Creech Air Force Base
COINS FOR THE
RPA COMMUNITY
Creech has a coin culture of its own, and it is not the one the rest of the Air Force has. The 432nd Wing's deployments are measured in shifts rather than rotations, the work does not photograph, and almost none of it can be described in public. The coins tend to reflect all three.
A DIFFERENT SET OF THINGS TO MARK
Most military coin traditions are built around movement — a deployment, a change of station, a homecoming. The remotely piloted aircraft community marks different things, and the coins we get asked for here reflect that: hours milestones, a crew that worked a particular period together, an operations floor rather than a flight line.
The practical consequence is that a lot of these coins carry a number rather than a place. That is a design problem worth thinking about, because a large numeral is either the strongest element on a coin or the weakest, depending entirely on how it is set. Sunk into recessed enamel it reads well at arm's length; laid flat in thin type it disappears.
Sequential numbering is a separate option and a common one here — each coin struck with its own number, which turns a run into a numbered set. It is worth knowing it exists before you design around a hand-engraved look you do not need.
WHAT CAN GO ON THE COIN
We are not the right people to advise on what is releasable, and we will not try. What we can say is that the design constraints run the same way regardless: a coin reads at about the size of a large button, so whatever survives that shrink is what should be on it.
In practice that pushes designs toward one strong central element, a clean outer arc of text, and a back that is either a motto or a single symbol. It is a better coin than one carrying four ideas, and it also happens to be the design that has the least on it to reconsider.
STARTING ONE
The designer will get you a front and back you can circulate before anyone commits to anything, and it prices as you go. If you would rather describe it than draw it, the quote form takes the whole spec in one pass.
Nearby: Nellis AFB and the Nevada Guard.
Asked and answered
What people here ask first
- Creech is an hour out. Do you still deliver?
- We deliver to an address in the Las Vegas valley, which in practice means we hand the coins to someone at a valley address rather than driving to Indian Springs. Most Creech orders go to a home address or an office in town — a lot of the community lives in the northwest valley — and that works exactly like any other local delivery.
- Can a coin show an aircraft that is mostly a silhouette?
- An MQ-9 in profile is a good coin subject for the same reason it is a hard one: the shape is instantly recognisable but it is long, thin and low-contrast. Flat two-dimensional enamel tends to lose the wing. Sculpted relief holds it, and so does running the airframe across the coin at an angle rather than straight across the middle. This is worth settling at the proof.
- We want something that does not look like every other Air Force coin.
- Reasonable, and common here. The usual levers are finish and shape rather than artwork: black nickel instead of antique silver reads very differently, and a custom outline costs the same as a round coin. Dual plating — two metals on one face — is the other one people reach for, and it photographs far better than it sounds.
- How small a run will you take?
- Twenty-five. It is not the efficient quantity and we will show you what 100 or 300 costs alongside it, but a crew coin for a small shop is a real order and we would rather quote it honestly than pretend there is a 100-piece minimum.
Elsewhere in the valley
Who else we build for here
- Nellis AFB
Squadron, wing and exercise coins for the units at Nellis — including the ones that rotate through for Red Flag and leave with something to remember it by.
- Nevada National Guard
Drill-weekend timelines, unit funds rather than corporate budgets, and coins that have to survive a deployment and a civilian job at the same time.
- Nevada, statewide
Reno, Carson City, Fallon and the rural counties. Outside the delivery radius, so everything ships — which changes the timeline, not the coin.
- Las Vegas Metro Police
Area command, SWAT, K-9, Search and Rescue and academy class coins for the largest police department in Nevada.
- Clark County Fire
Station and company coins for CCFD, Las Vegas Fire & Rescue, Henderson and North Las Vegas — where the coin belongs to the house, not the department.
- Casino & hospitality
Service anniversary, host and security team coins for the property recognition programmes that run all year on this valley's largest employers.
- Conventions & trade shows
Booth coins for a show with a fixed date. The deadline is the whole job, and delivery to your hotel or the convention centre is the reason it works.
Ordering inside the valley? We deliver locally — no carrier, no tracking number, no waiting on a truck.