How to Catalog a Coin Collection: Categories and Fields

To catalog a coin collection, put every coin in one category based on how you sell it (usually type and series), then record the same set of fields on every coin: date, mint mark, denomination, grade, grading service, cert number, cost, and storage location. Add your own fields for facts that change the price, such as pedigree, toning, or strike, and keep stories and conversations in notes.

The rest of this guide covers how to pick categories, which fields to fill, when a custom field is better than a note, and two worked examples. It applies to a spreadsheet as much as to inventory software.

Start with how you pull coins

Before you make any categories, ask one question: when a customer or a show asks for something, how do you go looking for it? Most dealers answer "by series". Someone wants a Carson City Morgan, so you go to the Morgans. Someone wants a Saint-Gaudens double eagle, so you go to the gold.

That answer is your top level. Categories should match the way you think about stock at the counter, not the way a reference book is laid out.

Ways to group coins

Grouping	Example categories	Works well when
Type and series	Morgan Dollars, Peace Dollars, Walking Liberty Halves	You sell mostly US coins to collectors
Metal	Gold, Silver, Platinum	You sell a lot of bullion
Denomination	Cents, Nickels, Dimes, Quarters, Halves, Dollars	You carry many series in small numbers
Country or region	United States, Canada, Ancient	You sell world and ancient coins
Purpose	Bullion, Type Coins, Key Dates	You sell to more than one kind of buyer

You do not have to pick just one. A common setup is a mix: series for the US coins you carry in depth, and broad groups such as Bullion and World for the rest.

Use subcategories for depth, not for every fact

Subcategories are useful when one series has enough coins that you split it when you pull them. A shop with 400 Morgans might have:

• Morgan Dollars
  • Carson City Morgans
  • Proof-like Morgans
  • Common Date Morgans

Stop at two levels in most cases. If you find yourself making "Morgan Dollars > 1881-S > MS65", the grade and the date belong in fields. Categories that split on every fact make a tree with hundreds of branches, and nobody can remember where a coin went.

One category per coin

Each coin goes in one place. If an 1893-CC Morgan could be in Carson City Morgans or Key Dates, pick one rule and follow it (for example, "series first") so two people put the same coin in the same place.

The fields every coin needs

These are the fields worth filling on every coin, even common ones:

Field	Example	Why it matters
Date	1881	Price, search, and buyer questions all start here
Mint mark	S	1881 and 1881-S Morgans are different coins to a buyer
Denomination	$1	Groups across series and sorts the face value of bulk coins
Series or type	Morgan Dollar	Lets you find coins outside the category tree
Grade	MS64	The single largest factor in price for most coins
Grading service	PCGS	A PCGS MS64 and a raw "MS64" are not the same coin
Cert number	The number on the holder	Proves which holder you have, and lets you look it up
Cost	$62.00	Profit, markup, and insurance values come from it
Location	Safe 2, shelf A, box 3	A coin you cannot find cannot be sold

For raw coins, leave the grading service and cert number empty and record your own grade with a note on who graded it and when.

Fields that matter for some coins

These are worth recording when they change the price or the way you sell the coin:

• Pedigree. The named collection the coin came from, such as Eliasberg or Norweb. Many buyers pay more for a known pedigree, and grading services print some pedigrees on the label.
• Toning. A short description such as "rainbow obverse" or "blue and gold rim". Toned coins sell on their color, so the buyer wants this before the photos.
• Strike. Designations such as Full Bell Lines on Franklin halves, Full Bands on Mercury dimes, or Proof-like and Deep Mirror Proof-like on Morgans. Some of these show in the grade on the holder. Record them in one field so you can find them all.
• Variety. VAM numbers for Morgans and Peace dollars, doubled dies, overdates.
• Eye appeal or your own rating. If your staff rate coins A, B, or C for eye appeal, record it the same way every time.

A good test for a field: if two coins differ only in this fact, would you price them differently? If yes, it needs its own field.

When a custom field beats a note

A note is free text attached to a coin. A field is one fact with the same name on every coin. Use a field when:

1. The fact has the same shape on many coins. Pedigree is a name. Toning is a short description. Strike is one of a few designations.
2. You will want to find coins by it. "Show me every Eliasberg coin" is easy with a Pedigree field and close to impossible when the name is buried in 200 notes.
3. You will export it. A field becomes a column in a spreadsheet. A note does not.
4. The value should be checked. A number field only takes numbers. A list of choices only takes the choices you set, so nobody types "FBL", "Full Bell", and "full bell lines" for the same thing.

