Think twice before you offer to sell coins

[+Traveling Chief]

Wow... I just got done reading "Idaho Micro Coin Update (OH BOY)" thread. It was an eye opener for sure. I'm not so sure I'd ever go through the pain of offering a coin for mass sales. I thought fellow cachers were compassionate folk but I guess it changes when you put $$ on the line. Life's too short for that kind of drama. I'm not sure it's worth that amount of heart-ache. I think I'll go outside and cache instead.

 

Mike

[+wsgaskins]

I went through a lot of pain on the sales of my first geocoin last year. But I was doing everything by hand (for the most part), and I didn't have mail-merge, etc. It is a royal pain to handle all of these in a timely manner, and I knew that it would be going in. Thankfully, it seems that I didn't mess up, and nobody's order got lost (as far as I can tell!).

 

But.... I'd do it again -- and I might be doing it again soon, if the geo-wife consents to letting me be in the home office late into the night for 2 weeks straight again doing coin packing, label printing, invoicing, etc.

[+Windrose]

It's something I've spent ALOT of time thinking about for the past couple of weeks. And I'm still on the fence.....to sell or not to sell.... And then there's the question off quanity to sell. Not to mention ebay sales.

 

My head hurts.

 

Windrose

[+Semper Questio]

Wow... I just got done reading "Idaho Micro Coin Update (OH BOY)" thread. It was an eye opener for sure. I'm not so sure I'd ever go through the pain of offering a coin for mass sales. I thought fellow cachers were compassionate folk but I guess it changes when you put $$ on the line. Life's too short for that kind of drama. I'm not sure it's worth that amount of heart-ache. I think I'll go outside and cache instead.

 

Mike

 

Going through the APE Coin development, sales, and shipping process I decided I'd never do one again - and I had lots of help! Some folks just aren't cut out for it and I'm one of them. I'd rather go caching.

[+Droo]

Yes, when a coin maker decides to avoid the middlemen there can be some delays, headaches and anxious people wondering what they paid for. I've pre-ordered a handful of times and learned patience and tolerance when waiting for someone's coins to be made. I've also learned I'm a buyer not a financier so I won't prepay for coins that have yet to be manufactured. Too hard to keep track of what I've reserved, what I've paid for and what's coming up and I want to get a hold of.... not to mention what's in the mail after the check was sent.

[+ozymandiasism]

It is a LOT of work to sell coins, but the result can be fruitful. I have learnt so much and it has been an incredibly rewarding experience for me. I have gained knowledge from negotiating with the coin mint, designing the coin itself, talking to cachers about tehir experiecnes in making coins, dealing with forum drama, creating a website, reseraching the best packaging methods, to keeping a list of buyers and making sure all your coins are shipped (which is not as easy as it sounds).

 

and it is SO COOL to know that people are caching with coins YOU created! There are always people that like what you do and there are always people that hate it. You need to decide if all the trouble you go through is worth the experience. In my opinion, it is.

[+BRoKeN W]

I can honestly say that it is a lot of hard work to deal with everything regarding coin sales. All we've done so far was take reservations, and e-mail over 100 people back, not to mention figuring out their total owed. I was the one to take care of all that, while my husband was at work, and by the time he got home I had pretty much worn myself ragged, as I was trying so hard to not let my e-mail box get swamped with e-mails again, and forgot to eat...OOPS! That part is done and taken care of... now we're just waiting for the coins to arrive (which should be next week some time) so we can send invoices, package and ship. We will however not ship coins until they have been paid for. The thing that is going to make getting the coins out harder on us is that we have school (which oddly enough starts next week!)

 

One thing I think people need to take into consideration is that they are ordering coins from individuals, not some commercial based business, and that certain things do arise that the individual has no control over (which can prohibit them from keeping a clear line of contact, as well as getting coins out in a timely manner).

[+Hula Bum]

 

One thing I think people need to take into consideration is that they are ordering coins from individuals, not some commercial based business, and that certain things do arise that the individual has no control over (which can prohibit them from keeping a clear line of contact, as well as getting coins out in a timely manner).

 

The problem with this is, when people are paying money and there is a profit being made people expect service.

 

Generally if you keep a good line of communication people are pretty mellow, but coins are a business now, whether you're selling one style or have a whole storefront, it's just what they've become.

