for the first group. Without them, it gets a lot harder to recruit that first group in subsequent years. Unfortunately, marketing to this group is a huge challenge. There aren’t good lists of show-prone collectors, must less by geographic region. Advertising in coin publications pays for lots of impressions but primarily reaches collectors who buy through the mail from advertisers in the publication. General advertising (TV, radio, billboards) means paying for huge visibility while probably way less than 1% of the eyeballs are the relevant audience. The shows that have good collector traffic tend to be shows that have been around a long time, been consistent in registering attendees and then using that registration list to promote future shows. This takes time to build. I haven’t seen any show with a marketing/promotion strategy that can achieve national show level customer attendance in the short term.

    Non-collectors – This group is important too. Typically, these represent estates and collections of former collectors for sale. This group is unlikely to be tuned into coin news so the marketing channels that work for collectors usually don’t work for this group. Since it is so recent, let’s take a look at what GACC did to reach this group. In the weeks leading up to the shows, there was a steady stream of announcements and press releases. Each one grew in significance. Think about a fireworks show or an entertainment performance like a concert or magic show. The action builds until the grand finale or crescendo. In GACC’s case there was a grand finale a few days before the show that was creatively coordinated with one of the show's sponsors that resulted in national “news” about the 1975 No S dime. This is the kind of story that reaches this non-collector group and makes them think “Hey, grandpa’s collection is gathering dust in the closet. I wonder if he had one of those dimes. Let’s take it to the coin show and find out.” The ANA typically does a campaign like this every year to varying effect depending on the material with which they have to work. That show is annual and rotates around the country which makes it easier to accomplish. This is way more difficult to pull off every year at the same show in the same city and even more so twice or three times a year. So, usually, this type of promotion is seen at major shows or well managed startups looking for just the right story to "go viral". IMEX also had a marketing effort of this type.

    The owners of restaurants, retail storefronts, online businesses and other similar continuous operation businesses can see how their marketing campaigns are working based on traffic and tweak them as needed. Often there are metrics to show which strategies have a positive ROI and which do not. Once strategies are tweaked, the success of the changes can frequently be determined in just a few days by monitoring the changes in traffic or conversions following the adjustment, allowing further tweaking as needed. This means that for most ventures there is an opportunity to monitor the effectiveness of marketing campaigns and optimize them in real time. On the other hand, for events like national coin shows, the whole marketing and promotion budget is spent in the weeks and months before opening day with no way to know until the show starts how effective the strategies were. By then, it's too late to adjust if something didn't work. Once the show provides that feedback, it's another year before a revised strategy can be implemented and tested. This extended delay in the marketing feedback loop process is another complicating factor new shows face.

    WH

  • wayneherndonwayneherndon Posts: 2,356 ✭✭✭
    edited September 18, 2024 5:47PM

    People often look at the past in order to predict the future. Of course, just because something happened previously doesn’t mean it will happen again. Notwithstanding, by studying the past we can better understand and anticipate the conditions, circumstances and context that are likely to influence the future. So, let’s take a drive down memory lane and review the past 20-25 years or so of national coin shows. (I’m working entirely from memory here so please let me know if I’ve missed anything.)

    First, the current national shows (excluding startups) are pretty much the same ones we had 20-25 years ago. I believe Baltimore’s third show was added sometime in the more than 20 but less than 25 year range. I could be off a year or two though. The 2024 Summer FUN show was the 18th annual. Its origin before that was a privately run show started as a national show effort in West Palm. It didn’t do well and after two to three years was either sold to FUN or maybe it shut down and FUN filled the vacuum by starting Summer FUN in West Palm. Summer FUN stayed in West Palm for a few years but it was not successful there. The organization moved it to Orlando where it grew and, more recently, thrived. CSNS went steadily downhill for many years during much of this period before finally turning the corner a few years back to the point that it has now recovered its status as a respectable national show. Until 2010, the CSNS show moved around the multi-state region but the non-Chicago Midwestern cities could not support a periodic national show. In 2011, a decision was made to make Schaumburg permanently home. The three Long Beach and two ANA shows round out the rest of picture.

    The ANA briefly tried to duplicate the smaller spring National Money Show with a similarly sized and conceived fall version. I believe that lasted for only two shows but perhaps it was as many as three. I think this was going on around 2010-2011 (ish).

    Whitman tried to establish a national show in Philadelphia in 2010-2013. They had the show in 2010 and 2011 but then cancelled it in 2012 for reasons I do not remember. It came back in 2013 but it was communicated at the time that the 2013 show would be the last. Whitman also made a few attempts in Atlanta and tried once in Nashville.

    Carl Schwenker’s valiant efforts with the Houston Coin Club were able to turn it into the Money Show of the Southwest for a few years in the downtown Houston convention center. But the national status of the show could not survive without his tireless efforts and it has since resumed being a nice regional show in the outskirts of town.

    We probably should include CoinFest which took place in the roughly 2008-2010 timeframe. It attracted a roster of dealers that would certainly qualify it for national status. CAC stickered coins onsite but I don’t recall PCGS or NGC attending, although they might have. The major auction houses did attend and I believe at least one (Heritage?) had an official show auction for at least one of the shows.

    To summarize, during this 20 to 25 year time frame, we lost two national shows (2x Santa Clara), gained two that have so far survived (both of which (Summer Baltimore and Summer FUN) were additional frequencies from established players) and had another attempted expansion and several startup efforts, none of which were able to gain enough traction to operate beyond a few years.

