United Kingdom: Space tourism 50p series

[eurocoin]

In 2014 The Royal Mint was planning to introduce a series of coins to commemorate the plans of the British company Virgin Galactic to provide suborbital spaceflights to space tourists. To commemorate this moment of history, the Royal Mint commissioned designers to submit designs for this series of 50p coins. Some designs that were submitted by Georgia Chambers:

[augsburger]

Interesting, doesn't work on a coin though to just have a few dot the dot things of stars.

[Alan71]

It seriously doesn't work!

What's going on with the last design?  Are they supposed to be two sides of the same coin, with the Queen's portrait shrunk to a stamp-style silhouette facing the wrong way?

[andyg]

Just wondering if they are supposed to be holes through the coin...

[eurocoin]

Just wondering if they are supposed to be holes through the coin...

Yes they are indeed.

[eurocoin]

What's going on with the last design?  Are they supposed to be two sides of the same coin, with the Queen's portrait shrunk to a stamp-style silhouette facing the wrong way?

You are right about that. I am surprised by all of the negative comments on here. I also posted these images in a few British coins collectors groups on Facebook and there were dozens of likes and dozens of positive comments in all of these groups. 

[augsburger]

We're special... and we have taste... 

[Alan71]

We're special... and we have taste... 

There's some truth in this.  Anyone can like a Facebook group, or join one.  To be on a forum takes more effort, and you have to be a bit more serious about it.

These coins would not work.  Holes in them would get very dirty, and possibly even affect the weight of the coin.  As illustrated, these designs couldn't possibly be used.  The Queen's portrait would have to be larger (and facing the right direction) and the DG REG FD etc. inscription would have to be prominent.  Dots or holes just aren't enough, there's too much space to fill.

[eurocoin]

This is what the collectors packs would have looked like, these would have contained 2 coins:

[Enlil]

OMG they are damn awful.

[Figleaf]

I think what gets people here (speculation!) is that there is no connection left between the coin as money and these designs. Add that they look gimmicky and that the design looks childish and you get negative comments. I would like to see the UK royal mint split into a coin-making part that produces for the government only and a "Tower mint" like part that produces this sort of stuff for the get-rich-quickly crowd as well as the hot air they seem to feel necessary to generate. The later part could be privatised and should anyway not be subsidised.

Peter

[Alan71]

^^ I agree with some of that.  However, surely the Royal Mint isn't subsidised now? Since it became a limited company it's operated as though it's a private company out to make money for its shareholders.  The shareholders are the government.  Whilst I don't like how the company operates in comparison to how it did even just seven years ago, at least its profits are going to the government and therefore back to us.

At least there is some quality control going on and we were spared this awful set of coins. However, the five coins for Beatrix Potter this year suggest this is how it will go.  Numerous coin designs to celebrate one event that isn't really worthy of more than one.  And this week's announcement that two 2015 £2 coins are "rare" ensures that collecting will remain popular with the Facebook masses.

[Figleaf]

"Subsidy" is a complicated subject, the more so because civil servants are very good at hiding them. Here's an example that may help. Say the UK mint can produce a coin at a cost of 100. A Korean company can produce the same coin at 50. If the UK Treasury will only consider the UK mint, that is a subsidy (guaranteed market share) by itself. If the UK Treasury offers to buy the coin at 85, the mint makes a loss, but there is a subsidy of 35, in spite of the loss.

If the UK Treasury offers to buy the coin at 125, there is a subsidy of 75. The mint makes a profit of 25, which is returned to the budget, so the net cost to the UK Treasury is 100 and the subsidy is reduced to 50.

Interestingly, there can be second degree subsidies. If the mint hires designers and engravers, while it could have outsourced the work more cheaply, the mint is in turn subsidising the designers and engravers it hires. If it runs a museum or a web site at a loss (taking additional sales into account), the mint is subsidising the entry tickets of the museum or the users of the web site.

If the mint sells rubbish at a large profit and amalgamates those profits on the balance sheet with the losses on circulating coin production, it subsidises the losses making circulation coins. In this way, it is difficult for the public - and parliament, when voting on the budget - even to find out what the cost of making circulation coins really is. The end result may well be that parliament asks no questions, which protects doubtful jobs at the mint. By splitting the monkey business and the money business, you preserve the dignity of the government, which will have little more to do with the monkey business than licensing new issues against a share of the profits, and you will create the kind of clarity that enables rational choices in the money business. That would likely even profit tax payers.

Peter

[eurocoin]

9 years after these coins were developed, Virgin Galactic has today for the first time flown people to space. The idea to issue commemorative coins for the occasion was abandoned a long time ago.