Press Pennies like a Pro at Disneyland

By Jennifer Stuart

Welcome to the world of pressed pennies, aka the most fun you can have for 51 cents.  Pressed pennies are a fun and cheap souvenir.  Kids (and adults) love to watch them being made and it is hard to beat the price.  Read on to find out our tips for collecting  pressed pennies at Disneyland.

Your first job is to know your locations.  There are many machines scattered throughout the park.  You will notice that often the designs reflect the area that they are found in.  For example, expect Paradise Pier pennies in the Paradise Pier machines.  There are even some located inside the 3 Disney owned hotels, so if you really get into the penny collecting you can get those too.  We just HAD to get the Goofy's Kitchen ones from the Disneyland Hotel after we had our character dinner there.

Click here for a map and guide downloadable pdf of the pressed penny locations at Disneyland and California Adventure.

Half the fun is of course watching the machine press your penny.  My kids are always eager to take it out of the slot while it is still hot off the press.   

​Note:  if you feel like being a big spender some machines press nickels, dimes or quarters instead of pennies. 

How do we organize to press pennies?  It all starts with a mini M&M container.  ​M&M Minis tubes are the perfect sized tube to stack your coins in so you don't have to always be digging through your purse in search of two quarters and a penny every time you want to press a penny.  We stack them in order so that they are ready to go.  Peel off the label and you could keep it plain or make your own label to customize them for every member of the family.

I used to carry all of our coins in this larger size.  But have now switched to the small containers and everyone has their own colour.  This also makes it easy for the kids and us.   Now that they are older they can choose which pennies that they want to press without having to ask us each time.  And when the coins are gone they are done.

Serious collectors can pick up this handy collection album at many of the souvenir shops in the parks.  It is a handy way to keep track of all of those pennies.  

There are so many different designs to choose from.   In honour of the 60th Anniversary many machines now press a Diamond Anniversary design on one side and an attraction design on the other.

Need more ideas of what to do with your pennies when you get home?  A quick search on Pinterest revealed a LOT of different ideas from a display board to a border for photos or turned into jewelry. 

Click here for a link to the photo border idea.
Click here for a link to the display board idea.
Click here for a bracelet idea.

​And so many more ideas out there!

All photos by Jennifer Stuart

Thoughts? Questions?  We would love to hear from you.