Is A Signature Item Really A Signature Item...

3.8k · February 24, 2004

Seeing JMBella, SBPhishy, and others post some really cool sig items got me thinking about my own again. Reading the rest of the posts in those threads, people were thinking they'd use the same or similar methods for their own.

Is a signature item really a signature item if other people are using the same thing, even in other areas of the country? I've seen some unique items, handmade by different cachers. These are truly valued on their own. Does a ziploc baggie with a JMBella magnet and batteries have any more value than another cacher using the same thing (with obviously a different magnet)?

Just curious of your thoughts... let's keep it clean.

February 24, 2004

Well I guess a signature item should reflect something about the person that hides it, It would be pretty smart if your signature item was a one of a kind but with so many people caching these days it would be hard to be totally original with your item, even if you hadnt seen the idea anywhere else you could bet that someone somewhere has already done something similar. One of the neatest signature items I have found is a minature handmade leatherbound book made by Evil Rooster. My own personal signature item is a beer bottle opener with my own little logo on it. It wouldnt take too long figure why I use a beer bottle opener! But I bet there are probally hundreds of people worldwide that use bottle openers as items to put in caches

February 24, 2004

Well, I think my signature wooden nickel (see avatar) fits me to a "T". I have the nickname "weasel" for 20 years, and since my wife thinks I'm cheap, I used a wooden nickel.

February 24, 2004

Seeing JMBella, SBPhishy, and others post some really cool sig items got me thinking about my own again. Reading the rest of the posts in those threads, people were thinking they'd use the same or similar methods for their own.

Is a signature item really a signature item if other people are using the same thing, even in other areas of the country? I've seen some unique items, handmade by different cachers. These are truly valued on their own. Does a ziploc baggie with a JMBella magnet and batteries have any more value than another cacher using the same thing (with obviously a different magnet)?

Just curious of your thoughts... let's keep it clean.

I actuality, the magnet is the signature item. The batteries are a very useful enticement to take the item. The magnet will be kept, the batteries will be used.

1.8k · February 24, 2004

Is a signature item really a signature item if other people are using the same thing, even in other areas of the country?

I think by definition, if an item has your name on it, or its an item that you leave at caches many times or if the item has any reference that it came from you, then its a sig item. If the item can be identified by others as having originated from you, then its a sig item. It doesn't have to be unique, many sig items are, however, many are not.

I had this idea of placing a sample of iron sulfide (pyrite) in a small bottle and placing a sticker on the bottle with my name on it. That same week, someone logged a find at one of my caches and guess what they left ... thats right ... a pyrite sample. So much for being original.

1.3k · February 24, 2004

I plan on going through sig items. Right now I'm using wooden pumpkins. In six months I'll probably do some molding. Maybe shrinkable plastic after that.

It's whatever you want it to be. Even if you're bound and determined to be unique, chances are someone out there is going to or has already thought of the same thing. That's just the way people are.

February 24, 2004

Maybe I should have all my teeth pulled and drill a hole through them and making keychains out of them. Of course the ones with the gold caps and fillings would be for the harder 5 rating caches

9.4k · February 24, 2004

Signature items should identify the owner in some way. Most likely, this will be their name. With 50,000 cachers (just a ballpark figure), there is lots of room for duplicate items, but they'll have different names or designs on them.

Once we hit 100 caches, we started leaving pens that said "Geocaching.com" on them with "Team GPSaxophone" written underneath. Since we hit several micros and even a few virts, we're just now running out of pens around cache #250. We were going to buy more pens and change the design, but our pens have started showing up in new caches now. We've saturated our area with them. Instead, we'll be making Shrinky-Dinks keychains with a saxophone on them (maybe my smurfy avatar). These should last for awhile and we can easily make more (they're also much cheaper to make than pens). That should last us until we hit #500, then we'll think about our next item.

5.3k · February 24, 2004

My idea of a signature item is something that identifies the cacher (usually has their name on it, but it doesn't have to), and that someone else would want to collect. Kinda like baseball cards, I guess.

I don't see a problem with multiple people using magnets or shrinky-dinks...I'd just want to collect one from each of them.

4k · February 24, 2004

This thread brings up the same question I was just asked last night: How do you keep a cat wet? No sig item for me until I answer that burning question.

