Royal mint survey

[apachebleu]

 Oh dear, did anybody else get the mints soverign survey today?

 Lots of questions about what 'innovations' you would like to see in future soverigns. Some of the suggestions were tags so you could see where they were made, security features, privy marks, whether you prefer rose gold, special monarch portraits and most bizarrely of all 12 sided coins.

 Somebody in charge there really needs to be fired. You have a coin with a legacy of hundreds of years and they think the best thing they can do is change it! I do like the very occasional special soverign but it's the rarity of these that make them special.

 Surely the whole point of a soverign is consistency and the fact its recognised worldwide. You start messing about with that and you ruin the legacy of what many would agree is the definitive coin of the royal mint. 

 All for a quick cash grab on the ever more pricey and ever less popular proof sets.

 

[apachebleu]

Oh yeah, they also want to know if people want to see a silver soverign, aside from the silver loving @GoldDiggerDave who would want that? 😉 

[Petra]

I hope that everyone who has received the same email has actually bothered to answer the questions as it gives a chance to comment and try to put in to perspective some of the stupid ideas that they are thinking off such as mentioned by @apachebleu!🤔🫢

[HonestMoneyGoldSilver]

Tell them from me to export the majority of their manufacturing to Australia like the good old days

[Shinus73]

1 hour ago, Petra said:

I hope that everyone who has received the same email has actually bothered to answer the questions as it gives a chance to comment and try to put in to perspective some of the stupid ideas that they are thinking off such as mentioned by @apachebleu!🤔🫢

Yes, I did.

Not interested in a silver sovereign.

Not interested in a 12 sided coin.

Not interested in different purity.

etc, etc.

Much prefer ‘old’ yellow gold to ‘new’ rose gold.

Comment: I won’t be buying any proof / SOTD sovereign until premiums come down significantly.

[Petra]

3 minutes ago, Shinus73 said:

Yes, I did.

Not interested in a silver sovereign.

Not interested in a 12 sided coin.

Not interested in different purity.

etc, etc.

Much prefer ‘old’ yellow gold to ‘new’ rose gold.

Comment: I won’t be buying any proof / SOTD sovereign until premiums come down significantly.

👍👍👍

[apachebleu]

1 hour ago, Petra said:

I hope that everyone who has received the same email has actually bothered to answer the questions as it gives a chance to comment and try to put in to perspective some of the stupid ideas that they are thinking off such as mentioned by @apachebleu!🤔🫢

 Yep, I'm not a massive soverign collector but I've got a few and I've been here long enough to know what it means to people.

 I think that as the mint when you have dedicated collectors forums like this you would be crazy not to just come here, lurk and read, you would certainly save the time and expense of asking such stupid questions.

 I think what this shows is that the management there are out of touch, do not care about the institution they are in charge of, have no interest in numismatics and they are desperately looking to see what they can get away with using the one coin they have that they believe is a guaranteed money spinner.

[Foster88]

I was about to delete the email but I thought, no, I’ll reply, I’ll try and do my bit for ‘change’, which I did and filled it all out.

This question made me realise that they have absolutely no idea what they’re doing.

Why even ask this?

[GoldDiggerDave]

8 hours ago, apachebleu said:

Oh yeah, they also want to know if people want to see a silver soverign, aside from the silver loving @GoldDiggerDave who would want that? 😉 

I did the survey and what the hell sort of questions were those?  They need the leave the sovereign as is and playing around with it will only cheapen and make a joke  of the chief coin of the world.....Other comments I had to be honest about the account mangers. 

[SeverinDigsSovereigns]

11 hours ago, apachebleu said:

Somebody in charge there really needs to be fired. You have a coin with a legacy of hundreds of years and they think the best thing they can do is change it! 

Unfortunately that's the norm of the day. People cry for changes and get the changes they deserve. A change from merry good life to misery. That sums up politics of the 20th century really.

[Olivard]

5 hours ago, GoldDiggerDave said:

I did the survey and what the hell sort of questions were those?  They need the leave the sovereign as is and playing around with it will only cheapen and make a joke  of the chief coin of the world.....Other comments I had to be honest about the account mangers. 

Agree about leaving it alone with one exception. Change the colour back to yellow gold. If they are asking the question it might be that the constant complaints are getting through.

Problem is that someone in marketing see's all these adverts offering different types of sovereigns from God knows where and raking in the cash. So they think they could do with a share of that market.

Just look at how Royal Mail has gone. Stamps no longer issued in moderation for real anniversaries. They milk the market.

Royal Mint already does some of this so to the mind of some executive extending it to sovereigns makes financial sense. They can't understand it from a collectors point of view because they only know the business from the short term economic point of view.

Edited December 29, 2023 by Olivard

[flyingveepixie]

RM no longer sends me emails.  Last one i received from them was about a year ago, probably because after my initial flurry of buying mistakes as a new stacker I quickly learned that they were ripping me off with their premiums and I stopped using them.  If I had been asked about sovereign colour preferences I would have stated that I like both colours of yellow and rose, because I do, but I don't like the idea of gimmicky new designs every five minutes just so they can cash in, and I would have told them so.

