Uptick in sales of Casascius Coins

[casascius]

For what it's worth, I have seen a recent increase in the volume of sales of Casascius Coins, yet I haven't done anything recently to prompt it.  By recent, I mean over the past week, and the average volume is probably double the quantity of orders and many of them are larger than average.

I suppose it could mean anything - maybe there was a posting somewhere that got a lot of attention, or maybe a popular gift-giving day is coming up that I just haven't realized.  Maybe we've reached a hump of BTC price spurting and people now want to spend some coins.  Your guess may be as good as or better than mine, I thought I would throw it out there, just for what it's worth.

[kentrolla]

thanks for posting this

[Hexadecibel]

I got one for me pa!

[SgtSpike]

Maybe that libertarian get-together inspired a bunch of them to go out and buy some?

[mollison]

Maybe that libertarian get-together inspired a bunch of them to go out and buy some?

Which one?

casascius, it would certainly be intersting to know the actual volume of Casascius Coins you sold if you can divulge that. (I understand that you may not wish to, for perfectly valid reasons.)

[miscreanity]

I ordered recently, partly because I think they're collectible, and partly for the novelty. Have to say, the service was excellent!

People have been asking me about Bitcoin recently, so it helps to make an impact when there's a tangible item. Military personnel especially seem to appreciate a real object, and tend to quickly grasp that it's a representation of value.

They're also great for birthday gifts, tips for cute waitresses (h/t Mike), and as conversation pieces, especially because of the recurring theme of financial panic seemingly without any real solutions. For some people, after discussing the concept, there is an understanding that Bitcoin could be a genuine solution instead of more lip service. I've presented coins at a number of meetups, and always wind up the popular guy after that for some reason. Must be my dashing good looks.

With that said, I ran out way too quickly. Time to order more...

[casascius]

casascius, it would certainly be intersting to know the actual volume of Casascius Coins you sold if you can divulge that. (I understand that you may not wish to, for perfectly valid reasons.)

There are two third-party stats trackers for my coins.  Their information is based on the fact that I have published in advance a list of all the pre-generated bitcoin addresses for my coins, along with some hints I have given to the authors of those two sites as to how I intend to use them.

http://casascius.appspot.com
http://casascius.uberbills.com

Now, day-to-day activity is hard to see for the following two reasons:

* for international orders, and for 100,1000 BTC pieces, I fund them after they are received, so block chain transactions happen a couple weeks later
* for US (and small international) orders, I usually fund a bunch of coins in a batch, and then draw them from a bin... so day-to-day order filling doesn't result in any block chain transactions.

When I first introduced the coins, it was the Christmas shopping season, and I had a really hard time keeping them in stock, with individual orders of 50+ and 100+ coins being regular.  Through the months of 5-dollar bitcoins orders were relatively slow, just a few orders a week and almost always small.  I haven't made marketing Casascius coins a huge priority, for example my website could use some new photos (and some more robust hosting), I presume that if I put more effort into it I'll sell more coins, but simply have other priorities that have kept me from it.

[mollison]

http://casascius.appspot.com
http://casascius.uberbills.com

Nice! And thanks for the all info. I will definitely consider these for Christmas, for those who can tolerate receiving the gift I wanted to give, instead of the gift they wanted to get. 

[waspoza]

Do you have pictures of silver 10 btc gold plated? Cannot find it on your site.

[apetersson]

or maybe a popular gift-giving day is coming up that I just haven't realized.

http://redditgifts.com/exchanges/arbitrary-day-2012/

[Stephen Gornick]

I will definitely consider these for Christmas,

Wow, just realized, that's less than six months away now.

[OgNasty]

I've been watching Casascius coins for a while now but never purchased one.  Perhaps it is time for that to change.  Great product.

[Tril]

Mike you forgot you placed a big ad in bitcoin magazine for these? 