5.3k · February 24, 2004

This thread brings up the same question I was just asked last night: How do you keep a cat wet? No sig item for me until I answer that burning question.

Seal it in a bag with one of those fancy vacuum sealers you see on the late-nite infomercials.

EDIT: EGADS!!! I've gone over 2000 posts...

Edited February 24, 2004 by Stunod

February 24, 2004

This thread brings up the same question I was just asked last night: How do you keep a cat wet? No sig item for me until I answer that burning question.

I could answer that, but I think would get warned for not being "family orientated"

9.4k · February 24, 2004

This thread brings up the same question I was just asked last night: How do you keep a cat wet? No sig item for me until I answer that burning question.

Seal it in a bag with one of those fancy vacuum sealers you see on the late-nite infomercials.

EDIT: EGADS!!! I've gone over 2000 posts...

Welcome to the MM Club!

(Sorry, I closed that thread weeks ago...

2k · February 24, 2004

I wouldn't say a signature item has to have your name on it. Jimmy Durante had a signature fedora. A lot of others wore fedoras back then but that and his nose were his trade mark. Kind of like Harpos horn.

I started out putting Sacagawea dollars into caches. So do a lot of others, but not around here. I have a design for a new item, when I showed it to my brother in-law his comment was "But the Sac$ is how we know you have been to a cache!" .

I'm still going with the new item, for two reasons. First I make them by hand one at a time, I like that when I find a signature itme and I think others do to. Second when I hit 100 caches I got to thinking, maybe I'll just keep the Sac$'s and put a $100 bill in cache #200. Then my cheap gene kicked in and I decided I need a new sig item.

4k · February 24, 2004

Actually, I've been looking for a sig item, and was thinking about using Matchbox car ambulances, since I used to be a paramedic. Now that I want them, I can't find them anywhere! A few years ago, they were all over the place. I've got a collection of nearly 100 miniature ambulances, some worth up to $500, but I can't part with them. The two ambulances I've put in caches were duplicates of one I already have...one of them is now a travel bug named "Johnny Gage"...I'm going to send another one out this week called "Roy DeSoto".....probably the same time I launch smurf-boy's "Cachemobile" TB!

9.4k · February 24, 2004

I wouldn't say a signature item has to have your name on it. Jimmy Durante had a signature fedora. A lot of others wore fedoras back then but that and his nose were his trade mark. Kind of like Harpos horn.

I started out putting Sacagawea dollars into caches. So do a lot of others, but not around here. I have a design for a new item, when I showed it to my brother in-law his comment was "But the Sac$ is how we know you have been to a cache!" .

I'm still going with the new item, for two reasons. First I make them by hand one at a time, I like that when I find a signature itme and I think others do to. Second when I hit 100 caches I got to thinking, maybe I'll just keep the Sac$'s and put a $100 bill in cache #200. Then my cheap gene kicked in and I decided I need a new sig item.

But how would a Sacajawea dollar identify YOU?

You could easily put it in a plastic bag with your name on it, or put a sticker that says your name.

We had a cacher place a FTF prize in caches, but no one knew that's what it was. It didn't have any marks on it identifying it as a sig item or a FTF prize. Eventually the story came out, but this was a home-made item not something anyone would have on them.

3.9k · February 24, 2004

I didn't read this whole thread, I was too anxious to respond.

DWM:
Actually, the magnet is the signature item...

That's true but others I'm sure have used magnets as sig item. The batteries are what makes it different. So really the whole package is the sig item.

It's fine if others take the idea. In fact how do I know I'M the first to think of it. As long as the magnet is different, it's still unique and still a sig item. IMO. The idea may not be unique, but the item itself is. Just like more the wooden nickel. Several people use wooden nickles as sig item, but there is only ONE weasel wooden nickel.

7.2k · February 24, 2004

Actually, I've been looking for a sig item, and was thinking about using Matchbox car ambulances, since I used to be a paramedic. Now that I want them, I can't find them anywhere!

We had a local cacher that used the same thing. If you saw the toy ambulance you knew he was in the logbook. Many people know me from my GGA branded items (coasters, key rings, etc.). They don't have my geo-nick on them, just a GGA logo. I know some don't know who it came from when I travel and place them in caches, but I write "mtn-man from Georgia" in the logbook. I have gotten emails from people who figured it out and told me how cool they are and thanked me for leaving them in the cache. I think that is so cool when someone takes the time to send me a message from somewhere in the country.

