Sand Sifter
Active member
I've been giving more thought about the increased competition we face today, and I can't believe I either forgot or didn't think of this earlier. Countless posts have discussed this before, and I’ve jumped in as well mentioning things like the increasing prices of gold & silver, more detector manufacturers, more choices, hi-tech waterproof SMF detectors at more affordable prices, etc. If you’ve been detecting for 5, 10, 15, 20 years, all of those make sense, but we all still seem to be scratching our heads, trying to figure out where all this additional competition has come from.
But after giving it more thought, it finally dawned on me. IMHO, I think the #1 reason we have such increased competition these days is due to AWARENESS. Sure, of course the increasing value of gold & silver plays a big part, but they wouldn't be able to play such a big part in our hobby unless it was due to AWARENESS of our hobby. Here’s what I mean.
I started detecting as a kid 56 years ago (1969), so in my case, I have the benefit of being able to look back in time, as I started when the hobby itself was just getting started. So I, and other old timers, can look back in time to compare the hobby then to the hobby now. Back in the early days, if people out on a beach saw someone swinging a metal detector, they wouldn’t go up and ask him if he found anything, they’d ask him what was he doing. That’s because back then, metal detecting was an “under the radar” hobby. You’d only know about it if you happened to see or knew someone with a detector, read some treasure hunting stories, maybe saw an ad for a detector in a Tabloid, etc. It wasn’t a well known hobby back then like it is today.
Back then, as a kid, I read treasure hunting stories, books about pirates & shipwrecks, the Readers Digest story about Oak Island, all that type of stuff, and I dreamed of finding treasure. I’d scan through the classifieds of the Tabloid’s my mom bought at the grocery store, looking for metal detector ads. Back then, the detectors in the classifieds were “off brands” that would look like toys today. But to me, they were magical. So in 1969, my mom bought me a Heathkit detector after I saw it in one of their catalogs. The Heathkit was a BFO that we had to build ourselves. And when I say build, I don’t just mean assemble, we had to actually build the detector from scratch, so that meant soldering the components to the pcb, soldering and connecting wires, etc. So, it was just me, I’d take the detector to the playground in our community and hunt through the woods looking for “buried treasure”, lol.
Sometime in 1971, I talked my mom into upgrading me a White’s Coinmaster IV (TR). The local dealer that we bought it from just happened to be the President of a newly formed Metal Detecting Club, so we joined. I got to meet other treasure hunters, got to see other detectors and brands that I had only seen in catalogs, got to participate in club sponsored hunts as well as larger regional hunts, so I was now part of a community of TH’ers. I use this to illustrate that back then, ours was what I would call a “word of mouth” type hobby. You either had to know someone, stumble across the hobby, or be very interested in the hobby and took the time to seek out others. And researching took a LOT more time back then than today. I’d either have to write a letter or call White’s or Garrett to request a current catalog. I vividly remember looking through the Garrett catalog and literally drooling over those cool looking green detectors, lol.
So, what’s changed from them until now? We now have the internet, and getting any information we want only takes a few seconds. Today, I can come up with a list of every detector manufacturer, their websites, and have access to every model detector made, in just minutes. Back then, it would have probably taken me a year or more to find all this information, and I’d have to write letters or make phone calls to request more information. But today, anything I want to know, see, or learn about is just seconds away with a few taps of my keyboard. Everybody has internet access, and they can just jump on YouTube to watch videos of detectorists pulling cheddar from beach sands, or snorkeling/diving underwater. And when the average person, who may have never thought about metal detecting, see’s a video of gold rings being pulled from a beach with a detector, their subconscious “gold fever” takes over, and suddenly, they become very interested in getting a detector and finding some of that gold for themselves.
But back when the hobby was first getting started, the barrier to entry was a lot higher. You had to know that metal detectors existed, or knew someone who had one, or seen someone swinging one. It took a lot more effort and time back then to research the hobby and even to find out where you could buy a detector, lol. But today, because the internet has given every one instant access to information, and YouTube video’s allow people to see our hobby in action, along with some of the incredible finds that can be made, I think that’s the #1 reason why we have so much more competition today. The mass marketing of metal detecting via the internet has created more and more people interested in our hobby that probably wouldn’t have ever been interested if the internet didn’t exist.
