Inside the tiny, shiny world of Atlanta’s Olympic pin collectors

Atlanta’s Olympic legacy varies depending on who you ask. For some, it’s a historic touchstone and model of how the city can grow with future events like the 2026 World Cup. To others, it’s simply an event the city held decades ago. 

Yet for a dedicated group of collectors, the 1996 Atlanta Olympics kicked off a lifelong passion: buying, selling and swapping Olympic pins. 

These superfans have met up once a month, every month since before Atlanta’s turn as host in 1996. On June 17, a group returned to their base in the back room of Manuel’s Tavern, this time with some new faces. 

A handful of collectors set up at different tables in the rooms, each with their own displays. A few organized the pins by price on cork boards, while others had bins full of pins for cheap. Attendees showed off their more precious possessions and showed off lanyards and vests covered in the little metal mementos. 

Many of them have been coming since before 1996. Longtime collector Scott Reed got into pin trading through his job: NationsBank, now Bank of America, gave all the employees pins to trade. Reed was quickly drawn in as a longtime Olympic fan and fell for the world around the pins. 

“There’s a social aspect to pin collecting, and people enjoy the transactions and the interactions of people and memories associated with this community,” Reed said. “What I observed was really fascinating.” 

Today, Reed boasts over 2,000 pins in his personal collection. For trading and selling, he has around 1 million pins he bought from a retiring retailer. 

Not everyone has such a large collection, though, and collectors often stick to certain pin categories. Reed prefers International Olympic Committee pins. Athlete, mascot and sponsor pins are popular too. Some had bins full of branded pins like Lucky Charms, and others had CNN media pins. Charles, a fixture at the meetings, prefers to collect Paralympic pins. 

It’s an intimidating world, so Reed positioned the June 17 meetup as a gathering for people attending the 2024 Paris Olympics in July. While first-timers and frequent travelers mingled, he took the chance to introduce them to a hobby just as competitive as the global sporting events. 

First-timers got free Paris Olympic Games pins and baggies of free “starter” pins to kick off trading — veteran collectors all agreed it’s better to get the cheaper pins here than start at the games. The hosts also raffled off Olympic pins and merchandise throughout the night.

After all, Olympic pins have become an entire industry since the subculture began in 1896 at the Athens, Greece games. According to CBS the first pins were made of cardboard and identified athletes, media and event officials. 

Today’s pins range in price from less than a dollar for secondhand buys to thousands of dollars for a rare find. Often, basic pins sold by the International Olympic Committee ring in at around $9. In 2021, the IOC estimated it has designed 65,000 pins across the games’ history – not factoring in all the collectible offshoots. 

But why collect pins? Well, Reed argues it’s not quite the pins themselves that people love. But the little trinkets are an easy souvenir: small and easy to transport across the globe, often at affordable price points and with enough variety for any number of interests.

“It’s not the pin itself, it’s the memory,” Reed said. 

The collectibles open up the overwhelming Olympic world. Each year, millions flock to the host city to wander the streets and attend events. 

“The Olympics is not like one event, it’s not like one Super Bowl,” Reed said. “It’s two weeks, 17 days of events all day long, and you don’t go to the events all the time.” 

Pin trading is what fills all those busy moments in between, and Reed believes it enhances the experience. He has friends across the globe that he hangs out with in Olympic off-seasons. Sometimes, he’ll even trade pins for room and board.

“Where else in the world can you walk down a street in a big city, go to a perfect stranger, and start talking to him without feeling worried?” Reed asked. 

He likes to hand pins off to children and rarely completely rejects a trade. For Reed, it’s one of those hobbies he didn’t know he would keep up forever, but the 2008 recession tightened his bonds and turned the collector economy into a community. 

“It became a place where people could get away from their daily issues and sort of be safe,” Reed said. 

Charles has been coming to monthly meetings since before the Atlanta Olympics began. He started pin collecting a few years earlier and today has about 6,000 in his collection. As a multifaceted collector he was selling off Simpsons pins, Hard Rock pins, vintage badges and more at the June 17 meetup. 

He admits that the meetings aren’t always as packed as the Olympic introduction ones. Sometimes only three people will turn out, but he doesn’t mind. The small group will take the time to bond over recent finds. 

“The worst part is when you absolutely know if somebody here outbid you,” Charles said. 

It’s a passionate group, but Charles fears the numbers are dwindling. 

“People are in their mid-to-late sixties; you can see the end of a lot in sight,” Charles said. 

Across the board his collector groups are getting older, and young people aren’t getting into the hobby. Charles thinks they’re selling and buying online, but he worries that the community of pin traders is lost. 

Still, among the tables tucked in the back of Manuel’s Tavern, a group of Olympic Games first-timers received their first bags of the collectibles — ready to trade.