Treasure Island Stamps & Coins

Rudy, the owner, was friendly and very knowledgeable. I was in town for only a couple of days helping my parents and needed a quick turn-​around. He evaluated multiple albums of stamps and a box of coins and gave me an appraisal and a fair offer the next morning. Rudy at Treasure Island Stamp and Coin is a U.S. Army veteran with over 40 years experience in stamp and coin collecting. He offers excellent experience and unparalleled integrity. if you are a seasoned collector or a neophyte who wants to buy or sell, it’s worth a visit to Treasure Island Stamp and Coin!

I have to give this place a 5 star plus rating.
This is the best stamp and coin shop I’ve found in the Bay Area. I’ve been to a few.
Rudy is a very friendly down home dealer and his shop is a very relaxed atmosphere. He’s your best broker in the stamp and coin industry with more knowledge about the hobby than a person needs to know.
See ya soon Rudy.

Good man. No stress shop. Positive experience buying British Sovereign coins then selling them a year later. Also positive experience buying Silver American Eagle coins. Nice place to peruse casually.

I had a very bad experience here. I have a lot of old coins, most with little value, and a lot of collectors’ sets with nominal value, plus a lot of silver and silver sets with more value. I emailed Rudy who said I should come in and he would evaluate them for me and he would also make me an offer on them.
After looking through them with me for a while he said he would put together an offer if I would wait. We discussed the price of silver, which he said was low and recommended I wait until the price goes up a bit before selling those.
So I asked him to make an offer on everything except the silver, which I would bring back when the price went back up. He tallied up all the sets and then gave me a price of around $ 1000. I started setting aside some of the silver and he said he had counted that in the total and had only excluded the silver mint dollars. I reminded him that I had asked him not to include the silver and then he said everything else was only worth $ 40. I pointed out was in the «everything else» and he said OK, it was only around $ 400 for the rest. Then with no provocation he suddenly said, «Just take it all. I’ve lost interest.» and got very angry. Then he complained that I had wasted his time and started muttering about people wasting his time and retreated into the back room.
It was his decision to reject the purchase if it did not include the silver, which I would have brought back later per his own recommendation. So he actually wasted my time, not the other way around. With travel, that wasted my whole afternoon.
And, you know, sometimes people have misunderstandings. I had clearly asked him not to include the silver and he took that to mean only some of the silver. That leap in his logic was his and he could have simply said, «I’m only interested in buying the rest if it includes this part of the silver currency.» No need to be unprofessional and rude to me.
I collected all the coins from the two locations in his shop and he came back out and I said in as friendly a voice as I could muster, «OK, is that everything?» And he snorted back, «I don’t steal from people.» I told him I was accusing him of stealing, just making sure I had everything before I left.
This was a one-​star experience, but I gave him a second star because he’s clearly knowledgeable.

This is my 3^rd time here buying 90% junk silver dimes.
More then fair price and really personal service.

As far as I know the best stamp and coin shop in the whole Bay Area mainly because the man himself — Rudy — is such a pleasure to deal with whether you are after something unusual or something ordinary. Its a great experience to go there and browse his stuff — you never know what you might find

Great service and pleasant experience all around. The only difficult thing was finding a place to park! Rudy counted up my silver coins and paid me a fair rate right on the spot. I had checked around and his price was slightly more than the others I was quoted by. This place is so popular that there are a constant stream of customers and people coming in and out. I found that amazing for a coin and stamp shop. I would definitely use this store again.

A lovely shop. I went to buy some packets of used postage stamps to start a collection with. They have topical ones and basic supplies and the owner is always willing to help. I also enjoyed looking through the old covers and postcards, as well as unused sheets of lower denomination stamps. The latter are great for adding a little extra detail to your mail, and are also a neat thing to collect.

Had fun. No pressure, interesting chat about coin collecting, grading. I told him I am a beginner and wanted to learn to grade. he showed me 3 books and discussed the pros and cons of each book. I bought the «Photograde» book and he even rounded down the price. Coin collecting is supposed to be fun and I definitely got that from today’s visit. I’ll be back and look forward to grading one of those sitting liberty coins and adding it to my collection. 5 stars for Rudy’s shop

The man who works here was so sweet and patient. I know nothing about stamps, but wanted to use vintage stamps on my wedding invitations. He sat down with me and helped me pick out everything I needed, and discounted some of the stamps I fell in love with so I could afford them. I will definitely be back, and I hope other brides go in there, too! Buying from him was MUCH less expensive than buying online, and he was just so nice, helpful, and knowledgeable.

Excellent stamp shop! I like to use old stamps on my letters to make them look extra old-​timey, and this place has tons of exactly what I like. They are well organized and reasonably priced. The owner is very helpful and friendly, even for someone like me who is not going to spend a whole lot of money. He certainly knows a lot about stamps and is happy to share his knowledge with newbies.
I’ll definitely come back here often!

I tried this place out on the advice of the other Unilocalers.
This was my first time in this place and I was very impressed with the friendliness of the two guys working there. I had to buy a Kennedy half for a friend of mine and he had no problems with the questions about the coin that I was purchasing.
The store has a ton of stamps as well as a lot of collector coins, not so much in the bullion category, so keep that in mind when you are looking.
You can tell these guys just love what they do and they are more than willing to help you find what you are looking for!

Paul is great.
I too used to rummage through Paul’s treasures when I was young, back when it was still in Town and Country. My grandfather introduced me to the place, the man and philately. So every time I bring my brood down to Mom’s birth town, we stop in at Treasure Island and see what we can learn.
So go, buy a few plate blocks or something else old and chat it up with Paul. He’ll talk about anything… Especially Theater, another passion of mine!

When I was little, my sister and I would always walk over here and dig through the treasure trove of old stamps. There’s a big chest of them mostly full of queen Elizabeth stamps. You can buy them for a penny or two. We would spend all day soaking them in water and creating our own stamp collections. Very fun and the owner was always super nice to us.

Without a doubt, the best stamp dealer in the bay area. Very friendly, knowledgeable, works with several customers at the same time. Excellent selection of stamps: I’ve never been disappointed.

Checked out this place today… and it was awesome since the owner is nice, helpful and polite… way better than the San Jose Coin Shop i checked out yesterday. The guy at the SJ Coin Shop was rude… didnt wanna give any customer service or anything.
:)

Everyone’s right: Treasure Island’s owner is a gem. He’s a trove of information and offered to answer our amateur questions even as he was assessing someone’s serious collection.

this place has
1:a great selecttion
2:great service
3:a nice guy!

I agree with Marcus O. that the owner is a downright nice guy. He showed great tolerance and patience even with a guy who came in to get late date wheat pennies. Whether your purchase is 50 cents or a thousand times that, he is equally friendly, a great contrast to the Coin Broker down the street (visited on the same day) where the owner nastily tells customers that his time is worth $ 200 per hour, so don’t waste it.
Treasure Island has a little bit of everything, from ancients to foreign postal covers, with somewhat limited depth in certain areas– but hey, the experience was so much more pleasant than most shops that it was enjoyable to take the time to go through what he had. You can see why this guy’s been in business for more than 40 years.

Highlights: Very friendly! Wide variety of stamps, and ancients, US common issues, carries hobby supplies.
I’ve met a lot of coin dealers and I think these guys are perhaps one of the friendliest out there. When I first just started collecting and knew nothing about coins Treasure Island’s owner helped me by actually taking his time to explain things to me and provide guidance. Very, very friendly.
He’s specialized in ancients and stamps, and has a couple cases of US coins as well. Has a limited foreign selection, but that won’t stop him from offering suggestions of where you can go! Great guy, and thus great store.