Pressed Penny Machines in theme parks

[jonahbear2006]

anyone know how much the pressed pennies are? I remember thinking that this would be a cool souvenir but I never thought to look at how much each one costs and whether they take dollars or quarters.

[Simba'sBud]

The pressed pennies are $.51 and are much better when you collect several of them and put them into an official Disney pressed penny book. We fill one up to bring home on every trip! You can buy the books at almost any of the gift shops at the parks and resorts. You will usually find them close to the check-out registers and they are less than $10 (around $6.95 or $8.95). Well worth it, and a lot of fun to collect!!

[jonahbear2006]

yay! thank you. yes, we did see the books but by the time we considered doing it, we were halfway through the 4 parks and wanted to be more on top of the game! So, we saved it for this trip! Can't wait to do it. Hope it doesn't rain too much. wish me lots of pixie dust this week!

[Altair]

Here's a tip, try to stick with the simple designs. They tend to press much better than the very complex ones with lots of lines in them.

[BigRedDad]

Something I found when starting this on our last trip is that shiny pennies show the images better. The older, oxidized pennies are harder to see. If you want to make your pennies shiny again, soak them in a bowl filled with Coke over night. Make sure the pennies are not on top of each other.

[Urbss]

Something I found when starting this on our last trip is that shiny pennies show the images better. The older, oxidized pennies are harder to see. If you want to make your pennies shiny again, soak them in a bowl filled with Coke over night. Make sure the pennies are not on top of each other.

I would be carefull with the Coke trick with any penny made between 1982 and present day. The newer pennies (since 82) are mostly made with zinc (very little copper). You would be best to try and find pre-82 pennies than still have some shine to them. I've gone through more than 50 rolls recently and was able to find about 50 of these that we will be taking with us in LESS THAN 2 WEEKS!! (not to mention a few wheat pennies).

[thumperbug]

My son started his pressed penny collection on our trip in April. We did get a book and started to fill it. I found some pennies I made when I was there on my Honeymoon in 2000 so he has some "rare" ones.

Our next trip is not until Feb 09 but I have a baggie put aside that I put in pretty shiny pennies as I find them and make sure there are 2 quarters to accompany each so come our trip...we are ready.

[SoaringEpcot]

We easily filled our book in one trip back in December. If you do a search you can find some good websites that tell you where the machines are located and the images that they have. Good luck, we now collect pressed pennies everywhere we go on vacation.

[Imagineer1981]

51 little pennies...actually 1 shiny penny and 2 qtrs is all it takes

[PlanningMom]

How many pennies do the books hold?

[thumperbug]

The one I have holds 64 pennies

[pixiesmimi]

Buy two books instead of one because it doesn't take long to fill one. Every night when we would go back to the room (after trying to find as many machines as we could that day) I would put them in the book (in some sort of order). I couldn't find another book at DTD before going home so will be getting more books this time we go. There is a list of places to find the machines at the resorts and parks here on Intercot. There are other web sites out there too. I have forgotten right now what they are. If I find them, I'll post them later. We had always just gotten one or two with our DGKs along but last year when DH and I went alone, we seriously tried to find all of the machines like a treasure hunt. That was fun. Some are well hidden, like in the gift shop behind Splash Mountain. I would have never thought to go down there if I hadn't seen it on the list. Also, there isn't one in China or Japan in WS at Epcot. Those are in the International Gateway Gift Shop. The series ones like Snow White are usually in the resorts so those might be hard to get unless you visit each resort. This can become addictive and an ongoing hobby. I just took rolls of brand new pennies and rolls of quarters with me. I ended up getting more change while there so will take more this time. I think I spent over $30 in change and didn't realize how fast it would add up.

[crazeedizneefinatic]

Before you start your penny hunting, go to city hall in the MK and get a printout of all the machines on property. It catagorizes them to each park, resort and DTD. It also tells you the image so you can plan to collect a set. Sometimes they are really spread out. Good luck and happy penny hunting!

[mainemajor]

Before you start your penny hunting, go to city hall in the MK and get a printout of all the machines on property. It catagorizes them to each park, resort and DTD. It also tells you the image so you can plan to collect a set. Sometimes they are really spread out. Good luck and happy penny hunting!

This will sure make it easier for us to find and press the ones we really want. They are the cheapest souvineers you can find.
As for shiny pennies, go to your local bank before you leave. Usually they will be able to help you out with shiny new ones.

[Sharon1026]

I always thought that smashed pennies were dorky, but we decided to make it a quest one trip, and now we really enjoy collecting them.

Does anyone know if they ever change out the die designs? Or do they keep them the same?

[BigRedDad]

They do retire some of the dies, but it is not too often.

You can download a very up-to-date location list from a site on the internet. Do a Google search for "disney world pressed penny locations". Select the first link on the page. There is a PDF file there that is updated often.

Very helpful I think. I will be using it on our next trip. I have gotten all my 1971 pennies and quarters ready. I hope to get quite a few, but it will not be my sole purpose there.

[pixiesmimi]

We made it one of our primary things to do the last trip and it was a lot of fun but we won't do that this time. I'm only going to concentrate on the ones I didn't get like at the resorts. We may go resort hopping one day just to get some of these. Too bad we won't be there at Christmas when we would have a good excuse to resort hop.

[LarryBoy]

My DS 7 is a collector and has enjoyed doing this on the last few trips. If you don't spend a lot of time doing this, one book will be enough. I know we've had ours for at least two trips. We usually get about 20 pennies per trip. We always use shinny new pennies from the year of the trip.