A couple of years back, The Royal Mint changed the way they released coins and caused a huge commotion among collectors. If they had any idea just how much trouble this would cause is open to debate. But one thing is for certain; for some it would mean that buying coins had instantly become far more expensive.
It all began in 2020 with the release of the three coins in ‘The Dinosauria Collection’. For the first time in UK coin collecting history, customers were able to choose either standard cupro-nickel fifty pences…. or colour versions. Of course, this was exciting stuff at the time because up until then, the only way of having colour UK fifty pences was to buy them as silver proofs or to purchase those crap ‘decals’ you see all the time on eBay.
But, as with all things, there was (and still is) a downside. To begin with, colour editions of fifty pence releases are twice the price of their cupro-nickel counterparts. This really isn’t an ideal scenario since coin collecting is expensive enough as it is. However, there was a far bigger issue on the horizon…
Numismatists have more than enough quandaries as it is. So, adding colour coins to the mix was something everyone could do without. For some people, the advent of colour would make little difference. In fact, a few would view the whole business as gimmicky. But coin collecting is a very personal thing indeed, so for quite a lot of other people it would now be necessary to own both versions of each release. And, if the truth be known, this is probably exactly the result that RM were hoping to achieve.
Colour releases have continued over the last two years but not with every coin. Only certain pictures deserve the technicolour treatment it would appear (predictably child-orientated ones on a whole lol). It is also fairly likely that we will see the release of coloured two pound coins in the not too distant. Considering how The Royal Mint have already mimicked the fifty pences of places such as The Isle of Man And Gibraltar (both had already issued colour coins prior to Mint), it is not at all inconceivable for us to see more copycat coinage in the coming years.
© Article and images (except where stated) copyright Mik Smith 2022
