Anyone Make Money With Fossils?

[kolleamm]

Have a business or profit?

[Auspex]

I'm in the red...'course, I don't sell anything

[Raistlin]

I cannot bring myself to sell fossils. I give a few away if I have some nice ones. But I could not bring myself to sell something I have invested so much time and interest in when each one is unique.

Edited July 4, 2012 by Raistlin

[kolleamm]

I've had a raptor claw for years, I love it so much that I didn't sell it in order to pay my health insurance! I wanna be buried with it! haha

[Malcolmt]

I have never sold a fossil, by the time you find them and go through prepping them, the cost you would need to recover to make it worth while is more than most people would pay. Heck the gas alone to get to my closest collecting spot is about $35 return trip. You also get very attached to them and its just to hard to part with them. Each significant fossil I find has a story to tell.

I do however give fossils away to people that will appreciate them and am not averse to trading a fossil for an unprepped fossil that I would never have the opportunity of collecting myself.

[kolleamm]

I guess it brings out the adventurous side in us.. money only gets you so much satisfaction

[Raistlin]

I guess I am strange in the fact I would never want to be rich. It is more burden than I would want.

Getting my bills paid on the other hand would be great, everything I make after that is just money in my pocket.

However, I will likely not see my bills paid off until I am dead LOL. Until then I will stick to playing with my rocks that contain old dead things.

[kolleamm]

"Getting my bills paid on the other hand would be great"

Yes, yes and yes!

[fossiladdict]

Nope, it's strictly for the collecting and enjoyment for me. I don't mind sharing though, especially with fossils that are common in my area.

[Vordigern]

Ive been collecting for 13 years and for just as long Ive been running an ebay business but up until this DecemberI had never sold a single one of the thousands of fossils I've collected and now have in storage, then this winter I heard about a trip with the NJ State Museum to SD/MO in July and I thought "hey what wouldnt I give to go on that trip" so I started listing some of my fossils to see if I could come up with the funds to pay for the trip without asking the wife to take it out of savings, because I think Id have better luck cloning dinosaurs from mosquittos trapped in amber. Anyway I have to say I was really disappointed with how little my fossils sold for and eventually I just stopped, I get more joy out of giving them away to someone who I know will appreciate them than. Thats not to say I would never sell another fossil but for now Im happy keeping what I find. Oh well, I'll get out west someday

[Uncle Siphuncle]

i've donated some, given away tons, and sold some over time, but i've kept over 90% of the better stuff. its a game of high grading to make best use of space. over time i've had to purge lots of stuff i would have never thought of letting go of just a few years prior. so i sell a few on occasion to help defray the cost of itinerant collecting, hoping to break even on gas, which i never do. i sell from my own sites, not sites i'm shown in confidence, although i've given away or traded surplus specimens from guided trips. money changing hands from the fruits of someone elses sites is bad juju, in my opinion. my trades and purchases are few as i prefer to "roll my own"...

[Herb]

If you want to make money in fossils you should be collecting dinosaurs.

The 'proffit' for me is still in the hunt, identifying and collecting with friends and soon to be friends. I do, give them away and donate them.

[Wrangellian]

The only fossils I have sold are a couple Moroccan trilos that I bought and wasn't happy with, and they sold at a loss. I have no doubt it is a tough business, at least if you're too attached to all the 'good ones' to sell them too! I would never sell anything that might be important to science, but I'm not against selling some of the others, especially as Dan says to make space and try to defray some costs at the same time.

[Missourian]

I tend to want to keep anything worth selling. As for everything else, it's usually not worth the trouble. In the past, though, I have sold fossils in bulk to be used for grab bags.

[Kehbe]

Although at times my wife would prefer otherwise, I agree with the majority, I recently boxed up and shipped some fossils that were 'sold' kind of, auctioned off to benefit the fossil forum and was delighted to be able to! I would certainly be willing to donate any of my finds if they were of any interest to science and trading them around goes without saying but for the most part, I am happy just collecting and hoarding! I have a garage full of 'rocks' to prove it, as well as every last square inch of shelf space in the house!

[Kosmoceras]

I have dealt with them. I used to buy (for example) Moroccan trilobites or dinosaur bone fragments in bulk, keep a few myself and sell the rest. Made a bit and then bought a nice piece or more stock. I don't sell them much anymore, but I never sell my own finds.

[Lloyd]

I don't really have much overload because I am constantly giving stuff away to kids and have, in the past, traded for things from places I doubt I'll ever be able to collect. I have, however, a small amount of St. Clair PA ferns, Florida shark teeth and Tennessee Crinoid stems that I have been considering - for some months now - putting on the trading/selling page of the forum here just to keep my stuff from overrunning the limited space I have in my "rock room." Even headed down to the Rock Room on several occasions with the intention of pulling some stuff out and talking pictures so I could post them... but, somehow, never get around to actually deciding to come off anything.

