We get offered a lot of stamps in the shop, and turn most of them down. The stamp market is such that there is no real call for First Day Covers, schoolboy collections or, indeed, most stamps we are offered. We even turned away a Penny Black the other day. As you can see from the link – they printed 68,808,000 of them and many used examples were saved. They were hand cut from unperforated sheets and only ones that have been well cut, with four even margins, are really worth anything. They frequently sell for under £30 on eBay, with several under £20. It’s not much for a cultural icon. (On the other hand, Stanley Gibbons have a nice one for sale at £250,000. Well, I assume it’s nice for quarter of a million.)
The ones we buy are the Presentation Packs. We then break them up and use them on parcels. As long as they are priced in decimal currency you can still use them. You can even use the ones priced in 1/2p denominations even though we stopped using the 1/2p coin in 1984.
It can take a while sorting all these stamps and working out the postage, as you can see from the accompanying pictures. It’s good for your mental arithmetic, if nothing else.
Bluebells and Winnie the Pooh
A very orange stamp
The first perforated stamps were Penny Reds. They were originally issued to replace Penny Blacks in 1841, and continued until 1879. In the beginning they needed cutting like the Penny Black but in 1854 they were issued perforated for ease of use.
1854 – we couldn’t run an efficient army nursing service but we could perforate stamps…
Variety is always great thing, but what about if stamps tell a story? My wife’s Finnish stamps tell!
Happy weekend.
I just looked up Finnish stamps – it was an interesting read. 🙂
I like all the varieties and feel quite sad when “stuck with” a boring common one. I think they decorate the mail quite nicely. It’s worth my happiness if not any money.
We try to spread happiness – Eddie tries to theme the stamps to the parcel contents, though I don’t go that far. 🙂
Yes, fascinating! And some of them are beauties.
We have some good stamps, but just too much variety! 🙂
I bet they love you at the post office!
They do get some money out of us occasionally, but yes, I often wonder what they think. 🙂
I do find stamps fascinating.
Yes, there’s something about them that brings different times and places to mind.
Especially when you had two collections in childhood and adolescence
They were the first thing I ever collected, when my father passed his collection on to me. I added a few more then moved on to coins for a while.
Interesting.
Thank you. There’s always something new to learn in the shop. Mainly I’ve learned that I don’t like working for other people. After 25 years of self-employment this was to be expected. 🙂