Custom Trading Pins

Baseball Pins | Softball Pins | Printed Pins

History of Trading Pins
Custom Trading Pins is currently as much a part of little league baseball as hot dogs and bubble gum. The pin trading originated in Disney which involved the purchasing, wearing and trading of custom disney character and theme lapel pins. This soon snow balled into baseball pin tradingwhere little league teams entering play-off tournaments would trade their baseball pins with opposing teams from all over the world. These trading pins would typically have their team name, mascot, colors and the year printed on their pins in various shapes and forms.

Soon other sports joined in on the pin trading frenzy which has swept up the youth little leagues and sporting events and shows no signs of letting up. Year after year pin trading is becoming more and more popular and many kids look forward to trading their pins with players from all over the world. It really is a great memory keepsake for the kids and a neat novelty item that can literally last a lifetime.

Trading Pins are not just for Baseball
Currently Baseball has the greatest demand for custom trading pins with softball following a distant second and hockey, soccer, swimming, basketball and football starting to catch on. Custom Pin Trading is not just for kids...parents coaches and even officials get involved in the action. What greater joy is there to a mother and coach (besides winning the world series) than to see their kids building special friendships with opponents and teams from around the country and even world wide!

Baseball Trading Pins - Custom Softball Pins - Custom Trading Pins

Order Trading Pins on Time
One mistake many coaches and parents make is that they wait for the last minute to place their trading pin order and do not leave enough time for manufacturing and shipping of the pins. At best we can offer to ship stock trading pins via UPS over night delivery to your door. We highly recommend placing your order early so when the factories get inundated with literally hundreds of thousands of custom trading pins you will not be stuck in the queue. If you find yourself making a tournament play-off and didn't order custom pins, all is not lost. You can order our stock pins and we can overnight them to your door the following day.

Custom Trading Pin Process
The custom trading pin process is a nice adventure in the art of metal craftsmanship. Your artwork is first sent to our factory where a die is made to the shape of your pin. Then the metal is stamped and hand polished. If your ordering soft enamel trading pins, your design will have slightly raised edges that will act as a reservoir to hold the different ink colors. Ink is added to these pins by hand using specially crafted ink needles that inject the ink into each area of your pin. The pin is then heated to over 1600° which helps the metal and the ink cure and adhere to each other. Hand polishing comes next, and we recommend adding an epoxy finish (at no extra cost!) which helps protect the pin from scratches and adds a nice luster finish.

If you order offset-digital pins or photo etched pins there are no raised edges. Your artwork is digitally printed or silk screen printed and then applied to a smooth pin surface. Epoxy coating is then added to the pin to protect the surface and colors from scratching. Printed Pins offer finer detail being the artwork is digitally or computer generated. Photographs or even gradients can be used in your custom pin design when using these processes.

Our Mission
Direct Tradingpins goal is to help you understand the trading pin process and know the difference between the different types of trading pins available so you can make the best informed decision possible. Should you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact one of our custom trading pin representatives. We are here to help you every step of the way.