PIN & POP Pin & Pop Trade Arcade Question

I recently participated in my first Trade Arcade with Pin & Pop, and it was an absolute blast! I had so much fun and can’t wait to do it again.

As I’m still learning the process, I received a couple of notifications asking me to approve pins that were submitted but couldn’t be authenticated by the Pin & Pop team. I’m curious how others typically handle these situations.

Do you generally approve the pin if it looks good to you, or do you err on the side of caution and decline it when authenticity can’t be confirmed? Are there certain factors you consider before making that decision?

I’d appreciate any advice or insight from those with more Trade Arcade experience. Thanks so much!

I've never used Pin & Pop, but I've heard a lot of people talking about it . . . when you're asked to approve pins, it's less because they're likely to be fake, & more because there's some (frequently very minor) flaw you're being asked to accept or decline.

(Many people have described having pins they purchased directly at one of the Disney parks questioned. Pins can have flaws! I've directly purchased blind-bags & ended up with far, far more flawed pins than these; but they were 100% authentic.)

It ultimately comes down to whether you are happy with the pins you're being offered (& if you think you'll even be able to see the flaws in person). Personally I think both those pins look fine, & the Donald in particular is just lovely!

I participate in the Pin and Pop trade arcades as a vip member. The info and photos from Pin and Pop are helpful and I use them to make my own determination. Sometimes I may ask someone else who has more experience whether the pin has been faked and/or whether the pin looks authentic. Things I personally consider; 1) has the pin been known to be faked; 2) are the blemishes I'm being shown likely to be visible with my naked eye or only visible in the magnified photos; 3) if I could see the blemish would it bother me - for example if it is on the face or major part of the pin; 4) what did I trade for it and was my pin more "valuable" or was my pin in "perfect" condition; 5) how easy/hard would it be to find this pin again, and how much do I want this pin. The more you do the arcade the more practiced you get in deciding what to accept and what to decline.

Hopefully some more experienced traders will also chime in. Glad you had a great first trade arcade.

Pin and Pop are letting you know what they found with the pins. Just like trading in person, it is up to you if you want to accept or reject the trade. Not sure about Mickey and Minnie heart pin. Donald pin is older, but looks good.

Personally, I tend to ignore small imperfections. Anything can happen during manufacturing and pins I get directly from Disney could be the same way. I especially ignore things that you can only see in the zoomed photos. I would never notice these in person and try not to let the P&P process sway me. So it's very rare that I cancel a trade.

There are over 150,000 Disney pins in existence (maybe well over). This makes it pretty impossible for any one person to truly be an expert on every single pin. Especially, pins that were produced before a person gets involved in Disney pins. I've been collecting Disney pins since the 1990s and there are still gaps in my knowledge because I couldn't afford or wasn't interested in all the possible pins. On their "About" page Jenn says they discovered Disney pin Trading in 2011. That means there is are 11 years of pins they didn't come to know upon original release. A lot of times when Pin & Pop says they are unsure, it's because they've never seen the pin in person before. Usually, bad pins have major tells that are much easier to pick up on when there is a real one to compare to, and Pin & Pop doesn't have that real pin. So they end up, IMO, stressing about tiny details that may or may not be important.

A lot of newer people over-estimate the historical quality of Disney pin manufacturing. I can randomly pull pins, of any age, from my very large collection, and I am positive I wouldn't have to look at very many before finding one that had small dips, pin holes from popped air bubbles, tiny areas where the enamel was missing or the wrong color was used, and other typical manufacturing errors. Disney uses multiple factories, and has changed them over the years and some factories are better than others. Just as now when people say, "If I didn't pull this from a mystery box / buy this pin myself I would have thought it was a fake," that's been pretty true the whole time. Add on 20 years of age, possible poor storage in humid climates, and some pins are can literally fall apart in your hands, because of poor manufacturing, and older pins can look not great, and still be 100% authentic, and it can play with your mind.

I have spent significant time documenting which pins have been counterfeited. There is a general feeling in the pin community, that 2% of pins have been counterfeited. I think it's a bit higher than that based on the size of my list. 5% of 150K would be 7500 pins, and that is probably closer to the real number, IMO. But that leaves over 140K of pins that haven't. Most pins are safe. Cast Lanyard / Hidden Mickey / Hidden Disney pins are highly faked. Within that category, it's not 5% of pins and more like 90%. It's a category people are likely to encounter on CM lanyards and with other traders, so it can make it feel like "all pins are fake." Some sources go through a period of higher than 5% rate of fakes (like D23 Expo DSSH pins seem to be faked a lot). International pins from Paris, HKDL, Shanghai show up in batches, and then other stuff are totally fine. But at the end of the day, most pins are safe.

FWIW, I do not recall seeing fakes of the Donald pin or in my documentation that dates back to when this pin was originally released. Disneyland Paris pins are a problem, because traditionally, there hasn't been a great paper trail of which pins have been counterfeited (although, more recently people are pointing them out). It's also an area, I am particularly weak as far as knowledge goes. However, I don't remember seeing this one.

If you look in one of the Trade Arcade threads, there is a link to our Pin & Pop Trade Arcade chat on GroupMe. If people save the images they are sent from Pin & Pop, you can post them there and several of us will try to provide assistance (especially, if one of us owns an authentic version). Although, Paris pins do still tend to trip us up.

Wow, thank you all so much for your responses! They were incredibly helpful and gave me a much better understanding of the situation. I really appreciate everyone taking the time to share their thoughts and experiences. 😊

I'll add that the Paris Minnie/Mickey heart pin was part of a booster set sold in DLP. Many cast members or boards had this pin on it, as it was an economical set to buy and trade with at DLP since it came with multiple pins in the set. I had one of these pins that I acquired by trading with a CM at DLP but I already traded it away. I'm not aware of entire booster sets from DLP being faked.

GeraldineWH said:

I'll add that the Paris Minnie/Mickey heart pin was part of a booster set sold in DLP. Many cast members or boards had this pin on it, as it was an economical set to buy and trade with at DLP since it came with multiple pins in the set. I had one of these pins that I acquired by trading with a CM at DLP but I already traded it away. I'm not aware of entire booster sets from DLP being faked.

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Unfortunately, there have been several. They will show up at the discount stores in Orlando, and on the Chinese Factory websites.

hopemax said:

Unfortunately, there have been several. They will show up at the discount stores in Orlando, and on the Chinese Factory websites.

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Thanks hopemax for the info!