27/1: Police Pin Update

I've found out that the police/London 2012 pin on eBay is NOT issued by the police in connection with the Olympics.

Apparently it was issued some time ago internally to support a charity and has absolutely no connection with London 2012. The letters in the rings represent traffic garages in London. I've therefore removed it from the listings and added it to the unofficial page so that future readers will know a little more about it. I think it's an interesting curiosity, but not part of the catalogue.

25/1: Regional Pins

Just a quick update this evening. Thanks to a response from one of the regional committees and an email from a reader, I can confirm that there are no regional pins being made for the London region (REG0003) and the West Midlands region (REG0011).

I'll leave them in the catalogue for completeness, but update the comments this week.

Better news is that it looks like the 33 London Borough pins may be out in March according to an unconfirmed comment from the London Development Agency. Remember this is not yet confirmed by LOCOG, so we'll have to see.

18/1: eBay Round-Up

Seems like most of the interesting pin activity is happening on eBay at the moment so here's a quick round up.

An Adecco pin (ADE0001) went over the weekend for £51. I think this is the top price paid so far for one of these pins and (someone please let me know if I'm wrong) I think the top price paid so far for a sponsor pin?

The Metropolitan Police Olympic Rings pin that went at New Year possibly came from the traffic division. I'm on the trail of more information to confirm this and will report back if I can. I'm holding back adding this one to the inventory until I get more details.

Finally a new Visa Europe pin has appeared - VSA0009. A rectangular gold pin with the 2012 logo and Visa Worldwide Partner. Again I'm trying to find out more details. I'll add this one to the inventory as it appears genuine.

If you have any news you think should be shared, please drop me a line.

16/1: Different Type of Sponsor Pin

Thanks to a regular reader and also to a fellow collector in Canada, here's news of a new sponsor pin seen recently.

This one is slightly different in that it hasn't been made by Honav under licence from LOCOG.

The back of the pin is marked

36 USC 220506

AMINCO

China

showing that it's been made by the Vancouver 2010 pin manufacturers.

I presume that as Visa are a worldwide Olympic partner rather than specific to London 2012, they have access to all Games logos and can choose who manufacturers the pin. I guess this one is not commissioned by Visa Europe like the previous ones. I suspect we'll see more of these types of sponsor pins from the Worldwide/Tier 1 partners.

I'm now debating whether this starts a new section of the inventory - I think it does, and I'll start a numbering convention, any ideas?

I'm trying to track down some information on who can use the Olympic Rings, 2012 logo and 'London 2012' on their pins, so will report back if I can.

12/1: Mini News Update

A few snippets of information in what appears to be a quiet pin time at the moment...

Those of you hoping for a 900 Days To Go pin on the 8th February may be disappointed. It looks like there are no plans to issue such a pin. We may have to wait for 750 or 500 days.

Still no date on the re-issue of the London at Night set, but there are prototypes of the new packaging being assessed, so hopefully not much longer.
No news on the London Landmarks set either.

I'm trying to find out if we can expect any new designs in the next month or so. We've had nothing (retail) for a while, so here's hoping there's something soon.

Rumours of a BMW partner pin, possibly in the first quarter of 2010.

Not a lot for now I'm afraid.