When <If> I do, I wouldn't expect to make anything on them, just recoup some of the expense that went into collecting them. The only benefit would be making room for future collecting.

Edited July 4, 2012 by Lloyd

[erose]

The few folks I know with a "business" are not making money and generally have something else going on as well.

[MB]

Not me...

[mikecable]

I haven't found a way to profit, but I have found a way to defray some of the cost of my two passions--teaching and natural history. I declared myself an "educational curriculum consultant". I spend two to three weeks each summer out of town attending professional development workshops and conferences for teachers (usually involving earth or environmental science). Usually all travel costs, meals and hotels are paid for, and on average I receive $50 a day as a stipend. When I develop and present my own workshops I get reimbursed expenses and paid $250-$500 per six hour workshop. I'm developing a four day workshop right now for next academic year--"Understanding Deep Time". We will have an intro session on relative and absolute dating, a boots on the ground field trip to Jacksboro and Mineral Wells, a day on interpreting geological data (geologic atlases, cross sections, topo maps, Google Earth, etc.), and finally a day on paleontology, faunal succession, and index fossils. I'll be sharing presentation lead with two other educators, but will average about $300 a day for the four days.

I'm not getting rich. The most income I've filed is about four grand. I probably average about $2500. I tend to write off about 80% of that. Books, materials, etc. All stuff that furthers my content knowledge or is used in my classroom or in workshops. I'm not writing off caviar or escorts. But it does allow me the indulgence of being an "amateur naturalist" without being part of the landed gentry.

[matt cable]

I've never sold any of my fossils. I've donated a few rare pieces to University of Michigan Museum. I've also given away stuff to kids or friends with interest.

I do have a prep room and I've cleaned some of my friends fossils in exchange for money or fossils. It's usually unprepped fossils which then sit on my shelf waiting to be cleaned. The little money I have made helps with gas for my next trip. I'll never recoup the money I invested to get the prep equipment. It was an investment I would make again.

[Raistlin]

Looking back on it I consider the fossil collecting simular to my car hobby(the one in my avatar). I am really new to fossil collecting and have been involved with cars for several years.

I will not get the money back out of the mods I put in the car should I ever chose to sell it. Unlike my fossils though the car seems to be retaining a fair amount of value. I could basically sell it for what I bought it for 4 years ago. Of course keeping the miles low and keeping the condition good helps with that.

My fossils on the other hand are not really that great, well to me they are, but to say a museum they would laugh at me. I am still working on being a bit more picky so that I do not fill my house too quick. It is hard to do though I want all the fossils I see because they are cool and each one is unique all its own. I think my stuff is so cool, I want to talk about it more often but it is hard to find many people around that want to talk fossils. Of course there are those mentoring me, but my stuff is pretty boring to them I would think since they have been doing it a lot longer.

I doubt I will ever sell my stuff, trade and give away yeah, but selling it would be hard to do for me. Thinking about the time and things I see while collecting though is priceless. There is so much beauty to be seen while out collecting. I am often left wondering how anyone can ever be bored with so many wonders in the world to see. I guess that is what a generation of gadgetry does to people.

[micropterus101]

I dont make enough to support my hobbies with my regular job so i sell what i dont keep for my collection. I collect so much every year i dont have rm for it all anyhow. It pays for gas and food and tools on my trips and for prepping and occasionally a late power bill or two but not something i would rely on. I give plenty away also to the kids and before the county fair each year i through stuff out around the display garden and log cabin for the kids to find. pretty fun to see when they find fossil clams gastropods and shrimp claws i am happy to answer there questions.

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[Wrangellian]

When <If> I do, I wouldn't expect to make anything on them, just recoup some of the expense that went into collecting them. The only benefit would be making room for future collecting.

That's all I would expect from selling fossils, it would help to make more room and recoup a small portion that goes into collecting, and for someone like me who doesn't make a lot of $ that's important. But like Missourian I have difficulty parting with any of the ones that would sell, but also difficulty getting rid of the others! (Don't want to just throw them away, but I'm not connected with kids or schools or anything where I could give them away). Trading is great too and would do more of it but it doesn't recoup costs or space.

Edited July 6, 2012 by Wrangellian

[Uncle Siphuncle]

i give many b grade dpecimens to goodwill, take the receipt, and file as a charitable deduction... great way to unload in bulk without much effort and get a little kickback in april....