Linking up WE took an interesting call at the Token Publishing offices this week—a gentleman responding to the September editorial regarding getting new people into the hobby. In fact that editorial seemed to strike a chord with many of you and we have had quite the response to it (one thing I would add is that whilst I said in that piece that the majority of collectors in the UK were white, middle aged and male that certainly wasn’t the case at the recent Coinex in London where there truly was a huge mix of just about everybody in the room!). In this gentleman’s particular case he was asking how he might go about finding people like him who had a general interest in coins rather than specialising in one area. He’d been to his local coin club/numismatic society but found it rather intimidating. It was, he found, full of very nice people (his words) who knew an awful lot more about coins than he did and, as he collects more modern coins (anything from the late 19th century onwards) he felt somewhat overawed by the Celtic/Roman/Greek/Hammered experts. I got the impression that he saw them as “numismatists” whereas he was simply a “collector” and felt that he couldn’t bring much to the table as he didn’t have the depth or breadth of knowledge that they did. He also told me that he wasn’t really that confident with trying to contact people via online forums or groups as his experience with the internet was limited, indeed he’d only recently got an email address. As an aside, I had another gentleman who spoke to me about this very subject recently. He was worried about joining online groups because he was always scared he’d give away personal details and he was concerned that the anonymity of the internet meant that there could be less than savoury characters posing as collectors in order to glean information about those who had collections at home, a good point and one we’d not considered before. I fully understand the concern about both coin clubs/societies and the internet forums; if you’re just starting off, or perhaps are a little shy or not confident that you have the same level of knowledge as those with whom you’re conversing, then any group of people, whether live or virtual, is going to seem daunting, but how do we get round that? How do we get those who are maybe just starting off to get more involved in the wider world of collecting rather than leaving them alone to their own devices only to find that their passion, if not nurtured, disappears? I have a few ideas but I really would welcome more if you have them. First on my list is “Beginners’ Nights” at coin clubs. Perhaps societies could devote one meeting every few months to an evening that is more social than speaker based to encourage new members, hitherto too nervous to come along, to pop their head around the door. Or perhaps have a “Social Start” where the first bit of the evening is dedicated just to saying hello, with the speaker coming a little later to allow those who feel that subject isn’t for them, to quietly leave… I’d also suggest that those who find their coin club a little daunting organise their own social event, with an emphasis on getting to know fellow collectors rather than just learning about coins. I feel there are many collectors out there who would just like to chat to others who share the same passion for these funny little bits of metal (or paper) we are so eager to collect. They don’t necessarily want to learn about the metallurgical composition of Ancient Greek coins versus those of Ancient Rome or listen to reasons why Bolton’s Soho Mint used superior machinery to the other mints of the time. They just want to chew the fat, chat about buyers’ premiums, talk about coin designs or about which is a better show, the London Coin Fair or Midland, and so on. The problem is how do we put those collectors together, if they don’t go online to forums, don’t visit their local numismatic society, then how will one collector know another? No-one wants to take out an ad in the paper advertising they have coins and that they want to meet others who have a collection too, so what can we do to get people together? We have an idea or two here at Token but first we need to know how many of you actually do want to be put in touch with fellow collectors. Not to listen to a talk but just to talk amongst yourselves. Let us know if you would; if there are enough of you out there, we may be able to help. We shall see. By the way please don’t think I’m down on Coin Clubs/Societies in any way, I’m really not, I’m a great supporter of them but at the same time I can see why those just starting off would feel a little overawed and out of their depth. They needn’t feel that way, not at all, but I understand why they might!