Baltimore show strong
It may have been the best Baltimore Coin & Currency Convention ever.
A total of 8,519 people attended the show, held March 17-19.
?We ran out of convention programs at 1 p.m. on Saturday,? said Edward Kuszmar of Florida Currency and Coin, one of the show organizers. ?That?s never happened before.? Kuszmar?s partner, dealer Gordon Berg, said, ?It was the biggest event we?ve ever held.?
The event has expanded, having increased its bourse space by 50 percent by adding on Hall C of the Baltimore Convention Center.
?The new room worked out very well,? said Berg. ?Traffic flow was excellent.?
To draw people to the new area, show organizers exhibited the famed Brasher doubloon in the space on Friday and Saturday. Also, some of the major dealers were situated in the area.
?We used 70 percent of the expanded space,? said Kuszmar. ?A lot of people were concerned there would be no traffic to Hall C, but that was not a problem.?
In all, there were approximately 870 dealers with photo identification at the show.
A total of $6,000 was raised for Children?s Hospitals.
For his part, Kuszmar reported strong sales across the board.
?A lot of Maryland obsolete currency was sold,? he said, ?and there were a lot of collector coins, a lot of silver Eagles, and mint sets and proof sets, and U.S. gold sold.?
As evidence of the show?s success, Kuszmar pointed to the number of dealers ? 125 ? that stayed through Sunday.
?When we opened on Friday, it took 20 minutes for the line of people waiting to get in to break,? said Kuszmar.
