2016 Year in Review

2016 was a very good year for the Coin Zoo, with more new animal coins added than the each of the previous three years. This post is mostly a bunch of boring statistics (mainly for myself), but if you are interested go ahead and click the read more link.

Daniel's Coin Zoo grew by over 18% last year, with 204 coins added. That's more than any of the previous three years before that (135 in 2015, 147 in 2014, and 117 in 2013). At the end of the year, there were 1,306 animal coins on display. There were also many coins added to the Need It list, but at 259 it is smaller than the start of the year. Add those numbers up, and it means that right now the Coin Zoo collection is 83% complete.

 VISITORS

In 2016, there were on average 1,000 visitors to the Coin Zoo each month, who collectively looked at almost 50,000 pages. In 2013, I started using a "flag counter" service, and this year the Coin Zoo received flag number 200, when a visitor from the Aland Islands dropped in.

NEW COINS

Those 204 coins came from many countries all over the world including 12 countries that were added for the first time. They are Armenia, Chad, Denmark, East Timor, Iran, Morocco, New Hebrides, Nigeria, South Sudan, Samoa, Transnistria, and Zaire. The most new coins for a single country prize goes to San Marino with 12 new coins added -- more than the previous two years combined. Russia and Poland each had 11 new coins, thanks to the help of special friends.

2017 and Beyond

I plan to continue growing the Coin Zoo, perhaps adding another 200 coins in 2017. If that happens, it will be interesting to look back and see how the size of the Need It list compares, because it never stops growing. When I first started this project back in 2005, the total coin list was less than 800.

In the first few months of this year I will also have to concentrate on some technology upgrades which are long overdue. Hopefully I can accomplish that without changing the look of the zoo, which I kind of like. Also, really really hopefully, I can accomplish it without too much expense.

Finally, thanks to all the visitors and a great big special thanks to my special supporters!