This week I showed the Congo silverback gorilla coin. I also showed African Wildlife elephant coin. Fortunately, I did not pay a high premium on either of these. Sometimes, I get lucky at my local coin shop.
It is important to know which coins should carry a premium. If you see them at your LCS, then you might get them without the higher premium.
Yeah, the silverback gorilla normally carries a rather sizable premium, so if you were able to get it without much markup, then you're doing well. I've found that for a lot of the non-standard coins the local shop sells them for less than online. (Standard being the American silver eagle, Canadian Maple Leaf, and even the Britannia). If you're looking outside of that, premiums are probably lower as they don't have many of them, so they want to move them and get the shelf space for something more popular.
This is absolutely correct. I know that some of my local coin shops will not pay any premium on any private mint coins. They could be a low mintage coin with a lot of popularity and they will not and do not pay more than spot, or actually less than spot. That is unfortunate for the seller; however, it is fortunate for the next buyer coming into the LCS because they get a great deal.
I was wondering why some of them were so low. That makes sense if they're buying them at spot or below. I guess they don't take the time to look them up and see what they're worth. Good for me since I'm buying!