Also, this video of buying a Casascius coin from a vending machine is on page 2 of youtube search for "bitcoin" currently at 6300+ views.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F2K6nNj_LEE

[farfiman]

For what it's worth, I have seen a recent increase in the volume of sales of Casascius Coins, yet I haven't done anything recently to prompt it.  By recent, I mean over the past week, and the average volume is probably double the quantity of orders and many of them are larger than average.

I suppose it could mean anything - maybe there was a posting somewhere that got a lot of attention, or maybe a popular gift-giving day is coming up that I just haven't realized.  Maybe we've reached a hump of BTC price spurting and people now want to spend some coins.  Your guess may be as good as or better than mine, I thought I would throw it out there, just for what it's worth.

It means bitcoin magazines ( with the ad) are finally being delivered everywhere  :p

[Serge]

consider putting up google analytics on your site, it will provide you with stats about your traffic and where it comes from if you're not using some local web stats tracking software

[minorman]

...
When I first introduced the coins, it was the Christmas shopping season, and I had a really hard time keeping them in stock, with individual orders of 50+ and 100+ coins being regular.  Through the months of 5-dollar bitcoins orders were relatively slow, just a few orders a week and almost always small.  I haven't made marketing Casascius coins a huge priority, for example my website could use some new photos (and some more robust hosting), I presume that if I put more effort into it I'll sell more coins, but simply have other priorities that have kept me from it.

I've used them for Christmas presents. No-one had a clue (or looked like they cared) what these shiny things were/are, but I told them that they were "worth" about $3 USD. I can't wait to see the faces next Christmas when I tell them what they are worth then (I hope they remember where they put them!).

Also - great item to have in your pocket just in case some asks you about bitcoin (which frequently happens if you wear a bitcoin t-shirt or use a bitcoin coffee mug at work).

Thanks Mike!

[casascius]

Your gold coins seems to have come down in price? Is that correct?

I have been introducing people to BTC and since they are not the most tech smart I have been sending them your way. You will odds are get a $5,000 to $10,000 order in the next week or so and sooner 1 (maybe two) of the gold coins will be bought.

I may very well be able to dump the minimum reserve on the gold coin just by offsetting the gold price with a buy elsewhere on the market, and I am in a position where I can now easily do that.  Gold has fallen enough that the reserve is outright silly.  So yes it's fallen due to the BTC exchange rate, but I intend to drop it even more so it's a simple $200-over-spot with no reserve.

I will update the website later today, but can accept an order where the correct calculation is figured and paid regardless of what my website says.

[scribe]

Curious - seeing some rise in interest here as well: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=90217.0

I've also literally had my first ever contacts to buy BTC via localbitcoins.com in the last days - 3 in total, 2 within minutes of each other, oddly. Will have to find out where they heard about it from.

(Don't take this as thread-jacking, just trying to draw a few threads together.)

[Jouke]

For what it's worth, I have seen a recent increase in the volume of sales of Casascius Coins, yet I haven't done anything recently to prompt it.  By recent, I mean over the past week, and the average volume is probably double the quantity of orders and many of them are larger than average.

I suppose it could mean anything - maybe there was a posting somewhere that got a lot of attention, or maybe a popular gift-giving day is coming up that I just haven't realized.  Maybe we've reached a hump of BTC price spurting and people now want to spend some coins.  Your guess may be as good as or better than mine, I thought I would throw it out there, just for what it's worth.

It means bitcoin magazines ( with the ad) are finally being delivered everywhere  :p

Think so as well Was just handing the magazine over to a friend of mine and he asked me about it

[Vandroiy]

I will update the website later today (...)

If you generally like sales upticks, update it with some images of the different coin types. You need to show these 5 BTC Coins, silver coins etc. more! People just don't like buying gimmicks when not even knowing what they look like! I've been hinting at this for a while... if you don't like sales upticks, then I dunno.

Anyway, thank you for the indicator! Either the magazine has more impact than expected, or something else is going on there...!