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What is the role of wholesale coin dealers?

291fifth291fifth Posts: 24,817 ✭✭✭✭✭
in U.S. Coin Forum
From the standpoint of retail dealers, what function do wholesale dealers play?

How important are they in today's numismatic market?

Has their role changed in recent years?

All glory is fleeting.

Comments

  • PerryHallPerryHall Posts: 47,055 ✭✭✭✭✭
    They are the middlemen and they help make coins more expensive.

    Worry is the interest you pay on a debt you may not owe.
    "Paper money eventually returns to its intrinsic value---zero."----Voltaire
    "Everything you say should be true, but not everything true should be said."----Voltaire

  • LongacreLongacre Posts: 16,717 ✭✭✭
    The market cannot survive without wholesalers. If coins only came from collectors in the marketplace, the coin market would seize up.
    Always took candy from strangers
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    Working for the boss every night and day
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  • savoyspecialsavoyspecial Posts: 7,322 ✭✭✭✭
    provide liquidity for dealers with slow moving inventory

    provide a way for dealers to sell problem coins they dont want to retail

    www.brunkauctions.com

  • ColonialCoinUnionColonialCoinUnion Posts: 10,087 ✭✭✭
    It's not like someone designed the industry and determined that a certain number of wholesalers were necessary to make the whole thing work.

    Wholesalers exist because individual business people determined that they could make money by buying coins and selling them to other dealers or funneling them into auctions.

    As a retailer, we don't need wholesalers per se, but if one of them has a coin for sale that we like and is priced right, we'll buy it. And if they call us to order something, we'll sell it to them.

    I would also add that I doubt any dealer is purely retail or purely wholesale.

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  • PTVETTERPTVETTER Posts: 6,046 ✭✭✭✭✭

    I would also add that I doubt any dealer is purely retail or purely wholesale.


    I strongly agreeimage
    Pat Vetter,Mercury Dime registry set,1938 Proof set registry,Pat & BJ Coins:724-325-7211


  • coinguy1coinguy1 Posts: 13,484 ✭✭✭


    << <i>I would also add that I doubt any dealer is purely retail or purely wholesale.


    I strongly agreeimage >>

    And I strongly disagreeimage I know a (granted, small) number of dealers who are purely wholesale - they do not sell to anyone other than other dealers. That's not to say they don't occasionally obtain "retail" prices, but that's an entirely different matter.image
  • joebb21joebb21 Posts: 4,790 ✭✭✭✭✭
    and we also ALL know of a certain dealer that ONLY does retail (unless they must discount it to move)
    may the fonz be with you...always...
  • coinguy1coinguy1 Posts: 13,484 ✭✭✭


    << <i>and we also ALL know of a certain dealer that ONLY does retail (unless they must discount it to move) >>

    In which case, that dealer doesn't do retail-only.
  • MowgliMowgli Posts: 1,219 ✭


    << <i>They are the middlemen and they help make coins more expensive. >>



    For me they are the reason coins are cheaper - when I buy from them rather than the retailers.
    In the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king.
  • WTCGWTCG Posts: 8,940 ✭✭✭
    Wholesale dealers find and procure the coins that the retail dealers seek for their customers. While wholesale dealers may seem mostly like middlemen, the retail dealers often do not have the time nor resources to find the coins themselves and need to rely on the wholesalers who can find coins on their behalf.

    There aren't many dealers who are exclusively retail, but there are some dealers who are exclusively wholesale.
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  • GreeniejrGreeniejr Posts: 1,321 ✭✭✭
    As was stated before, it is purely a liquidity issue. As a B+M we take in 700+ Morgan/Peace dollar per month and can typically sell 300+-. We need an outlet for the remaining 400. The rest goes to the wholesaler who then has outlets for it. On the other hand we were doing a promotion where we needed a quantity of BU Buffalo Nickels but did not have them in stock. We called up a wholesaler and bought them. They make the market run and connect the buyers to the sellers who may not otherwise contact one another.
  • seateddimeseateddime Posts: 6,180 ✭✭✭
    to sit at CF's table and buy and sell and then buy more and sell more?
    I seldom check PM's but do check emails often jason@seated.org

    Buying top quality Seated Dimes in Gem BU and Proof.

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  • seateddimeseateddime Posts: 6,180 ✭✭✭
    next poster has it.........
    I seldom check PM's but do check emails often jason@seated.org

    Buying top quality Seated Dimes in Gem BU and Proof.

    Buying great coins - monster eye appeal only.
  • roadrunnerroadrunner Posts: 28,322 ✭✭✭✭✭
    At the majority of coin shows most of the dealers in attendance or more wholesalers than retailers. In fact the bulk of the coin market has morphed further to the wholesale side than ever before.

    Wholesalers supply most of the market liquidity. And a very large percentage of them buy for their own collection/investment and therefore supply another outlet that takes coins off the market.

    roadrunner
    Barbarous Relic No More, LSCC -GoldSeek--shadow stats--SafeHaven--321gold
  • Walkerguy21DWalkerguy21D Posts: 11,804 ✭✭✭✭✭
    WTCG (Wei) already posted most of my thoughts on the subject....I would also add, that the wholesale/retail distinctions are not sharply delineated.....if a 'retail' dealer buys a courtesy-discounted coin from another 'retail' dealer because he has a customer for it, does that make the second dealer a wholesaler? When a 'fresh collection' of significant coins comes on the scene from a dealer buying them from the collector, the coins may be quickly dispersed to a number of dealers, many of whom may flip them quickly to other dealers, etc., until they get acquired by collectors at retail-level prices. Was there ever really a wholesaler involved?
    A good friend of mine routinely sells $30k+ worth of material to national wholesaler Larry Lee when he is set up at shows in the Southeast - so he's a wholesaler's wholesaler, I guess?
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