[+Traveling Chief]

 

One thing I think people need to take into consideration is that they are ordering coins from individuals, not some commercial based business, and that certain things do arise that the individual has no control over (which can prohibit them from keeping a clear line of contact, as well as getting coins out in a timely manner).

 

The problem with this is, when people are paying money and there is a profit being made people expect service.

 

Generally if you keep a good line of communication people are pretty mellow, but coins are a business now, whether you're selling one style or have a whole storefront, it's just what they've become.

 

I understand what you mean "it's just what they've become". Too bad that it seems to have gotten a little out of hand, especially for the folks that do the preorders. They don't seem to have much, if any, mark up compared to the ones on sale at several sites not to mention what some coins have been going for on E-Bay.

 

If I were paying a lot for a coin, I'd expect to recieve great service especially if the seller was making twice, or more $$ on the coin manufacturing costs. I'm not so sure this was the case here, especially if he has lost money.

 

Anyhow, I agree with what others have posted, we need to be patient with each other. In the end, we are all human.

 

Mike

[+Go JayBee]

 

One thing I think people need to take into consideration is that they are ordering coins from individuals, not some commercial based business, and that certain things do arise that the individual has no control over (which can prohibit them from keeping a clear line of contact, as well as getting coins out in a timely manner).

 

The problem with this is, when people are paying money and there is a profit being made people expect service.

 

Generally if you keep a good line of communication people are pretty mellow, but coins are a business now, whether you're selling one style or have a whole storefront, it's just what they've become.

 

I understand what you mean "it's just what they've become". Too bad that it seems to have gotten a little out of hand, especially for the folks that do the preorders. They don't seem to have much, if any, mark up compared to the ones on sale at several sites not to mention what some coins have been going for on E-Bay.

 

If I were paying a lot for a coin, I'd expect to recieve great service especially if the seller was making twice, or more $$ on the coin manufacturing costs. I'm not so sure this was the case here, especially if he has lost money.

 

Anyhow, I agree with what others have posted, we need to be patient with each other. In the end, we are all human.

 

Mike

 

 

Oh, so its ok to play the "I lost money on this deal" card...that gives you the option of not keeping folks informed?

[+Traveling Chief]

 

One thing I think people need to take into consideration is that they are ordering coins from individuals, not some commercial based business, and that certain things do arise that the individual has no control over (which can prohibit them from keeping a clear line of contact, as well as getting coins out in a timely manner).

 

The problem with this is, when people are paying money and there is a profit being made people expect service.

 

Generally if you keep a good line of communication people are pretty mellow, but coins are a business now, whether you're selling one style or have a whole storefront, it's just what they've become.

 

I understand what you mean "it's just what they've become". Too bad that it seems to have gotten a little out of hand, especially for the folks that do the preorders. They don't seem to have much, if any, mark up compared to the ones on sale at several sites not to mention what some coins have been going for on E-Bay.

 

If I were paying a lot for a coin, I'd expect to recieve great service especially if the seller was making twice, or more $$ on the coin manufacturing costs. I'm not so sure this was the case here, especially if he has lost money.

 

Anyhow, I agree with what others have posted, we need to be patient with each other. In the end, we are all human.

 

Mike

 

 

Oh, so its ok to play the "I lost money on this deal" card...that gives you the option of not keeping folks informed?

 

No one said it was an option. I just thought it was curious that he has lost money trying to keep everyone happy and making up for the delays getting all the coins out. Good on him for trying to do the right thing. I appaud him for that. Unfortunately life threw him a curve ball or two in getting these out as quickly as others.

 

I hope you get your coins in short order. I hate to think that something like this has got you so worked up. He can only apologize and give out his contact information so many times. Let it go and rejoice when the mail delivers your coins. I'm sure he has learned a valuable lesson.

 

Peace be with you fellow cacher

[+wigoweb]

I was somewhat surprised that anyone would be quite so upset over a coin's late arrival. I will admit that when I first started following these discussions last fall, there were several participants who seemed to delight in being unpleasant. Most of them seem to have calmed down recently which has made the forum a much nicer place to visit.

