I own about 15. Actually I have not bought any for over 20 years. I used to haunt second hand bookshops once but life got too busy after we opened Moonlit. By the way, don't take the show or the books as gospel. Gerry played fast and loose with the facts to fit a story. Not the least Lawrence was married at the time and lived in a separate house.
These days just maps and tickets. As a child I had a huge collection of feather, porcupine quills, owl pellets, camel fur, pretty much anything I could fish out of an enclosure. My parents encouraged it, it kept the need for pocket-money to a minimum.
Do those little model schleich animals they sell on the shelves that cost way too much count? Because I have...too much of those I also have a little wall of a select few zoo maps
I have at least 27 guide books for London Zoo alone - along with countless other places e.g. safari parks, aquariums, museums & other zoos. Plus this website is good if you want to know what year / date your guide books are from: Les Zoos dans le Monde - Base documentaire
The Bartlett Society also provides an extremely useful catalogue of zoo guidebooks. See the link below for details. The Bartlett Society - Zoo guidebooks
There are the obvious items I tend to collect like maps from zoos, saving a pristine copy of each zoo and aquarium visited along with worn out copies. Then I love collecting what may be enamel pins from the LA Zoo of animals whether in tye dye colors or natural colors, and mugs or tote bags from both the SDZ and SDZSP
Considering corona-virus may continue to be an issue for a while, I wonder if zoo branded face masks might be a popular souvenir.
I collect Zoo T-Shirts! One of my favorite parts of going to a "new" zoo is selecting the shirt to add to my collection. My family has figured out that I like Zoo Shirts so now I get them from far away zoos as presents.
I collect all sorts, but something I tend to get almost without fail each time are pencils. I also love keeping the maps from each place I visit.
I buy Tee/Sweat Shirts, specifically ones that say " I've been to ***** Zoo", or words that have the zoo name in them. eg Pickleswade Zoo, no 1, wild experience. However they seem to be harder to find in zoo gift shops these days. There are plenty of Tees with animal prints. designs etc, but have neglected to include the name of the zoo. When I went to Chester/Longleat and Hamerton last year, I was disappointed to find, there were no adult Tees/Sweats or Baseball caps (I sometimes buy those instead) with the zoo name on them.
We did try Zoo named Tee-shirts some years ago. Stocking proved impossible for the number sold. Everyone seemed to want a colour, design and size different from those in stock... and, we only have a small footfall. It is interesting that Chester and Longleat could not stock them either, given their huge visitor numbers.
Yes, I guess economics must come into it, especially for the smaller collections. However Crocs of the World, sell named sweatshirts and Tees, and they're available both online and from the gift shop. A few years ago I bought everyone in my family a COTW tee shirt for Xmas. It's also free advertising. I think you have to be conservative about sizing and colours. Black or Grey suits both male and female, and M , L &XL sizing only. It would be nice to have zoo named Tees back in the gift shops again. But understandable as to why they're not ,especially in today's economical climate.
