It’s election season in America, but Trump and Hillary aren’t the only campaign pins showing up in Old Town Alexandria. Outside Big Wheel Bikes on The Strand, 14-year-old Diego Antonio Moore has a table full of election pins promoting candidates from Eisenhower to Obama.
For Diego Moore, selling campaign pins has been a chance to make money while exploring one of his favorite subjects: history. He has a friend at the Georgetown Flea market where he gets many of his pins and he loves hearing the friend tell him the stories behind each of them. Diego Moore’s favorite pins are the holograms, like the ones for the Adlai Stevenson ticket, where the image changes based on how you look at the picture.
“I love selling as many as I can,” said Diego Moore. “I want to see people have a piece of American history with them.”
The stand started with lemonade, but Diego Moore says the inventory expanded into selling seashells he collected from the nearby shoreline, then into collecting and selling antique bottles. But over the summer, the bottle sales started to dwindle. But Diego Moore noticed that more and more people were taking an interest in the few antique pins he had available.
“People were really buying them,” said Diego Moore.
Diego Moore says running his own stand has helped teach him a lot about retail and salesmanship.
“You have to take care of your product and stay at your post for the people walking by,” said Diego Moore. There have been some challenges. Diego Moore says there have been windy days where his inventory was blown over and he thought he’d lost all of them. Other times, the intense sun deters people from staying outside or shopping up and down along the waterfront. Most of his customers are from the nearby foot traffic. It might be a long ways off, but Diego Moore only half-jokingly says he’s saving up for a building.
Among the Democratic pins, Diego Moore says the most popular ones have been Kennedy and Obama. Among the Republican pins, he says the most popular choices have been the Nixon pins and the Eisenhower pins. Diego Moore’s oldest political pin is a Smith-Robinson pin from 1928. He also has a few older international flag pins; pins that came in cigarette packages in the late 1800s.
Diego Moore’s father, Bennett Moore, runs Big Wheel Bikes in Alexandria. Bennett Moore says at first he thought the stand would last a couple weeks, but he’s been surprised at how much of a success it’s been.
“A lot of people come in and are really impressed with him,” said Bennett Moore. “I’m really proud of what he’s been doing. He’s taking it very seriously and he won’t miss a day. He’s been hoping to get election day off from school to come back and sell pins.”
After the election is over, Diego Moore said his parents told him people won’t be as interested in buying campaign pins, but Diego isn’t as sure.
“Even after the elections over, I think people will still be interested,” said Diego Moore. “I think this is something that’s important to people.”