It is completely free to visit the facility and there is a self guided tour you can take which goes along a walkway about the production floor. You're given a headset which explains the different parts of the processes are you walk above the factory floor including how the paper comes into the factory, is then printed with specialist printers which apply the ink using huge amounts of pressure (this is how you get a 3D look and feel on the notes), how they are quality checked, cut, checked again, how the security features are added and finally how they are stacked, wrapped and sent to the vault. Whilst we visited, we saw thousands of $100 and $1 bills going through the process.
At the end of the tour, there is a museum and information area explaining the history of money in the US and interesting facts about the current currency. A couple that I can remember:
1) The $100 bill is the largest bill in circulation but there are $500, $1,000, $5,000 and $10,000 and $100,000 bills. These are no longer printed but used to be used to banks to transfer money to each other.
2) There is a $2 bill. It is no longer printed as it wasn't very popular but there are some still in circulation and you can buy them in the BEP gift shop.
3) You can tell from the numbers/letters on each note where it was produced (Fort Worth or DC) and which Federal Reserve it was sent to after printing. If you have a spare note at home, look for FW, this will be a Fort Worth note.
Unfortunately there was a strict no electronics rule in the facility, no phones or cameras, Lee wasn't even allowed his smart watch! So the only photo we have is the one of the outside of the security building:
shame you could take pics or video but I imagine it was a really interesting tour
ReplyDeleteYou could also buy pages of real notes that hadn't been cut yet. It would have been cool to buy a whole sheet to put up on the wall at home but it was unlikely to make it home in one piece given how jammed Fin is.
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