 

Given all the examples we have of really dishonest people ripping others off, maybe it is difficult to be trusting and understanding. But, this is a community of like-minded individuals who share a hobby. That's right, a hobby. As someone else has said, "It's a coin, not a kidney." And, if the loss of $10 will devastate a cacher's budget, maybe the cacher would be wise to wait until $10 isn't a significant amount of money.

 

I have my own coin about ready. I know that if I sold all the coins for twice what they cost me in dollars, I still wouldn't be breaking even by the end of the process considering the effort involved in keeping in touch and keeping track. I may not sell at all. Trading is much more fun.

 

Just because email is fast and efficient on a personal level, doesn't mean that it works that way for a situation with a hundred plus people. We would all be happier if we took a deep breath once in a while and enjoyed the coins we already have while waiting for the next batch.

 

Most of the world's problems throughout history have probably resulted from poor communications and "not keeping people informed." This may be exacerbated by the fact that some people have expectations that every email and or posting will be answered within minutes. We recently had a young fellow posting a question here and then 5 minutes or so later posting again wondering why no one had commented. He did this several times over a couple of days.

 

I like the hobby. I enjoy caching. If I ever have a problem with a coin, I doubt that I will make it really public. I expect that I will email the person directly and determine a solution. I certainly hope that I remain civil and calm throughout the entire episode. Even better, I hope to never get too upset anyway. Of course, my glass is always 3/4 full.

[+geoSquid]

Most of the world's problems throughout history have probably resulted from poor communications and "not keeping people informed." This may be exacerbated by the fact that some people have expectations that every email and or posting will be answered within minutes.

 

It's my opinion, and I'm sure someone will call me a nasty name for saying it, that some (many?) people have a fairly ridiculous expectation for how informed they should be kept in trivial matters. And yes, the purchase of $10 or $20 worth of geocoins IS a trivial matter by any measure.

 

As a matter of good business and to help ensure future business, the seller should strive to keep people informed, but "strive to keep informed" doesn't mean up-to-the-minute details on tiny transactions.

 

Pre-order a $40,000 car, and you probably have some ground to wonder what the status is at all times, but for a $10 purchase I think it's reasonable for a seller to bulk-blast updates by email every 7-10 days.

 

Better yet, the kind of person who stresses out over the status of their $10 pre-order would serve everyone better by waiting until the coins hit the street... less personal stress, less stress for the coin issuer, less drama in the boards.

[+Go JayBee]

Allright..I see your points here. But...just to clarify the situation, there is much more than $10 involved. It is on the order of 6 times that amount. Please understand that I have been in contact with the seller, and they have made commitments which have not been fullfilled to date. i.e. "send me an address, and I'll get your coins sent out right away" .... I've waited over a week and then get an answer stating that the goods are on their way and I should be seeing them "any day now".

 

 

So, you tell me...am I being un-reasonable?

 

 

I sent my money to the seller on the 16th of December, 2006....coins were being sent out in early February...I waited till early March to even ask about the status of my order. Is that un-reasonable?

 

 

How about defending the folks that sent their money months in advance, on good faith that the goods would be delivered? The seller has an obligation to fulfill their buyers needs, whatever their personal situation might be.

[+Hula Bum]

Allright..I see your points here. But...just to clarify the situation, there is much more than $10 involved. It is on the order of 6 times that amount. Please understand that I have been in contact with the seller, and they have made commitments which have not been fullfilled to date. i.e. "send me an address, and I'll get your coins sent out right away" .... I've waited over a week and then get an answer stating that the goods are on their way and I should be seeing them "any day now".

 

 

So, you tell me...am I being un-reasonable?

 

 

I sent my money to the seller on the 16th of December, 2006....coins were being sent out in early February...I waited till early March to even ask about the status of my order. Is that un-reasonable?

 

 

How about defending the folks that sent their money months in advance, on good faith that the goods would be delivered? The seller has an obligation to fulfill their buyers needs, whatever their personal situation might be.

 

Agreed.

[+Kealia]

Here's the issue - people are jumping into the coin business because they see a way to make money (not saying the recent case was an example of this). Sad, but true.

 

It seems that some are not willing to back up the "business" side of it. If you're going to sell something, you have the obligation to act like a business and be ready to communicate without playing the "i'm just one person" card. You can't have it both ways.

