Aruba Americana, Bud Jones CIC (1 Viewer)

[DrStrange]

Singles

• DrStrange
• Jul 31, 2015

When I first started collecting playble sets of chips, one of the hot trends were Bud Jones Coin-in-Center chips. In those days such sets were expensive and uncommon. Today tastes seem to have changed. The CiC chip set is still a rare find, but such sets are not nearly as loved as they once were.

I came by this set in a lucky find. The eBay seller posted his auction with the picture of a single five dollar chip even though he was selling a full set of chips. Aruba Americana is one of those chip sets where a lot of single chips are auctioned, so this auction looked like many other single chips sales. I was bored that day and saw a single chip selling for $60 bucks when the others were selling for less than ten. So I looked past the thumbnail picture and saw an auction for 300 chips. I ended up winning for $150.

The set was 195 $5s, 75 $25, 30 $100s. I have never seen a one dollar chip for the Aruba Americana. So I added 200 tan chips from The Grove in Washington state as my one dollar chip giving me 500 chips and a modest $6,050 bank.

Aruba Americana

• DrStrange
• Jul 31, 2015

Aruba Americana CIC with Grove non-denominationals for ones

Aruba Americana CIC

• DrStrange
• Jul 31, 2015

Aruba Americana with Grove. Racks by Ozwoodworking

Aruba Americana

• DrStrange
• Jul 31, 2015

The next day -=- game picture

DrStrange

 

[detroitdad]

I have always been a fan of the CiC chips. Thanks for posting.

 

[MaxB]

I ended up winning for $150.

Nice score!

 

[jbutler]

love them. got my sites set on a possible CiC purchase in the near future. very underrated among the majority of chippers imo.

 

[rowlin]

I had no idea how awesome CiC chips are until I played with a set last September. I love my S2 set, but would not hesitate to snap up a set of CiC if I could.

 

[pltrgyst]

Nice set!

I love CICs as well, just love the weight and feel when playing with them. But I can't cope with brass inserts -- for some reason, I've always been a silver guy, never gold (unless it's white gold, and what's the point of that?) I have several CIC sets. The Mullet Bay set is personally most significant, because of my wife's and my personal connections to St. Martin.

But my favorite has always been the Aruba Americanas with steel inserts, especially the black/white and black/blue hundos. I picked up about a thousand of them, but like you, no ones. I got by using the racks of beautiful BJ ones I picked up at the Divi Carina on St. Croix:

but nice as they are, they're not CICs, and it just wasn't right.

Then in January 2012 I got lucky and picked up a set of mostly Americanas on eBay

that included 250 Cerromar Beach Dorado Puerto Rico BJ grey CIC $1s:

These do the job pretty well, but I still dream of finding a hoard of Americana singles one day...

 

[Dwight87]

love cic bjs. Congrats. By the way, those 'tan' grove chips are actually orange.

 

[ChipEnvy]

I too love Bud Jones chips. Funny thing is, I've sold all the sets I once owned. My all time favorite were the "Dutch Inn" chips from PR. Those are some sexy chips.

 

[DrStrange]

I try not to have "orange" chips in my home given my years spent at Texas A&M. Orange reminds me of a runny baby's diaper, most of all when used on a sports uniform. Really, those chips could pass for tan.

Gig 'em -=- DrStrange