Would love to hear thoughts/comments from other old timers here who can also look back in time. I’m sure they may have had similar experiences that I had.
But after giving it more thought, it finally dawned on me. IMHO, I think the #1 reason we have such increased competition these days is due to AWARENESS. Sure, of course the increasing value of gold & silver plays a big part, but they wouldn't be able to play such a big part in our hobby unless it was due to AWARENESS of our hobby. Here’s what I mean.
I started detecting as a kid 56 years ago (1969), so in my case, I have the benefit of being able to look back in time, as I started when the hobby itself was just getting started. So I, and other old timers, can look back in time to compare the hobby then to the hobby now. Back in the early days, if people out on a beach saw someone swinging a metal detector, they wouldn’t go up and ask him if he found anything, they’d ask him what was he doing. That’s because back then, metal detecting was an “under the radar” hobby. You’d only know about it if you happened to see or knew someone with a detector, read some treasure hunting stories, maybe saw an ad for a detector in a Tabloid, etc. It wasn’t a well known hobby back then like it is today.
Back then, as a kid, I read treasure hunting stories, books about pirates & shipwrecks, the Readers Digest story about Oak Island, all that type of stuff, and I dreamed of finding treasure. I’d scan through the classifieds of the Tabloid’s my mom bought at the grocery store, looking for metal detector ads. Back then, the detectors in the classifieds were “off brands” that would look like toys today. But to me, they were magical. So in 1969, my mom bought me a Heathkit detector after I saw it in one of their catalogs. The Heathkit was a BFO that we had to build ourselves. And when I say build, I don’t just mean assemble, we had to actually build the detector from scratch, so that meant soldering the components to the pcb, soldering and connecting wires, etc. So, it was just me, I’d take the detector to the playground in our community and hunt through the woods looking for “buried treasure”, lol.
Sometime in 1971, I talked my mom into upgrading me a White’s Coinmaster IV (TR). The local dealer that we bought it from just happened to be the President of a newly formed Metal Detecting Club, so we joined. I got to meet other treasure hunters, got to see other detectors and brands that I had only seen in catalogs, got to participate in club sponsored hunts as well as larger regional hunts, so I was now part of a community of TH’ers. I use this to illustrate that back then, ours was what I would call a “word of mouth” type hobby. You either had to know someone, stumble across the hobby, or be very interested in the hobby and took the time to seek out others. And researching took a LOT more time back then than today. I’d either have to write a letter or call White’s or Garrett to request a current catalog. I vividly remember looking through the Garrett catalog and literally drooling over those cool looking green detectors, lol.
So, what’s changed from them until now? We now have the internet, and getting any information we want only takes a few seconds. Today, I can come up with a list of every detector manufacturer, their websites, and have access to every model detector made, in just minutes. Back then, it would have probably taken me a year or more to find all this information, and I’d have to write letters or make phone calls to request more information. But today, anything I want to know, see, or learn about is just seconds away with a few taps of my keyboard. Everybody has internet access, and they can just jump on YouTube to watch videos of detectorists pulling cheddar from beach sands, or snorkeling/diving underwater. And when the average person, who may have never thought about metal detecting, see’s a video of gold rings being pulled from a beach with a detector, their subconscious “gold fever” takes over, and suddenly, they become very interested in getting a detector and finding some of that gold for themselves.
But back when the hobby was first getting started, the barrier to entry was a lot higher. You had to know that metal detectors existed, or knew someone who had one, or seen someone swinging one. It took a lot more effort and time back then to research the hobby and even to find out where you could buy a detector, lol. But today, because the internet has given every one instant access to information, and YouTube video’s allow people to see our hobby in action, along with some of the incredible finds that can be made, I think that’s the #1 reason why we have so much more competition today. The mass marketing of metal detecting via the internet has created more and more people interested in our hobby that probably wouldn’t have ever been interested if the internet didn’t exist.
Would love to hear thoughts/comments from other old timers here who can also look back in time. I’m sure they may have had similar experiences that I had.