 

That being said, yes they are just coins. Nobody is going to lose sleep over losing a few bucks here or there, but nobody should have to either.

 

Having sold a few coins in the past, it's really not that hard. Just be prepared to answer questions when they come up. I won't comment on the Idaho coin situation since I wasn't involved in a purchase.

[+sTeamTraen]

And, if the loss of $10 will devastate a cacher's budget, maybe the cacher would be wise to wait until $10 isn't a significant amount of money.

 

Unless the purchaser is planning to sell the coin on, the $10 is "lost" - in terms of not being available to put food on the table or gas in the car - as soon as you order it. Even if you get ripped off, you're still down $10 when you buy a non-essential item.

 

So far I've been in the coin selling business for 72 hours. I've received 70 orders and shipped 60 of them (the other 10 came in today, and my boss like me to do some work). It's cost me a couple of evenings to ship out the coins, and I guess it will cost me three or four two-hour stints to send out the rest over the next couple of weeks (60% of the coins have already gone, and there will be some face-to-face sales at events).

 

I keep track of every order in an Excel sheet (number of each type of coin, plus Paypal#/e-mail/shipping address copy-pasted from the order e-mail). I've added a column for "have I packed it", "have I e-mailed the acknowledgement", "have I mailed the coins", and I'll soon add one for "have they been received". Using Excel's sort functions, that lets me quickly generate a list of e-mails of people who haven't yet confirmed that they got the coins, for example.

 

In a separate sheet I've pasted all the tracking and activation codes, and noted which order # corresponds to which coin. That way if someone calls to say "my coins never arrived" I can see if they've been activated. I can also grab the activation code of "missing" coins myself from the manufacturer's site, so that nobody else can activate them. But I don't expect problems with this.

 

The slight concern I have is that North American buyers may not appreciate just how darn long it can take for a small package to work its way across the Atlantic. 6 to 8 weeks is not uncommon, even for so-called "priority air mail".

[+Ladybug Kids]

NorthWes, Scobey and I have worked as leads for several GeocacheAlaska! coin projects and have found the geocaching community to be great to work with. Here are some examples of things that didn't go well and how we handled them:

 

1. 2005 Alaska geocoins (1st for Alaska): We opened preorder/payment in March thinking we'd have coins in a month, but the production schedule kept slipping and we didn't get the coins until July 7. We created a webpage and posted updates on the page and to the forums. I don't recall receiving a single negative forum post or e-mail.

 

2. 2006 Alaska geocoins: Having learned our lesson with the 2005 coins, we waited until we had the coins in hand before posting them for sale. That project went well except for a few shipping glitches (short orders or wrong mix of coins) which we were able to quickly fix at our cost.

 

3. 2006 Alaska Coinaments: We had a quality bust during the striking process and decided to apply a matte finish to about half the coins to mask the flaw and get the coins into buyers' hands before the holidays. We did a full disclosure e-mail to all buyers, posted the same language to the forums, and updated the webpage. No one requested refunds and only three buyers requested exchanges (interestingly, two swapped matte for mirror and one swapped a mirror for a matte).

 

4. 2007 Alaska Micromosquitoes: We waited until we had these coins in hand and then waited some more to post sales in the forums and on the web until we were sure we'd be recovered from the Geocoinfest trip so we could assure quick shipping.

 

Bottom line...continuous communication with buyers via multiple means (e-mail, webpage, and forums) goes a long way toward keeping the geocoin collecting community happy even when things don't do according to plan. The communication piece is especially critical for those projects that do presales before the coins are in hand because then the project managers are working with other peoples' money and some folks are more sensitive about that than others. Because of my inability to control when the coins actually are in my hands, I won't do presales anymore. Instead, I cover the cost of the coins out my own pocket and add a few cents onto the cost of the coin to cover interest lost on those funds.

Edited March 13, 2007 by Ladybug Kids

[+Renegade Knight]

Thus far I've seen all kinds of time frames. Lots of things have happened and we always got the coins eventually as the bugs got worked out. Whenver we can we get insurance. It's not always offered.

 

I'm now working on the Friends of Caching #1 and it's my turn to have glitches. So it goes.

