Where to buy trackables?

[+councilwoods]

My family is new to the game this year but seems like every spare moment I have, I am researching caches to visit or searching out information. This will definitely be a life long hobby for me if not my children as well.

 

We bought our first trackable and sent it out on a mission. I knew from reading other posts that trackables disappear. At $15 a pop, I don't know how much money we can invest in trackables. I am pretty sure the one we sent out is long gone. So my question is where the cheapest place to buy trackables? And does it help to get plain or ugly ones so that people are less inclined to keep it?

[+K13]

Mine have been bought from the G$ store or were gifted to me. Currently, one is deployed and closing in on its goal.

I used a dog tag style travel bug attached to another object.

Good luck.

[+wmpastor]

Some say don't attach anything too cute to the TB so that some cacher's 6-year-old doesn't fall in love with it.

[+dameetro]

I have tried several things to keep trackables from getting lost or stolen. I tried attaching a second tag with instructions. I've tried attaching trackbles to HUGE items (such as a giant squid), small items, or really weird items (like a plastic hamburger bun). I've put instructions to only place them in Premium Member Only caches, or high difficulty/terrain caches. I've drilled holes in coins to "ruin" the value purposely. I've purchased stupid looking or ugly ones too. Nothing has seemed to work any better than the others. It's luck of the draw. The next person to come along might be a great cacher who knows what to do, or a new cacher who is eager to learn the ropes and follow instructions. Or they may be a drooling vegetable or just a bunghole who doesn't care. You just really never know who will come along. That's part of the fun, and it's also part of the frustration.

 

I've had plenty get lost on their first drop. And I've had one travel to the other side of the world and make it to its goal. My advice, don't spend a ton and don't get mad when one gets lost. After getting lost, sometimes they show back up years later, but most don't. Just enjoy the ride and have fun with it.

 

As for where I get mine, I get them from the Groudspeak store, sometimes Geoswag, and sometimes are freebies at events or as FTF prizes.

Edited October 1, 2015 by dameetro

[+councilwoods]

OK that was what I was afraid of. Thank you for the responses!

[+kunarion]

So my question is where the cheapest place to buy trackables?

At the Geocaching.com Shop, you get a pretty good deal on Travel Bugs, if you buy 8 at once:

http://shop.geocaching.com/default/trackable-items/travel-bugs/travel-bug.html

 

You can't control what other people do with trackables. Place one and watch what happens. It's almost impossible to convince "Geocachers" to place a TB into a cache -- let alone to log it properly. If it vanishes, revive it and place it again. It may be enough to put a tracking number as a permanent mark on some suitable object. Tracking numbers are reusable. You certainly do not need to spend $15 each time a Trackable is stolen.

 

Trackables can reappear, so if a TB dogtag is at least securely attached to a durable item, maybe it can return to play. Perhaps someone in that family of criminals accidently got an honest gene by a freak of nature. Or a friend did. They place it and it's back in play, until the next... family... gets ahold of it...

Edited October 1, 2015 by kunarion

[+councilwoods]

I didn't realize that the trackable numbers were reusable if lost. So I can use the same tracking number that was on the one that disappeared and just reassign it to a different object? How long is a reasonable amount of time to wait before reassigning?

 

Thank you for the link. I will look into buying those instead of a cutesy one like I did for our last one. Glad I asked!

[+luvvinbird]

My family is new to the game this year but seems like every spare moment I have, I am researching caches to visit or searching out information. This will definitely be a life long hobby for me if not my children as well.

 

We bought our first trackable and sent it out on a mission. I knew from reading other posts that trackables disappear. At $15 a pop, I don't know how much money we can invest in trackables. I am pretty sure the one we sent out is long gone. So my question is where the cheapest place to buy trackables? And does it help to get plain or ugly ones so that people are less inclined to keep it?

The last few geocaching events I attended had stores set up on site. They displayed and had for sale many different TB's and virtually every geo-container you could think of.

[+Manville Possum]

Nothing seems to work, even the proxy geocoins I released dissappeared.

 

I seldom ever buy trackables anymore, and there are no places to get good deals. They average $10-$15 each for common trackables and more for the nice collectable ones.

 

Try large events that have vendors, or eBay. Just keep in mind that geocoins are for collecting and not throwing away in a cache.

[+fuzziebear3]

Some of the aluminum tag style, whether the plain dog tag style or the cuter animal ones, can usually be found on sale at one or another of the online vendors. I try to get them for about $5-$6 each. Sometimes you can get a little bit of a discount if you buy multiples.

[+niraD]

I didn't realize that the trackable numbers were reusable if lost. So I can use the same tracking number that was on the one that disappeared and just reassign it to a different object?

I've seen a number of replacement (or proxy) trackables. Years ago, TB tags came with a copy tag that had the tracking number marked on it just like the original. That copy tag was used for the first replacement. Other replacements have used printed and laminated tags. A couple times, when I marked a trackable missing from one of my caches, the owner even mailed me a replacement with the same kind of object attached to a printed and laminated tag, so the trackable could resume its journey where it went missing.

 

And I've seen proxy geocoins that have used color images attached to either side of a similar size washer. Or proxy geocoins that are laminated double-sided images. But for proxy geocoins, it may be helpful to mention that the original was lost. I've seen less interest in proxies when the owner didn't want to risk losing the actual geocoin, and more interest in proxies when the owner was replacing a geocoin that went missing. It may not make sense, but it is what it is.

 

How long is a reasonable amount of time to wait before reassigning?

I would wait at least a few months after the trackable was confirmed missing. If someone moved it without understanding how to log its movement properly, then it could be a while before some else finds it, logs a "Grab" log, and gets its actual location back in the system. In the meantime, people could be reporting it missing from the cache it was improperly retrieved from.

[Keystone]

I am moving this thread from the Geocaching Topics forum to the Travel Bug forum.