Use a note when:

• The fact is a one-off story ("bought from the estate of a retired machinist, his father's collection").
• It is a conversation ("Jim thinks this one would cross at MS65, worth a try at the next show").
• It is about a problem that will be resolved ("small rim ding at 3 o'clock on the holder, ask PCGS about a reholder").

A common mistake is to start with notes for everything and try to turn them into fields later. If you know you will search by a fact, make it a field from the first coin.

Pick the right kind of field

Field type	Use it for	Example
Text	Free descriptions with no fixed list	Toning: "Rainbow obverse, untoned reverse"
Number	Anything you will sort or compare	Mintage: 12,000
List of choices	A small, fixed set of values	Strike: Full Bell Lines, Full Bands, Proof-like, Deep Mirror Proof-like

For a list of choices, write the choices once and do not change their spelling. That is what makes a filter on them reliable.

Worked example: a 220-coin collection

Laura Bennett, a dealer, buys a collection of 220 coins. It holds 140 Morgan dollars, 30 Franklin halves, 25 pre-1933 gold coins, and 25 world coins.

Categories. Her store already has Morgan Dollars (with Carson City Morgans under it), Franklin Halves, US Gold, and World. Each coin goes into one of them. The 12 Carson City Morgans go in the subcategory.

Fields on every coin. Date, mint mark, denomination, series, grade, grading service, cert number, cost, and location. She allocates the purchase price across the coins first, so each coin carries its own cost instead of an average.

Custom fields. She sees three facts worth keeping as fields:

• Pedigree (text). Eight of the Morgans are in holders with a pedigree on the label. She records the name as printed.
• Strike (list of choices). Eleven of the Franklins are Full Bell Lines, and four Morgans are Proof-like.
• Toning (text). Nine Morgans have color worth photographing.

Notes. The collection came with a letter from the original owner listing where he bought each gold coin. That goes in a note on each gold coin, because it is a story, not a fact she will filter by.

A week later, a customer asks for Full Bell Lines Franklins. She filters the coin list by Strike and has all eleven in one view.

Worked example: cleaning up an old spreadsheet

Tom Russo has 1,800 coins in a spreadsheet. The "Notes" column holds everything: "PCGS MS64 FBL nice toning ex Norweb", "raw AU, cleaned", "CAC".

1. Pull the repeated facts out of the notes. He sorts the column and reads it top to bottom. The facts that show up again and again are grade, service, strike designation, pedigree, CAC sticker, and problems such as "cleaned".
2. Make a column for each. Grade, Grading Service, Strike, Pedigree, CAC, Problem.
3. Move the values. "PCGS MS64 FBL nice toning ex Norweb" becomes Grading Service PCGS, Grade MS64, Strike Full Bell Lines, Pedigree Norweb, and a short Toning value.
4. Keep what is left as a note. Anything that did not fit a column stays in the notes.
5. Set categories after the import. He selects the coins of each series and sets their category in one batch edit.

After that, every coin can be found by any of those facts.

Mistakes that make a catalog hard to use

• Categories that are really fields. "MS65 and up" is a grade filter, not a category. When a coin is regraded, a category like that is wrong.
• Two spellings of the same value. "NGC" and "N.G.C." split one group in two. Use a list of choices where you can.
• Facts only in notes. If you will search for it, make it a field.
• An average cost. Record each coin's own cost. An average hides which coins made money.
• No location. Every catalog entry needs a place the coin sits, or the record and the coin drift apart.

How CoinManagerPro handles categories and custom fields

In CoinManagerPro you make categories on the Categories page and give a category a parent to make a subcategory. Each category page lists its coins, with a search. You set the category when you add a coin or accept one from photo intake, or select many coins on the coin list, click Edit, and set the category for all of them. You can filter the coin list by category and save the filter as a view. When you delete a category, its coins stay in your inventory with no category.

Custom fields are added in Settings, under Custom fields. A field holds text (up to 500 characters), a number, or one choice from a list of up to 50 choices, and a workspace can have up to 50 fields. A custom field cannot take the name of a built-in field such as Year or Metal. You fill a field by clicking its value on the coin page, in a batch edit for many coins, or with a matching column in a coin import; a value that does not fit shows a warning on its row. You can filter the coin list by a field that contains a value, such as Pedigree contains Eliasberg, and the coin list export has a column for each field. The coin history records each change. For stories and conversations about a coin, use coin notes. The steps are in the custom fields help article.