Replicas and Counterfiets Have Their Place

Posted on September 22, 2008
Filed Under Collecting Thoughts

Replica challenge coins and even the counterfiets are not popular in today’s collecting and we absolutely do not support the making of these coins. The Society feels the remaking of a coin no matter what coin it is shows unoriginality, and theft of someone else’s work. However, by taking a look into reality as long as the hobby is so popular we know it will continue. So what do we do with the market share of unauthentic coins? Besides tracking down sellers of these coins we could learn to embrace or tolerate it to a degree. What do we mean?

By accepting the fact that some coins are going to be remade, we understand there is a section in collecting that needs “gap fillers”. There are areas in collections where people know they will never obtain a certain coin that is authentic. This idea comes from the patch collecting market when gap filling is an everyday event in buying and trading. We have yet to adapt this practice in the coin world openly and the better part of me is glad this hasn’t happened. Not everyone can have a President Bush coin but I know somewhere someone has made a duplicate of it and are trying to peddle it. The problem comes in when people are passing off a fake as the real thing and this is where it needs to stop.

Obviously stealing someone work should be a no-no but if it’s going to happen then we need to label it as such. I hate to compare it to the War on Drugs where all the resources we have thrown at the problem and yet it still flourishes is almost the same in this regards. I would be absolutely irate if someone stole my work and made replicas and anyone that makes their own designs and coins should be as well.

So our point in this post is to invoke thought about what is upon us as a collecting community. Talking about it rather than keeping it under the rug does not help further the hobby. If we are going to endure the replica’s and fakes then we need to start labeling them as such. Even if there is a speck of doubt whether or not a coin is the real thing we need to call it a replica or some deontation that tells a potential buyer or trader that this is unknown. Pulling $500 for a questionable coin only further denagrates our niche and it should not be tolerated.

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