February 24, 2004

I didn't read this whole thread, I was too anxious to respond.

DWM:
Actually, the magnet is the signature item...

That's true but others I'm sure have used magnets as sig item. The batteries are what makes it different. So really the whole package is the sig item.

It's fine if others take the idea. In fact how do I know I'M the first to think of it. As long as the magnet is different, it's still unique and still a sig item. IMO. The idea may not be unique, but the item itself is. Just like more the wooden nickel. Several people use wooden nickles as sig item, but there is only ONE weasel wooden nickel.

LOL, You bet there is only 1 weasel wooden nickel!! I had a pretty good response from people who wanted to trade sig items by mail.

February 24, 2004

Actually, I've been looking for a sig item, and was thinking about using Matchbox car ambulances, since I used to be a paramedic. Now that I want them, I can't find them anywhere!

We had a local cacher that used the same thing. If you saw the toy ambulance you knew he was in the logbook. Many people know me from my GGA branded items (coasters, key rings, etc.). They don't have my geo-nick on them, just a GGA logo. I know some don't know who it came from when I travel and place them in caches, but I write "mtn-man from Georgia" in the logbook. I have gotten emails from people who figured it out and told me how cool they are and thanked me for leaving them in the cache. I think that is so cool when someone takes the time to send me a message from somewhere in the country.

Hmmm, maybe you can atach your signature item to my racer thats heading your way!!! So far Hydee is leading the pack out of the starting blocks!!

6.5k · February 24, 2004

This thread brings up the same question I was just asked last night: How do you keep a cat wet? No sig item for me until I answer that burning question.

Wouldn't the fire from the burning question dry out the cat?

SInce the trade isn't a big part of caching for me I haven't bothered to create a sig item. I almost never take them from a cache either. To me they are more of a 'found it' marker than a trinket.

2k · February 24, 2004

....................
But how would a Sacajawea dollar identify YOU?

You could easily put it in a plastic bag with your name on it, or put a sticker that says your name.

We had a cacher place a FTF prize in caches, but no one knew that's what it was. It didn't have any marks on it identifying it as a sig item or a FTF prize. Eventually the story came out, but this was a home-made item not something anyone would have on them.

Exactly. Still Sac's aren't common around here. They don't work in slot machines. Anybody who caches much around Reno pretty much knows I've been there when they find a Sac$.

But I do want somthing more personel. I came up with a small brass canister about half the size of a 35mm film can. I can make them for about $0.25 each. As soon as I figure out how to etch a logo on the side and design a logo I'll be all set. I plan on experimenting with ferric chloride (PCB etchant). It should etch brass since it is an alloy of copper and zink. I just need to figure out how to apply the etch resist.

2k · February 24, 2004

This thread brings up the same question I was just asked last night: How do you keep a cat wet? No sig item for me until I answer that burning question.

Wouldn't the fire from the burning question dry out the cat?

SInce the trade isn't a big part of caching for me I haven't bothered to create a sig item. I almost never take them from a cache either. To me they are more of a 'found it' marker than a trinket.

I agree. I don't trade. I just leave the Sac$ and sign the book.

Edit: Me to comment.

Edited February 24, 2004 by rusty_tlc

February 24, 2004

....................
But how would a Sacajawea dollar identify YOU?

You could easily put it in a plastic bag with your name on it, or put a sticker that says your name.

We had a cacher place a FTF prize in caches, but no one knew that's what it was. It didn't have any marks on it identifying it as a sig item or a FTF prize. Eventually the story came out, but this was a home-made item not something anyone would have on them.

Exactly. Still Sac's aren't common around here. They don't work in slot machines. Anybody who caches much around Reno pretty much knows I've been there when they find a Sac$.

But I do want somthing more personel. I came up with a small brass canister about half the size of a 35mm film can. I can make them for about $0.25 each. As soon as I figure out how to etch a logo on the side and design a logo I'll be all set. I plan on experimenting with ferric chloride (PCB etchant). It should etch brass since it is an alloy of copper and zink. I just need to figure out how to apply the etch resist.

Cool, post pics when you get this completed!!

5.3k · February 24, 2004

I just need to figure out how to apply the etch resist.

