Greetings everyone. I sincerely hope every one of you is safe, healthy and getting through this mess with as little hardship/inconvenience as possible.

And as little *boredom* as possible.

Me? I'm the furthest thing from bored right now. There's always plenty to do at Northeast even if we're not in the building, so hopefully I can alleviate some of your boredom with a Northeast-style 'day in the life' of the sales director.

I've been filling my days with a boatload of social media, customer correspondence, dealer networking and washing my hands. I could fill literally months’ worth of posts, whether on Instagram (@nencoin) or Facebook (www.facebook.com/northeastcoin) alone. Please follow us on both if you're not already! Thanks to a robust inventory, it would take years for me to run out of items to talk about and showcase. And though I'm quite busy with all of this, I welcome your input as to what you think an online coin company can be doing ITCT. 

Perhaps more interesting than the above work/task tidbits is how it all plays out in a work from home (from here out 'WFH') environment. First off, setting work/home life boundaries when WFH is easier said than done. Pre-COVID, I would typically rise each morning early due to a fairly long but not unreasonable commute. Now, I get up and immediately start in on what I didn't finish the night before (which went much later than a 'normal' workday because I had no commute home and I'm not going anywhere anyway any time soon). We're on week two of the state-mandated lockdown and already days are blending from one to the next, but it's not all that bad because I'm pretty sure it's Friday. My guess is that by the time I have a solid WFH daily routine/schedule, it'll be time to go back to the office (God-willin' and the creek don't rise!), but it's a fluid situation and we shall see.

Secondly, it has occurred to me that some things that naturally occur at the office don't necessarily translate to WFH; for instance, drinking plenty of water throughout the day. Hearing our "bubbler" (as we New Englanders like to call it) or water cooler (as everyone else in the country calls it) elicits a Pavlovian-type response to get up and go refill many times throughout the day, but the absence of that at home results in having to set reminders throughout the day to drink more water or else become dehydrated. It's a fluid situation.  : )

There are many other relatively minor concessions that are made in the WFH environment (to go along with, admittedly, decided advantages), and though I'm not quite ready to pull out what little hair I have left, I will concede that separate work and life spaces is probably for the best. I'm already welcoming a return to the office and seeing my mates and looking at actual coins again! 

Until next time, remember, we're all in this together, separately, in these challenging times.

Brian Alty

Director of Sales

The following was written by Tom.

We returned this past weekend from the 56th Annual Greater American Coin Fair in St. Louis, MO. This show, which is one of our favorites, takes place directly across from the airport, which is about a 3-minute shuttle ride.

The word vintage comes to mind when considering how best to describe this show, as it is held in a 19^th century Hilton Hotel with its walls and corridors adorned with old framed TWA posters of stars from another era; stars such as Marilyn Monroe, Cary Grant, Bob Hope and other lesser knowns. They are shown departing on TWA flights when the airline first flew into St Louis in the early 1960’s. 

St. Louis is one of those shows that gets a good mix of regional and national dealers who can easily fly in for a quick visit and fly home. It’s also a hot spot for collectors (who have been known to drive for several hours) with money burning a hole in their pockets to buy for specific needs, or with product ready to sell to eager buyers. Few are just browsers, but all participants seem to have the same goal in mind.

We always see many of our faithful customers; often those who primarily see our inventory online and are now getting a first-hand look. We also tend to meet new clients anxious to do business. We can thank Mike Orlando for many of these new customers. Mike has managed this show for decades, doing an excellent job with his friendly coin club volunteers.

While we fully appreciate what this show has to offer, there is one minor downside.  The Greater American Coin Fair has (easily) the most cramped aisles of any show we regularly attend. Never fear though, each table comes faithfully stocked with a jar of Vaseline, a can opener, and the jaws of life to get in and out of the booths.

The Fair takes place in two small rooms, with the bourse floor right off the lobby. A narrow back up table is shared with the dealer behind us and our table is in the middle of a row. If either of us wants to get out, we have upwards of ten people to slink past as we make our way down to the end of the row. Brian and I, however, figured out a better way.  Turns out, crawling under the table to get in or out of the booth is much mor efficient, which we proved about two dozen times. Still, this show remains one of our favorites with its down home, friendly feel. We look forward to it every year and this year was no exception. 

From the get-go, dealers packed the room and trading began immediately. In this type of atmosphere, it is much more likely that dealers will come to your table to buy your coins, rather than waiting for you to come to them. The general public traffic over the next couple days was robust and it was very nice to put faces to names with some of the customers and smaller dealers that we have been working with recently.

Overall, we were happy with the retail business we did and for the opportunity to buy fresh, different material that we sometimes don't see at the usual major shows we attend (i.e.., Baltimore, Long Beach, ANA). We have been busy this week listing our new purchases from the show.

On Friday night, with a hankering for Indian food, Brian and I took a shot at a little place called Gokul, as it had many positive reviews. From this point forward, I'll never forget that Gokul is located in "The Delmar Loop" area of St. Louis, as our Uber driver mentioned this fact upwards of 57 times. Upon arrival at the restaurant, Brian spotted this sign on the window. I was delighted; Brian not so much. Still, it was very good (editor’s note: so says Tom).

There were far too many St. Louis Blues hockey jerseys and way too much Kansas City Chiefs gear (Kansas City, Missouri, that is). Being sports fans in New England, we’ve been pretty spoiled, so it was a tad painful to see all of the constant reminders of the teams that bested us these past hockey and football seasons. But we dealt with it alright and are certainly looking forward to attending this show again.

We'd like to give a big shout out to Ralph, a customer of ours from Baton Rouge, who helped us kick off the carnival season by sending us this King Cake! As is our custom when any goodies show up, and particularly with King Cakes, we got right to work demolishing it. Dotty, who is new to this tradition, was excited to get the baby, particularly when she learned that it mean good luck for the rest of the year. She was a little less enthused, however, once she found out it also means she has to buy the next cake.  : )

The following was written by Tom.

This is an old New England saying, as the weather can sometimes vary tremendously within any 24-hour period. Last weekend this was certainly the case, with a record setting temperature for the month of January of 74 degrees.  January is a time when we can potentially have several feet of snow. It was a pleasure going out for my weekend walk over the old North Bridge, through the town forest Fairyland, around Walden pond, and up and over Fairhaven Hill and back home in short sleeves and shorts.  This is simply unheard of in the month of January in these parts. A day or two later we had temperatures in the low 30’s with several inches of snow, and as you can see, I built a snowman with my grandson Fergus. This past week we have had some 10 to 15-degree days, tomorrow rain is forecasted, followed by sunny warmer weather the following day. We never know what to expect.  

Speaking of hot and cold, the recent FUN show in Orlando was one of our hottest and most active, as Brian, Chris, Steven, and I were busy doing pre-show business, seeing clients and dealer contacts, as well as seeing many long-time website customers. The constant activity of buying and selling, meeting new customers, and dealer-to-business, continued nonstop up until shows ended on Saturday.  We always love starting off the new year with this popular event, and certainly all anticipations were met. I made every winter FUN show since 1972 and I’d never thought of missing one. Yikes - that’s 48 years! Hard to believe. And by the way, we also managed to get some time in at the NYINC world show a few days later. No rest for the weary!

The following was posted by Chris.

Check out this find at a wine store near me this past weekend. Mercury Head Cabernet. Really high star rating, but also really expensive. I couldn't help myself and had to buy it. (Then explain to my wife when I brought it home that this nice wine is NOT for drinking!)