Coin World managing editor William T. Gibbs reports on a bonus for customers who ordered their 2016 America the Beautiful Quarters Proof set early: error packaging that will be corrected when sales resume in April. Learn what caused a suspension in sales.

Full video transcript:

Good morning. This is William T. Gibbs with Coin World’s Monday morning blast. 

What’s the value of a wrong image in Mint packaging for a Mint product? We’ll soon find out.

In early January, the United States Mint began selling the 2016 Proof America the Beautiful Quarter Dollar Sets, and then it realized that one of the images representing one of the national parks in the packaging was actually from a state park—it was wrong.

The Mint suspended sales so it could go back, reproduce new packaging, and resume sales sometime in April. However, some 12,000 sets had already been shipped to collectors and they are now making their way into the secondary market.

Will those sets carry a premium in the future? That’s up to collectors to decide. However, this incident is just the latest in a series of packaging problems the Mint has experienced since September.

In September, individuals receiving some of the American $1 Coin and Currency Sets reported that the Federal Reserve notes in the set had become dislodged and were damaged. Then, in early November, the Mint announced it was postponing sales of the limited edition Silver Proof Set, again because of packaging problems. Later, the Mint even had to cancel that set for an unrelated reason.

More recently, the Mint postponed sales of the 2016 Mark Twain commemorative silver dollar, again because of packaging problems. The certificate of authenticity made reference to a scene on the reverse of the coin as having been from Twain’s The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, when in reality the scene is from The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

Now, I will be the first to admit that I make mistakes, some of them embarrassing that made their way into print in my writing. But I attempt to learn from my errors and not repeat them. Let’s hope that the United States Mint’s sales and marketing staff will learn from these recent errors and take added steps to prevent them from occurring in the future.

In the meantime, if you’re one of the lucky collectors who received one of these error sets, let us know what you’re going to do with it. Are you going to keep it? Are you going to sell it, maybe for a premium? We would like to know.

This William Gibbs for Coin World. Thank you. 

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