I did something similar (not caching related) and used clear fingernail polish and a small artist's paintbrush. Hope this helps...be sure to show off pictures when you get it!

2k · February 24, 2004

They look like a scaled up version of this:

5.3k · February 24, 2004

They look like a scaled up version of this:

I'm glad you don't live near me...that looks evil!

2k · February 24, 2004

I haven't had the time or heart to actualy hide the darned thing ........yet.

1.3k · February 24, 2004

I also agree that sig items can be whatever the person wants. I like the fact that mine take me a little bit of time to make. I had to find the design for my avatar, then did a lot of work trying to fix it up and have it print out well. Then realized it worked the best just how it was. Cutting out the shrinky dinks is such a pain in the a**, so, each one has a little bit of elbow grease on it. I also have business cards that my girlfriend had made for me for christmas. I use those too, but I wanted something extra. I usually number the card, and often write the name of the cache I know I am going to, and then laminate the card, so they are kind of "special" to each cache.

February 24, 2004

This thread brings up the same question I was just asked last night: How do you keep a cat wet? No sig item for me until I answer that burning question.

I could answer that, but I think would get warned for not being "family orientated"

Note to self....Sit at other end of table from Weasel at next EIGA meeting!

2.1k · February 24, 2004

I watched a neat program, at least part of it on Winston Churchills Auxillary Force that he made up during WWII when the Germans invaded England. What caught my attention was that they were passing notes along by hiding them in things that reminded me of geocaching...Brought up some gooooooooooood ideas....

February 24, 2004

My $.02 here. My signature item is changing all the time. I have made wood tokens, left baseball cards with a small geogeek baseball, made laminated cache cards (see avitar, it's the front of my card) and right now I'm working on a new type of item (I'll post when it's finished). I change it all the time because I get bored with them and it's fun to create new stuff. I don't buy minted coins or trinkets. I like to create them myself even if they look a little cheesy. SO, a signature item can be anything you want it to be. Mine always have my GC.com name and web address on them. Cachers in the Chicago area seem to like them so I'll keep doing it. Have fun and be creative!

Edited February 24, 2004 by Geogeek65

24.7k · February 24, 2004

If you leave the item as your calling card it's your sig item. Even if it's just one of those biz cards.

7.2k · February 24, 2004

Hmmm, maybe you can atach your signature item to my racer thats heading your way!!! So far Hydee is leading the pack out of the starting blocks!!

Great idea! I will do that. The compass is my favorite.

February 24, 2004

I am fairly new to the sport and just beginning to develop my own signature item. I think that the really neat thing about sigs are not so much that they distinguish you or display your uniqueness, but rather that they give the finder something interesting or pleasantly suprising. I have developed a few friendships with other cachers in my area and I always get a smile at knowing that so-and-so has been here! In other words, I don't really pay attention to what the item is - more important is making the connection to the guy/gal who left it. When people find my items, I hope they like them, but I also hope they might shoot me an email or something that might lead to making more geocaching buddies.

3.8k · February 25, 2004

Thanks to everyone who posted a comment so far, except for Sparky who brought up the cat.

:unsure:

February 25, 2004

I'm of the "make it yourself" group. I use a hand carved stump pin as a signature item. My avatar is a picture of that pin. Each one is slightly different since I carve them out of wood and wood is not perfect. When collecting signature items the ones I notice are obviously hand made. Some painted rocks, flowers pressed between pieces of glass, a handmade bookmark. These are the things I treasure.

There are any number of items a person could make and materials are many.

A clay figure or emblem using sculpy.

A scrolled piece of wood in the shape of your state.

Painted rockes with your own style.

A pin with your avatar on it.

Pins are a very collectable item. They can be displayed on hats and vests very easily.

Enough ramblings for tonight.

:unsure:

3.8k · February 25, 2004

I'd like to come up with a really unique sig item,

but so far all my ideas stink! :unsure:

2.3k · February 25, 2004

I'd like to come up with a really unique sig item,
but so far all my ideas stink!

With a name like "septic tank" maybe you could place a rubber turd?

February 25, 2004

I'd go out of my way to collect a rubber turd! My collection needs to keep growing!

Edited February 25, 2004 by The Snail

1.3k · February 25, 2004

Yeah, the rubber turd idea would be cool!

3.8k · February 25, 2004

Do you guys smell something?

Is A Signature Item Really A Signature Item...

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