Just a note that in my earlier post I wasn't saying LEs weren't popular. It appears to me that the new issues dealers have plenty of people who enjoy collecting them. I think part of it is the fun of having new chips show up in your mailbox regularly. I think many of us, whether we get our "mailbox fix" from buying LEs, trading chips or buying on all find this part of the fun of collecting.

What I was observing is the market in people selling off older LEs seemed slow, unless you were selling at face or lower, which isn't flawed but a fact. And I think most of us at some point think of the amount of money we've put into collecting and think of the eventual disposition of our chip collection. If you collect for fun and say have 5,000 LEs that you've spent $25,000 to $35,000 on over the years, are you figuring your wife or kids or whomever ends up with them will just throw the chips out? It appears to me your heirs (or you if you decide to sell them as your collecting interests change) can probably get face for them with a lot of effort. I wonder what the going rate would be for a large collection of LEs sold as a big lot? Are there any dealers out there with standing offers to buy big collections of LEs at face? How about 80 percent of face? Half face? Maybe 10 percent of face?

Also I think Tyrus' post on some of the steps people go through in chip collecting is right on. And I think if people want to collect LEs that is great. I've bought a few over the years, too. But it is also good for collectors to know what they are likely to find when their LEs are sold.