For collectors, investors, and families inheriting treasured items, understanding exactly what they own can make all the difference. Whether it’s a gold sovereign, a silver medal, a bullion coin, or a box of inherited collectibles, confidence starts with accurate identification.

Thompsons Coins, a growing coin and precious metals business based outside Melbourne, Australia, relies on Vanta XRF to provide fast, reliable, scientifically backed verification for a variety of customers.

Thompsons Coins uses a Vanta Core XRF analyzer paired with the Vanta Work Station to help staff members accurately analyze and price valuables with instant karat, fineness, and composition results.

A Passion Turned Into a Business

Matt Thompson, Director of Thompsons Coins, has spent more than 15 years in the collectibles industry. His journey began in Australia Post’s Philatelic Bureau serving stamp collectors, before moving into the coin industry and eventually launching Thompsons Coins as a side business fueled by his passion for rare coins and banknotes.

What started as an online venture operating from a spare bedroom quickly outgrew its original space.

“When my daughter was born, my wife said I had to move all the coin things elsewhere,” Matt recalls. “We bought a small retail shop that I thought would be predominantly an office. Now there are five of us working here and it’s grown significantly.”

Today, Thompsons Coins serves collectors, investors, and members of the local community seeking expert guidance on precious metals, rare coins, and historical collectibles.

The Challenge: Trust and Verification

In the coin and bullion industry, authenticity is everything.

Many of the items that come through Thompsons Coins have significant intrinsic value. Gold sovereigns, for example, were historically minted in Australia and contain 22-karat gold. Distinguishing authentic pieces from replicas, jewelry copies, or altered items requires more than visual inspection alone.

Without scientific verification, explaining those distinctions to customers would be extremely difficult.

“There are instances where a jeweler will create a replica sovereign for a specific date,” Matt explains. “Sometimes those replicas may even contain a higher gold purity than the original coin. Identifying that type of thing and communicating it clearly to customers is incredibly challenging if you don’t have XRF.”

Adding to the challenge, many customers arrive with inherited collections or unfamiliar items and simply want answers.

“They don’t know where to begin the process of researching their items,” says Matt. “XRF reduces a lot of the guesswork.”

With Vanta XRF, Thompsons Coins can detect metals such as gold (Au), silver (Ag), platinum (Pt), palladium (Pd), iridium (Ir), rhodium (Rh), nickel (Ni), lead (Pb), copper (Cu), zinc (Zn), iron (Fe), and more.

Choosing Vanta XRF

Before investing in XRF technology, Matt relied largely on his expertise and complementary testing methods to evaluate precious metals. As his business expanded, he recognized the need for a more definitive solution.

Having previously worked with Evident analyzers in the bullion industry, Matt was already familiar with their capabilities. When it came time to purchase an analyzer for Thompsons Coins, several factors influenced his decision.

“The costing was comparable, and the service level and support were significantly greater than competitors,” Matt says. “Also, it was a unit that I’d literally used before and was comfortable operating.”

Reputation also played a major role.

“Evident has a reputation as the leading brand in the industry,” he says. “If I walked into a shop and they weren’t using Evident XRF, I’d be a little wary.”

Vanta XRF provides simple, easy-to-understand analysis screens and also allows users to create customized branded screens based on their needs.

Providing Customers with Scientific Proof

Today, Vanta XRF plays a central role in Thompsons Coins’ verification process.

Their Vanta Core XRF analyzer helps confirm the composition of gold sovereigns, bullion products, silver collectibles, jewelry, medals, silverware, and other precious metal items brought into the shop.

More importantly, it gives customers confidence.

Rather than simply relying on an expert opinion, customers can see the elemental composition of an item for themselves.

“It provides irrefutable proof to someone who may be uncertain as to what they have,” Matt explains. “It’s not just me saying it. It’s backed by a scientific instrument.”

This capability has become especially valuable when customers unknowingly purchase counterfeit or misrepresented pieces.

Matt recalls helping one collector who believed he had found exceptional deals on silver coins selling below market value. A quick XRF analysis revealed the coins were not silver at all.

By comparing the results to those of a genuine silver coin, Matt was able to clearly demonstrate the difference and help the customer understand what had happened.

“It’s a clear and easy-to-follow process,” he says. “People are very receptive to that.”

Expanding Services Beyond Coins

Vanta XRF has also helped Thompsons Coins broaden its offerings beyond traditional coin buying and selling. Customers frequently bring in a variety of items for testing, including jewelry, silverware, dining sets, medals, and other valuables.

As a result, the business has become a trusted local resource for precious metal verification.

Located less than an hour from Melbourne’s central business district, Thompsons Coins offers customers a convenient alternative to traveling into the city for testing and authentication services.

“The fact that people can have items verified at a local community level is quite positive and has been well received,” Matt says.

With Vanta XRF, getting an answer is as simple as pushing a button—no sample prep or acid handling required.

Where History Meets Science

For Matt, the work is about much more than precious metal content.

Customers often describe Thompsons Coins as part retail store, part museum—a reflection of the history behind many of the items that pass through the shop. From Australian agricultural medals to ancient Roman coins and pieces dating back to the era of Alexander the Great, every item has a story.

“Unless you know the story behind it, you can boil it down to the intrinsic value,” Matt says. “But once you start to scratch the surface and learn about these items, they are something much more.”

Vanta XRF helps bridge the gap between history and science, providing precise elemental analysis while supporting the expertise and storytelling that make historic collectibles so fascinating.

Delivering Confidence Every Day

For Thompsons Coins, every customer interaction ultimately comes down to trust.

Whether verifying a gold sovereign, authenticating a family heirloom, or helping a new collector avoid costly mistakes, Vanta XRF provides the scientific confidence needed to make informed decisions.

By combining deep industry knowledge with advanced XRF technology, Thompsons Coins is helping collectors and precious metal owners gain certainty about what they hold, one analysis at a time.

Vanta XRF for Precious Metal Analysis

When accuracy is critical—and confidence means everything—Vanta XRF delivers instant nondestructive elemental analysis and karat determination of precious metals, including gold, silver, platinum, palladium, and more.

Available in benchtop and handheld models, Vanta XRF analyzers are an essential tool for jewelers, pawn shops, coin dealers, and cash-for-gold operations. Vanta XRF analyzers give you the power to verify purity and value in seconds—no guesswork, no damage, no delay.