Franklin – Rod Crochiere collected comic books before joining the Navy in 1993. When he got out of the military, he decided to collect something different.
“I stumbled across coins and I started collecting them, and it just snowballed my purchases,” said Rod Crochiere, owner of I Have Coins and Collectibles in Franklin.
Crochiere says the coin business is doing well, but the collectibles business has seen a boom during the pandemic
“People are at home, and they’re bored,” Crochiere said. “They started cleaning out the basement. They started looking for all those childhood collectibles. Whether it was comic books, sports cards, stamps, even Beanie Babies.”
Crochiere says there’s always an unexpected surprise when you walk in the door. He recently saw a 1790 sword and a medal from the Titanic in Japan.
“This is a Titanic Carpathian Medal. It is awarded to a senior officer or direct lifeguard of the Carpathian crew for rescuing Titanic survivors from the water,” Crochiere said.
The veteran now shares his passion for collecting with his children. They collect Pokemon cards.
“I really like a lot of the customers who come in and talk about their childhoods or collect baseball cards, because that’s what a lot of people have in common,” Crochiere said. “So you don’t have to know someone to have something in common.”
Levan Reid
