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Looking for a fun business investment? Let’s go smash some pennies

What a really fun idea if you're looking for a business to invest in: Try one a penny machine. No, I don't mean a machine that MAKES pennies. I mean a machine that SMASHES pennies. I'll bet at one time or another you've seen one of those machines that lets you crank out an elongated coin with the Statue of Liberty on it, or the U.S. Capitol, or Pikes Peak, or ... well, one of many places or faces.

I remember two of those instances when I used a hand cranked "penny smasher" machine to make some souvenir coins. When my son graduated from high school in 1991, he and I took a special "road trip" together and ended up in Colorado Springs. You cannot go to Colorado Springs without driving up Pikes Peak (it's a law -- not really). At the top of Pikes Peak, while he roamed around, his chubby old dad sat on a bench -- and spotted a hand-crank coin machine that was smashing out Pikes Peak souvenirs. I still have that around here somewhere.

The second time was just last spring, on my way to visit my brother on the East Coast. We stopped at a restaurant on one of the many turnpikes for a quick pit stop and snack attack. I spotted another of those hand-cranked penny machines. This time I got a Statue of Liberty elongated penny (we were just across the river from New York City) to take home and give to a friend.

Anyway, take a look around the "Global Impressions" site I've linked to above. I don't think you can go wrong on a penny smashing machine. How cool is that? Just sort of like pennies from heaven!
[tags]Global Impressions, hand-cranked penny machine, just a guy who reads the papers[/tags]

January 30, 2008 | Filed Under Business News, Useful Websites 

Comments

2 Responses to “Looking for a fun business investment? Let’s go smash some pennies”

  1. Connie on January 31st, 2008 9:34 pm

    We collect “stretched coins” from our many trips to Disney World. We have so many that we have a book to keep them in. They’re fun to find. I’d love to have some of the coins like you mentioned though, especially the Statue of Liberty one.

  2. Gary on February 1st, 2008 10:44 am

    Yeah, they really are fun to collect. I used to have one for the small Nebraska town I grew up in — Tecumseh — because someone there set up a machine in the local drug store when I was a kid. I also thought it pretty special when I was 6 or 7 and went to Lincoln — the state capital and the biggest city I had ever seen at the time — and got one of Nebraska’s State Capitol Building.

    As for the Statue of Liberty, all I remember is that we went into a convenience store/restaurant rest stop somewhere on the New Jersey Turnpike, I think near the George Washington Bridge on ramp? I wasn’t driving and I’m pretty fuzzy about that part of the country. LOL!

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