Edited December 30, 2023 by flyingveepixie

[MrStacker]

I wasn’t one of the "lucky" folks who received the survey email. I guess I need to spend more directly with the mint LOL. 😂

It’s quite worrying the questions being asked as I really don’t have any confidence in them actually acknowledging and placing any value in the feedback they will receive. I feel they will just crack on with what they deem “best for business”. The last 2 years they have milked several ranges and made the sovereign range less appealing for me anyway. I delayed my first baby steps into the proof market solely on the basis of such poor quality control from RM and the high number of non satisfied collectors. Not just on TSF.

I would prefer them to focus on quality control and revert the sovereign back to the yellow gold finish. The copper finish is just horrendous both on bullion and proofs. The potential changes in pricing structure for 2024 may not reflect the value and quality you will receive.

Also, I think I’m the only one here that hates the packaging? Is it a laminated wood finish? For the proof boxes? I find them tacky and reminds me of the cheap wallpaper you find in poundland.

No to silver version of the sovereign. We had enough of milked britannias. We don’t need milked silver sovereigns to match.

[pricha]

Like modern football I don't buy into it. It's c**p. I have no interest.  Same with sovereigns.  I love the history and the tradition.  Being a gullible cash cow chasing the latest gimmick is not for me. 

[Stuntman]

I didn't get the survey email, but let's hope that the vast majority of those people who complete the survey vote for a return to yellow gold.  
I'd certainly be keener to buy modern bullion sovereigns and double sovereigns that looked like the pre-2000 coins did.

Beyond that, the RM would be mad to mess with the specifications of the sovereign - whether size, shape, purity, weight, main metal content...

[paulmerton]

No survey invitation for me either, despite opting into hearing from them via email at every opportunity. You'd have thought they'd want to be asking these questions to the people who actually buy sovereigns, but nope!

[SilverJacks]

If this doesn’t tempt @LawrenceChard to make a comment then nothing will…

[paulmerton]

57 minutes ago, SilverJacks said:

If this doesn’t tempt @LawrenceChard to make a comment then nothing will…

The topic or the spelling?

[SilverJacks]

@paulmerton if he doesn’t say something soon I’m gonna fill that survey full of praise for pink sovereigns. 

[LemmyMcGregor]

Purple sovereigns anyone?

[westminstrel]

I spent about an hour crafting my responses, and with all due respect to whoever reads them, I provided severe feedback and also cross questioned them about their line of thinking.

- Security features  
- micro text    
- 12-sided coin    
- hidden latent image    
- edge lettering    
- more privy mark Sovereigns      
- ability to verify Sovereign’s authenticity using smartphone (HOW? By fiddling with the coin’s design? And also, WHY?)   
- wavy lines in the fields (like the Britannia)    
- recycled materials for coin and packaging    
- unique KC III portraits (again, FOR WHAT REASON?)  
- St. George and Dragon (vs alternate designs, I assume)     
- silver Sovereign (again, WHY?)     

The only question worth posing imo was the yellow vs rose gold question (which got a YES for yellow from me). The question should never have been asked though, the choice should have been obvious; but probably some advisory committee thinks rose gold looks contemporary and pretty so “let’s ask our customers!” 

I made it clear that in the Royal Mint’s own words, the Sovereign is supposed to be A CONSTANT THROUGH CHANGE!

I also gave my thoughts about the numerous variations: proof, bullion, BU matte / plain edge, SotD, privy marks, and that I’ve lost interest because the Sovereign’s rarity and uniqueness has been diluted.

It’s likely the survey was sent out to check a box, and the Royal Mint will do what they want in the end; but I’ll keep my fingers crossed they genuinely care about collectors’ opinions.

[SovereignBull]

19 hours ago, Foster88 said:

I was about to delete the email but I thought, no, I’ll reply, I’ll try and do my bit for ‘change’, which I did and filled it all out.

This question made me realise that they have absolutely no idea what they’re doing.

Why even ask this?

If those were the examples provided it’s clear they want to stick with rose gold! Why else would you choose a worn 1892 yellow and a 2024 proof rose as the examples

[apachebleu]

 OK so I will say something controversial....I don't hate the modern colour, I actually quite like it. I have no idea why they edit the pictures to make them look more pink because if they really were that colour it would be ridiculous. However I do agree they should be gold, use the rose tint for the other tat they sell as super limited edition, once in a lifetime proofs.

 

 What should be telling is that on here, among the people who buy them, with the exception of some dissenting voices prepared to accept the colour, the opinion is unanimous, leave it alone.

[apachebleu]

1 hour ago, paulmerton said:

The topic or the spelling?

 I see spelling as more of an art form than an exact science

[Silverlocks]

On 28/12/2023 at 22:47, HonestMoneyGoldSilver said:

Tell them from me to export the majority of their manufacturing to Australia like the good old days

Well, the Royal Munt could take a leaf or two out of Perth Mint's book when it comes to quality control.