    At the moment, we have IMEX and GACC trying to find footing. Launching a new show takes a lot of hard work, risks a lot of money and even when everything is done right, the location or the calendar can still sink it. It’s too soon to know whether these two new efforts have enough new ideas, financial backing, and perseverance to achieve a level of success that will allow them to attain a sustainable position.

  • wayneherndonwayneherndon Posts: 2,356 ✭✭✭
    edited September 19, 2024 6:32AM

    We have had two successful national show startups in the past 20-25 years as described previously. Both of these were existing shows with established customer bases adding another show in the existing city. In the case of FUN, they started in another city but it didn’t become successful until it moved to the same city. The other startups were starting from scratch (with the exception of the ANA’s Fall National Money Show) and they didn’t make it.

    It should be clear to everyone that a prospective new national show faces a deck stacked against them. The other national shows already have the best locations. They also have staked their claims on the best dates on the calendar. The existing national shows have robust registration lists of thousands of prior attendees with mailing addresses and maybe email addresses. This makes it easy and inexpensive to market the show to a highly qualified group (who is more likely to attend than someone who has attended before?). Their marketing budget can be used for prospecting for additional customers which is more difficult and costly. The new show, on the other, has no pre-vetted list of likely attendees and is forced to rely exclusively on prospecting.

    A muscle car might be able to go from 0 to 60 in X seconds but it is probably not reasonable to expect a coin show to go from 0 to national in a one outing. The existing national shows didn’t go from 0 to national in a year or even several years. While I’m sure the startups are hoping they can do 0 to national in a year or two, they need to be prepared for the long haul in case that does not happen. Hopefully they are capitalized well enough to endure a period of initial losses and are flexible, lean, agile competitors willing to assess and redirect following disappointments.

    The concepts communicated in the OP above about the future of coins shows can be heard in chatter between attendees (dealers and public) at pretty much any show these days. It might be in the context of the future (like the OP), the current state of shows, or reminiscing about coin shows of yesteryear, but the content of the mumbling and grumbling sounds a lot like what was posted above. There is no doubt in my mind that the people behind IMEX and GACC heard it too. And, they decided they could do it better. This is exactly how capitalism and the market system are supposed to work. If there is the perception that established operators are not doing things as well as they should, new entrants who believe they can do it better or believe they have better ideas will challenge them. The market then sorts it out. Sometimes the new entrants succeed and become leaders in the industry. Other times, they don’t. Sometimes their better ideas or employees get picked up and incorporated into the products, services or staff of other players thereby improving on the status quo even if the new entrants themselves are not successful.

    Of course, the established players rarely sit on their hands in the face of competition from new entrants. They might adjust schedules, take steps to shore up their customers (dealers and collectors), adopt some of the ideas of the upstarts or even be spurred to innovate in their own ways. This is progress as well.

    While this process might on an interim basis produce more shows than are needed and spread business too thin, that is a temporary situation while the market decides who remains and who has to bail. In the meantime, new ideas get tested (dealer trading rooms, collector annex rooms, and high profile key note speakers, to list just a few examples). Sometimes these are entirely new concepts and sometimes they are ideas for updating or modernizing longstanding concepts. In any event, new ideas get tried and tested. Some of these may be winning ideas and become standard industry practice. Others may have sounded good in the brainstorming session but fail in the real world setting. We will soon have those answers because bold entrepreneurs in our industry are currently giving these new concepts a market test.

    What we are witnessing today is a perfect example of capitalism, the market system and entrepreneurship (the willingness to risk one’s capital, energy and time in pursuit of success and vision). We are also likely to witness the process of evolution where the players left standing are the ones that are strongest, have the best ideas, and are overall the best situated to lead the industry going forward. I for one am happy to see that this process is alive and well in our industry. This is what will keep us growing, innovating and relevant to an audience that has easy access to more information than ever before, is embracing technology, and is evolving as well. While temporarily it means juggling more shows than are needed and having shows that are not as productive as they would otherwise be, in the long run the process we are witnessing right now is exactly what we need in order to determine -- in OP’s words -- “The Future of Coin Shows.”

  • ThePennyLadyThePennyLady Posts: 4,468 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Wayne, I love your very detailed, very thought out, and very well written analysis on this topic. I hope all current and future show promoters read this. I also think it would make a great article if you wanted to submit it to one of the coin publications and/or post it on social media as well.

    Charmy Harker
    The Penny Lady®
  • We 2nd The Penny Lady's compliment, comment and suggestion that your outstanding analysis and insights be compiled into a "national" magazine cover-story (both print and online) -- thanks so much for sharing, Mr Wayne! :)

    :)

  • CatbertCatbert Posts: 7,165 ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited September 19, 2024 7:19AM

    Certainly the COVID years impacted coin show attendance. Collectors gained comfort with buying on-line and the decision by auction companies to not have their auctions during a major show further reduced collector attendance.

    The ANA's decision to hold their show in Oklahoma along with a competing show in Chicago will disrupt the symbiotic relationship described between dealers and collectors that helps a show survive. I think the ANA made a bad decision with OKC in their attempt to attract collectors to a show where a significant number of dealers and collectors won't attend.

    Seated Half Society member #38
    "Got a flaming heart, can't get my fill"
  • oldabeintxoldabeintx Posts: 1,932 ✭✭✭✭✭

    I ran and helped run a successful regional show back in the day. Wayne’s analysis is excellent, spot on.

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