Mint waiting and ready

The Mint is preparing for an order stampede on Thursday when sales begin at noon Eastern Daylight Time for the National Baseball Hall of Fame commemoratives.

Being prepared is a good thing; just ask any Boy Scout.

How has it gotten ready?

The Mint says it will use its online waiting room, which it says has been used for previous production launches this year.

The Mint says consumer reaction has been positive.

How does it work?

The Mint offers these four points of explanation:

• Customers can enter the waiting room to “get in line” to enter the website and make their purchase, and the waiting room will tell customers how long they have to wait before entering the catalog website.

• While in the waiting room, they may open other tabs in their browser or another browser window to visit other websites.

• Customers also will have the option to leave and come back later to shop when there is less traffic on the site.

• They will be informed that they will lose their place in line if they close the waiting room browser window to leave the waiting room.

So the Mint is prepared for a high level of initial collector demand.

Will that be the case?

One sign that the stampede will be just a small one is that there are no order limits in place.

We’ll have to wait until Thursday to find out for sure.

Buzz blogger Dave Harper is winner of the 2013 Numismatic Literary Guild Award for Best Blog and is editor of the weekly newspaper "Numismatic News."