Government Wealth Warning on Royal Mint's Coins?
The Royal Mint's prices on some of its coin collections seem rather high, yet people buy them by the thousand. Is this likely to erode public trust?
Save Over £500!*
The Royal Mint, not content with its monopoly in producing new sovereigns, has for some years now been buying mintmark sets of sovereigns from the numismatic trade, and marketing them to its "Coin Club" members (customers) at prices which seem surprisingly high to us. Sadly because most of its customers are not coin collectors, but ordinary members of the public who appear to trust the Royal Mint without question.
As we wrote this, the Royal Mint's latest price on its George V mintmark collection was £1,245! We should point out, in mitigation, that the Mint's collection does come in a quite impressive wooden box, with each coin in its own capsule, and with an informative booklet / certificate. At a pinch, the presentation might be worth as much as £50, but on the negative side, the quality of some of their coins is rather interesting. We have the advantage of having seen a number of the Royal Mint's sets, so we know their typical grades. Some of their coins would not even make it into our lowest grade / price. Otherwise their sets are closest to our lowest graded set.
Even our most expensive set is £350 less than the Royal Mint's offering. Perhaps we should have increased our prices, but we just couldn't bring ourselves to charging poor value* prices.
*Relevant Dates & Other Information
Our "Save Over £500!" heading originated in or around 2000, on one of the following pages.
As it is no longer a simple matter for us to determine our original publication date. In an effort to ensure that our comments remain historically accurate and fair, we note the following, and will add any more data as it becomes available:
- The back cover of the Royal Mint's certificate states "Crown Copyright 2000".
- The certificate states "This collection comprises seven sovereigns of George V..."
- Our mintmark sets are all of George V sovereigns, so they are directly comparable with the Royal Mint's sets.
- All price comparisons were correct at the time of writing.
- The Royal Mint may not be offering any similar sets currently.
Examples
There are many other examples we could quote of Royal Mint pricing being, in our opinion, very high. Here are a selection:
-
Sovereign Mintmark Collection - by The Royal Mint - in Wooden Box
Classic seven coin mintmark collection, but our own is better for less money!
-
George V Sovereign Mintmark 7 - Coin Collection - by The Royal Mint - in Wooden Box
Exactly the same as the classic mintmark set with slightly different packaging.
-
Three Monarchs The Sovereign Mintmark Set by The Royal Mint
Twelve sovereigns, giving examples of three monarchs, Old Head Victoria, Edward VI, and George V, and four different mints, London, Melbourne, Perth & Sydney. Omits Canada, India and South African mints.
-
The Sovereign Century Collection by The Royal Mint
Partial type set from 1901 to 2000. Omits coins which our own type sets include.
-
Mints & Monarchs Gold Sovereign Collection
Eight sovereigns displaying seven different portraits, from Victoria Young Head through to Elizabeth II, and all eight mints including Llantrisant. In very posh box.
- 1957 to 2007 25 Coin ER II Diamond Wedding Gold Sovereign Collection
Save at least £1,000 on this collection, or buy our own and save even more.
- 1957 to 2003 21 Coin ER II Royal Sovereign Collection
An earlier version of the previous collection.
-
Gold Portrait Collection of Queen Elizabeth II Gold Sovereigns by The Royal Mint
-
Gold Portrait Collection of 3 Queen Elizabeth II Gold Sovereigns by The Royal Mint
- The Historic Sovereign Collection - by The Royal Mint
- George V Gold Mintmark Set - 5 Coins - by The Royal Mint
This "set" puzzles us more than most. It contains 5 gold sovereigns of George V. A complete mintmark set of George V sovereigns would and should contain 7 sovereigns.
- The Edward VII Sovereign Mintmark Collection - by The Royal Mint
A five coin set.
Better Coins for Less!
Buy from us, and you will get better coins for less money.
|
|
Set of 7 Different Mintmarked Sovereigns in Case
1925 London Mint - No Mintmark
1924 S = Sydney Mintmark
1924 M = Melbourne Mint
1922 P = Perth Australia Mint
1913 C = Ottawa Canada
1918 I = Bombay India
1932 S.A. = Pretoria Mint South Africa
Die Numbers
Order Form
Order Form - USA
|