Stamp Collecting - The Hobby Is Dying

I don't know how many of you keep up with the Texas Hold'um phenomenon on TV. I watch it some while stamping when it gets to the world series event in Oct/Nov.

Five years ago the overwhelming majority of players in the final 18 were in the 40's to 60's age bracket and were all well known lifelong casino gamblers. The last couple of years they have almost all been in their 20's and are primarily online poker players.

I see the same trend in stamp collecting - as others have said - in that there are probably tens or hundreds of thousands of collectors younger than 30 or 40 who relate to the hobby almost exclusively trough the Internet.

The Internet has certainly given me more access to stock (especially since I live in the bayou boonies!), but like PhilB and others, I miss the one-on-one. It's too bad we can't have both.

To say the hobby is dying is hyperbole. There has been a definite contraction or reduction in the number of people practicing this hobby since I started in the mid-1970's.

This poll goes back a few months now, but it is pertinent to the questions being raised on the age groups in stamp collecting:

https://goscf.com/t/9259&SearchTerms=Poll

Swabbie..the more we are the same the more we differ or something along those lines...i know collectors who work the first page of Canada and the United States stamps and wonder why some of us bother with "ordinary stamps" . they are not living in the same world as many of us who attend stamp shows are !!

10-4 Phil.

Looking at the poll again something has become obvious to me - we need to get more super-geezers on the Internet and in the SCF family. No one over 70??????

I guess I have it both ways. I've been a collector for 26 years. I joined a brick and mortar club around 5 years ago and they have an annual stamp show. I've been surfing the internet since the 1990's and am a member of a few internet stamp clubs/forums/chat rooms (SCF is the best though). I am still considered a young collector though in my early 30's.

It has been lamented that stamp collecting has been dying for at least a century and a half. I think that there will always be collectors of sticky pieces of paper and the history surrounding them.

I think not.
And I agree with Laswabbie.

https://goscf.com/t/10342

Londonbus1

laswabbie,

I think that with "super-geezers" that you are talking about at that point they have slowed down in the collecting themselves and are thinking of selling off what they have. Hopefully, they have someone in the family that will inherit their collections. They would be an infinite source of information on what they have collected.

So, you grab them. I'll tie them up and we'll both make them talk.

Donna

For the record, the poll showed that there were no SCF members over 74 (not 70).

There may also be some SCF collectors that are into the older age bracket that may prefer not to divulge their age!

...and still others that may not be comfortable with the SCF web site (or even computers, for that matter).

I am 71 going on 20...do I have to be put in a catagory ?

I don't think as many young people are collecting, but I have met a lot of people in their late twenties to mid thirties that are taking it up. I guess it is hard to compete with computer games and facebook. Mosy collector I meet are fifties to seventies.

Ahhh, My Poll... I forgot all about that post... I was super concerned about making everyone mad asking the age group but it actually went over well and was useful to know I was not alone in my mid to late 30's here...

I did find it interesting that it really fell off after 70, even Spock didn't post his 94+ after I took the time and care to make him his own age bracket!

I believe those in their mid to late 70's just never got the internet bug. I remember my parents giving my Grandparents a Apple IIe computer to type and print letters on to replace their typewriter. when we visited 6 months later it was still in the box, we taught them to use it and came back 6 months later it was back in the box. I guess at some point in your life you just stick to what works for you. there is no shame to that, I just feel we could be missing out on some great info, whos going to go sign them up?

It's funny, I recently got back into collecting after about a 5 year hiatus and I have been around what I collect pretty much all my life. I also collect coins.

I have noticed a few things.... A trip to the "mega" ASDA show in NYC Last weekend was an eye opener, it wasn't anywhere near as big as the shows that I remember from even 10 years ago.

OTOH, attending the Ray Vogel sale at Siegel Auctions a few days before the sale showed me one thing, classic postal history is still very hot and there's a huge and very strong market for what I collect. I only bought one cover for my actual collection out of that sale.

Still, people are often noticeably surprised that someone my age (35) collects what I do (1861s on cover, particularly 24cs). Granted I did grow up around this stuff, I can remember traveling to Ameripex in Chicago with my father when he exhibited his collection there.

I don't think that there's been a show the likes of Ameripex since :(

In General I do think the hobby is contracting, however thankfully (Or is it regrettably when I try and buy covers?) my field is alive and well and quite strong.

RUSS
I was playing computer games before I came back to collecting in my early 40's. I played intensively for about 5 years and I bought about a dozen of games. Then I operate a change of lifestyle for my weekend. That mean going to bed early and start to write poetry early saturday morning.

My stamps album were always sitting on the same shelf for 20 years and one day I took a look. At the same time I thought that the money I use to spend going out could be spend on stamps. And here I am!

this would be a good place to ask tony why his age doesnt go above 13 year after year?