Sports Trading Pins Are Loved Around The World

October 4, 2011 admin admin

Since their introduction in the early 1900s, sports trading pins have been a treasured part of many sporting events, including the Olympic Games, Little League baseball and many others. The popularity of sports trading pins shows no sign of abating; instead, it continues to grow.

The passion for sports trading pins made its way to India recently for the 2010 Commonwealth Games. The 12-day international sporting event concluded Oct. 14, with many people still seeking sports trading pins from participating countries. According to the Times of India, athletes, staff, even volunteers engaged in “a covert competition to get as many of these as possible and flaunt them as mementos of the (19th) edition of the Games.”

It’s no surprise that sports trading pins would flourish at the Commonwealth Games, a 54-country quadrennial event similar to the Olympics. The tradition of athletes and others swapping sports trading pins dates back more than a century to the origins of the modern Olympic Games.

The precursors to today’s sports trading pins were simple pins used to identify athletes and officials at the first modern Olympics held in Athens in 1896. A decade later, Swedish athletes wore what is considered the first real sports trading pins, in their national colors of blue and yellow.

Athletes soon began trading pins among themselves as a symbol of international friendship. The attractive designs of sports trading pins, links to the Games and small size made them popular as mementos of the Games in which the athletes competed. Officials soon adopted sports trading pins as keepsakes as well.

Over the past 30 years, the popularity of sports trading pins has exploded worldwide. At the 1980 Lake Placid Winter Games, spectators picked up the pin trading hobby, which has grown every year since.

 

 

Many youth sports now feature sports trading pins, none more so than Little League baseball. Since the early 1980s, trading pins have become a regular part of the Little League world with entire teams swapping sports trading pins at games, tournaments and the Little League World Series.

The pin trading has grown so popular that it’s secondary only to the baseball games themselves among players, coaches, officials and parents. Other youth sports including, hockey, soccer and even football have picked up on the sports trading pin craze in recent years, but none have yet reached the level of Little League.

Corporations such as Coca-Cola and Disney have helped fuel the sports trading pin hobby as well. Coke opened its first pin trading pavilion at the 1988 Winter Olympics and has maintained a strong presence at every succeeding Games. Disney introduced its own character trading pins a decade ago – in essence, competing with sports trading pins – and today features trading pins at each of its theme parks worldwide. The Disney parks include staff members who trade pins with guests, special trading pin events and other unique touches.

Sports trading pins are popular because they are an affordable hobby that offers a chance to get to know people. That makes them just about universally popular. As Sumita Chhabra, an operations assistant at the Commonwealth Games told the Times of India, “There is a sense of bonding, and the team members often give lapel pins with the appeal, “Please remember our country by it.”