When you look at a lapel pin, one of the first things you see is the design, and then maybe the shape, and then maybe what colors are used, and the color of the metal… is it gold? Is it silver? The important thing here is, you primarily see the front of a lapel pin, and the only time you ever even consider the back, if at all, is when you put one on.
As it turns out, there are several different types of pin backs, or clutches if I may, that are available for lapel pins. I believe that most
Disney pins come with a rubber mouse-ear shaped clutch. Really neat!
Most of the time, I’ve seen the metal backing, commonly referred to as a metal clutch, military clutch, or butterfly clutch. But there are several others that you may have seen as well.
The most commonly used pin backs:
- Rubber clutches – Typically black and round with a tab to pull on
- Jeweler’s/Jewelry clutch – this looks like the bell end of a tie tack
- Safety pin – Just like you see on buttons
- Cufflink – Apparently it’s very popular to use cufflink attachments on lapel pins to make them into cufflinks – great idea!
- Magnetic – I guess these make sense if you don’t want to puncture your nice suit jacket
- Threaded Spur - This is almost like a screw on the back with a round part that spins securely on..more permanent.
Well, that covers some of the basics, of course there are many more, and we’ll cover them all one of these days!
The Washington DC Metro Area Star Wars Collecting Club (DCSWCC) has announced their fourth bi-annual charity lapel pin sale.
Here’s an excerpt from the official source:
Just about any type of military lapel pins are collectible. Some people collect pins from all branches of the military, and some collectors like to specialize in collecting from only certain branches of the military, such as the Navy.
Navy pins are a great idea for beginning collectors due to their availability, and many are very affordable. I’ve included some resources below to help you get started in collecting Navy pins.
We’ve gone over flag pins in the past, but we wanted to touch a little bit on Friendship Flag pins. These pins typically feature flags from 2 different countries, indicating alliance and friendship between those 2 countries. Friendship flags are very popular, and can be found in a variety of countries spanning the globe. Many are very collectible items and some even fetch a pretty penny on auction sites, etc.
Chances are, if you’re a lapel pin collector you have a few, or many of these types of pins, and they’re easier to become addicted to, due to the consecutive nature of trying to collect one from each country. 
This is something that has been a collectible for a long time, even for those who don’t collect pins in general. There’s just something cool about airline wings that makes us want to keep them and collect them. Many airlines throughout history have issued wings to their pilots, and also given away wing pins to passenger. I’ve included some popular resources for airline wing collectors below.
Police badge pins are a great, unique collectible type of lapel pin. Many law enforcement agencies around the country use small replicas of their badges for use on polo shirts, sleeves, and just about anywhere else.
These pins have become really collectible, and there are many out there. One of the reasons they’re so collectible, is that you can collect pins from just about every state, and even go as far as to try to collect pins from each major county in the US.
Police badge lapel pins typically look just like the real, full size badge they’re replicating, minus some of the ornate details, simply due to the fact that most police badges are 2 1/2″ to 3″ in size and a lapel pin is normally only about 1 inch in size. Obviously there’s only so much detail you can fit on a 1″ lapel pin I suppose.
There are a lot of police badge pins available on sites like 
Jewelry lapel pins are a little bit different than your typical lapel pin. Usually they are more ornate, and feature gemstones, either simulated, and in some cases real! Obviously, jewelry pins with real precious gemstones can be very expensive, and they are. You can find many retailers selling jewelry lapel pins with real stones for hundreds, sometimes thousands of dollars.
Jewelry lapel pins are most often referred to as Brooches, and they are typically fairly large and many times 3-dimensional. Bugs, animals, and symbols and the most common types I’ve seen.
These brooches have become highly collectible, and Fmr. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright actually published a book entitled ‘Read My Pins’; describing her personal collecting of brooches, which have been publicly noticed by the nation for many years.
I haven’t yet started collecting jewelry pins, but I run across many collectors of them in visiting various pin trading events across the country. They are definitely an eye catching item, and many are very valuable, which may be one of the reasons I haven’t started collecting them yet: there is a minimum budget!
If you have a jewelry pin, or brooch collection you’d like to share with us, please email us at 