[+geoSquid]

Allright..I see your points here. But...just to clarify the situation, there is much more than $10 involved. It is on the order of 6 times that amount. Please understand that I have been in contact with the seller, and they have made commitments which have not been fullfilled to date. i.e. "send me an address, and I'll get your coins sent out right away" .... I've waited over a week and then get an answer stating that the goods are on their way and I should be seeing them "any day now".

 

 

So, you tell me...am I being un-reasonable?

 

Yes.

 

Did you pay for tracked, expedited shipping? If you did, then get the tracking number and look it up. It won't speed things up, but it may satisfy your curiosity and you may have some recourse with the shipping company (USPS/whatever), although even they will probably tell you something like what I'm going to tell you in the next paragraph...

 

If you didn't and it's been less than 4-6 weeks from the day it was claimed your package (not some generic "the coins") was shipped then you are, in fact, being unreasonable. Although it USUALLY takes only a few days to get a package across the country, it can take a lot longer. It's sucky when that happens, but it does happen.

 

Having shipped close to 1000 coins, I can say with some confidence that some percentage (about 5% in my experience) of the shipments will be delayed with no explanation by the postal folks. Honestly, I do not entertain requests for refund until 30 business days had passed. Strangely enough, every package but one that I have sent arrived within that time frame. The odd one was a package that had been opened and the contents removed (envelope arrived, coins did not).

 

If it has been more than a month since they were shipped, you probably have good ground to wonder where they are. Still, if you didn't pay for insured shipping the best you can hope for is to get your money back.

 

I sent my money to the seller on the 16th of December, 2006....coins were being sent out in early February...I waited till early March to even ask about the status of my order. Is that un-reasonable?

 

It was probably unreasonable to send your money in December for something that wasn't going to ship until February. However, if you were informed that your coins were shipped in early february, then yes, early march is a fair time to start inquiries.

 

How about defending the folks that sent their money months in advance, on good faith that the goods would be delivered? The seller has an obligation to fulfill their buyers needs, whatever their personal situation might be.

 

As a matter of best practice, it probably wasn't a good idea. The seller has a legal obligation to produce the goods or refund the money, but has no special obligation to do so on your time schedule. A GOOD seller will want to be prompt, of course, because that encourages repeat business. it's hard to defend a pre-order because the person pre-ordering is assuming considerable risk and should understand that. There is the risk that the seller is even legitimate, the risk that the proposed timelines are even reasonable, the risk that the proposed timelines will be altered by unforeseen events, the risk that the final product will meet expectations. The buyer has to accept these risks when making a pre-order. The trade-off is that pre-orders usually get a better price.

 

On my own coins, I don't take pre-order payments until the coins have been ordered at the mint and I've been provided with an estimated arrival date for my doorstep... but that's just me - I allow non-committal reservations, but I won't take your money until I am confident of the coin project schedule. The reason is because I don't like to deal with people pestering me about what their order status is. I'm far from perfect - I recently botched a trade because I wasn't careful with an envelope and it slipped under some furniture and didn't get mailed for a couple weeks. Accidents and silly situations happen, and it doesn't make the sender an evil person. (edit: I did get the thing in the mail promptly once I figured out what happened).

 

A great example of a silly situation... I ran out of envelopes for geoSquid coins... went to the 3 post offices: out of stock... went to 2 Staples outlets: both out of stock. I was delayed sending by nearly a week on some orders because i wasn't prepared to drive all over town more than I did to acquire #0 padded envelopes and had to wait until one of the three nearish places had some. Personally, I don't think anyone needed an explanation of that, but maybe I'm being unreasonable.

Edited March 13, 2007 by geoSquid

[+GA Cacher]

 

 

If I were paying a lot for a coin, I'd expect to recieve great service especially if the seller was making twice, or more $$ on the coin manufacturing costs. I'm not so sure this was the case here, especially if he has lost money.

 

 

Mike

In regard to making twice the cost lets look at a assumption on a 1.5 inch coin 6 colors trackable with icon!

 

750 cost $4200

= 5.60

Sell at $7.50 each

Paypal for $7.50 = .60 7.5 - .60 = 6.90

Shipping thru paypal with Delivery Conformation .77

6.90 - .77 = 6.13

Padded Envelope and packing tape = .16 per order

6.13 - .16 = 5.97

5.97 -5.90 = .37

So make .37 each times 750 = $277.50

If I keep 50 for myself 50 * 5.6 = $280.00 cost

There fore I am out $2.50 and have 50 coins. Kwel!

