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There are a decent number of "original" strike collectors who actually were playing the strike machines in the 90's. Keep in mind that in the 90's the price of silver was like $5 or $6 an ounce (or something close to that) so a strike had about $3 to $4 worth of silver in it. The strike collectors were into them because they were fun to win, they had great designs, and they were EVERYWHERE. The redemption value was higher than the silver value, and people collected strikes like how people collected tokens and chips (no "scrap" value to them, just face or collector value) except again, these you had to win, and it was fun doing it. These collectors were never in it for the silver value, and the rise in silver price is just a nice bonus so to speak. Predominantly, most of these long-time collectors voted 2 or 3 and stated they will continue to play the strike machines. Some did vote 4, but were more hesitant about it.
Now fast forward to the last 2 to 5 years. Silver has shot up in value, and new collectors have joined the fray. The majority of these new collectors are SILVER collectors first, strike collectors second. They latched on to strikes because it was a cool way to collect SILVER. They are coin collectors who maybe got a little bored, they are general silver rounds and bars collectors, and silver tokens were a logical step with the allure of winning a prize from a slot machine (sometimes pretty cheaply) and getting silver rounds with cool casino designs. Evidence of this is in the redemption rate of $10 strikes. I have been told that prior to silver going up, between 50 and 60 percent of $10 strikes were redeemed at the cage for face value (so only about half the people who won one actually kept it). Now that number is only 10 to 20% redeem them, meaning 80 to 90% are keeping the strikes. That appears to be because people know silver is worth money now, and even the casual person walking by and putting a $10 bill in a machine will keep the strike while before odds were they would redeem it. These are also the collectors who are currently driving a majority of the secondary market (other than new releases and a few odd and ends here and there). These are the people who overwhelmingly voted #4 and said they will not collect HSP strikes. That's because HSP strikes will have no silver value, which again is the PRIMARY reason these people are collecting. These collectors also drop a bunch of money in strike machines when they go to Las Vegas, and keep every single strike they win. And believe me that some of these silver collectors have collections valued right up there with some of the long-time collectors.
So the question boils down to, if strikes do indeed get approved and switch to HSP, and if all the new collectors (a big chunk of the secondary market as well as strike machine players) stop collecting, stop buying, stop playing the machines for HSP strikes, can just the long-time collectors who don't care, and tourist (less tourists in my opinion, because there will be some tourists who know the value of things) and those who want the $300s, keep the hobby going? Or will play drop off so that casinos scrap the program? If you figure there are usually 148 $200s released, and a bunch end up on eBay, so there are probably about 100 hard core $200 collectors maybe less. Can 100 hard core collectors keep the dealers in line with their suitcases to redeem, keep the market going enough to sustain? I think when a $300 is released, there will be play to get strikes to redeem, but in between new releases what will happen? Only time will tell on that one.
Hope this helps, and again, THANKS to everyone for responding and discussing!
Dave.
SS - 1029
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