 

This assumption is selling one coin at a time. But still in no way do I make 2 times the cost!

Just my humble opinion.

I'm sure others have a different opinion and that is a good thing.

[+Traveling Chief]

 

 

If I were paying a lot for a coin, I'd expect to recieve great service especially if the seller was making twice, or more $$ on the coin manufacturing costs. I'm not so sure this was the case here, especially if he has lost money.

 

 

Mike

In regard to making twice the cost lets look at a assumption on a 1.5 inch coin 6 colors trackable with icon!

 

750 cost $4200

= 5.60

Sell at $7.50 each

Paypal for $7.50 = .60 7.5 - .60 = 6.90

Shipping thru paypal with Delivery Conformation .77

6.90 - .77 = 6.13

Padded Envelope and packing tape = .16 per order

6.13 - .16 = 5.97

5.97 -5.90 = .37

So make .37 each times 750 = $277.50

If I keep 50 for myself 50 * 5.6 = $280.00 cost

There fore I am out $2.50 and have 50 coins. Kwel!

 

This assumption is selling one coin at a time. But still in no way do I make 2 times the cost!

Just my humble opinion.

I'm sure others have a different opinion and that is a good thing.

 

You made my point exactly. I don't believe this coin was priced excessively and that surely diminishes the thought it was done purely for profit. Communication could have been better, I guess, but I don't think it was all that bad.

[+Hula Bum]

It cost you 5.60 a piece for 750 coins?

[+GA Cacher]

It cost you 5.60 a piece for 750 coins?

You feel that is to much or too little?

[+Go JayBee]

 

 

If I were paying a lot for a coin, I'd expect to recieve great service especially if the seller was making twice, or more $$ on the coin manufacturing costs. I'm not so sure this was the case here, especially if he has lost money.

 

 

Mike

In regard to making twice the cost lets look at a assumption on a 1.5 inch coin 6 colors trackable with icon!

 

750 cost $4200

= 5.60

Sell at $7.50 each

Paypal for $7.50 = .60 7.5 - .60 = 6.90

Shipping thru paypal with Delivery Conformation .77

6.90 - .77 = 6.13

Padded Envelope and packing tape = .16 per order

6.13 - .16 = 5.97

5.97 -5.90 = .37

So make .37 each times 750 = $277.50

If I keep 50 for myself 50 * 5.6 = $280.00 cost

There fore I am out $2.50 and have 50 coins. Kwel!

 

This assumption is selling one coin at a time. But still in no way do I make 2 times the cost!

Just my humble opinion.

I'm sure others have a different opinion and that is a good thing.

 

 

 

I commend you on your creative bookkeeping skills, GA Cacher...

 

But lets look at this scenario another way, shall we?

 

 

Pay $4200.00 for 750 coins...

 

Sell 700 at $7.50 ea = $5250.00

 

Net profit from 700 coins @ .37 cents ea = $259.00

 

You have to pay for the 50 coins which are left, at a cost of: <$280.00>

 

Yes, you just went in the hole for $21.00...

 

But wait, there's those pesky 50 coins on your desk that you paid $21.00 for....thats only .42 cents each.

 

 

So, lets divide that .42 cents into $5.60...thats 1/13th of your original cost. Now that is pretty cheap swag if you ask me.

 

 

Don't get me wrong...I fully realize there is a lot of work which goes on behind the scenes (advertizing, keeping up with emails, purchasing packing materials, standing in line at the Post Office for hours, etc.)....so it IS only fair that you get something for your efforts. And, you've made a coin available at a very reasonable price in the meantime.

 

 

I know that this thread has taken a slight detour from it's original intent. So I'll just close my post by agreeing that there is a whole lot of work and a whole lot of responsibility to be assumed if you are going to sell coins here. Communication has to be high on your list of things to remember. I simple one-liner like: "I got your order"..."Coins have been shipped"..."Hey, I lost your addy...sorry for the delay"...."The mint broke my dies, and the coins won't be delivered for another 2 weeks" goes a very long way to insuring good customer relations. And, the best part of it....its free.