Stamp Collecting Process

I am interested in hearing from other members how they manage their stamp acquistions, be it purchased or cut from envelopes. I have tried to follow an organized process of late but am looking for other good ideas. Here are some things I am doing.

1. Stamps I purchase for value ( ebay e.g.) immediately go into a small stock book pending finding their best long term home.

2. Stamps I acquire off envelopes or buy in bulk I try to sort into some general categories and store them in those plastic "Glad" storage boxes. I sort them by US on paper, US off paper, World on paper, World off paper, trimmed self adhesives, and a separate box for stamps clearly destined for one of my topical albums. Anything of real value I uncover goes into the stock book describe above. Later, I grab one of the plastic boxes and sort them down by country and move them on to a final home.

Your thoughts are appreciated.

I decant a box of junk stamps in a thrice.

I have a half sized 2 ring binder with plakky pages
Simply sort the stamps by country alphabetically.

2 ring Binder $3 pages $2 per 20 IIRC.

(Incidentally, this size fits the
"Australian Stamp Bulletin" perfectly

Caveat: <Not> good for gummed stamps,
humidity may have them stick together

Like Rod I sort my incoming stamps by country, and move on from there.

But instead of plastic sheets & binder, I use labeled envelopes & glassines which are stored (alphabetically) in two large sized shoeboxes. The other shoebox is reserved for empty covers, the other is reserved for those with stamps. Additionally I have separate box for onpaper stamps waiting for soak, but these are totally unsorted...Works pretty well for me.

Being I am reorganizing my collection, I am trying to think ahead. I am doing things in this order.

STORAGE

1)I have two boxes. Both are a little bigger than a shoe box. One is marked canceled and the other is marked MNH and MH.

2)I try to go through one collection or the other for a few hours everyday.

3)I will look up the stamp up in my Scott catalogs. Take down the year, the number and the value of the stamp and record that on a 3x5 index card that I keep in an index box.

4) Being some of my stamps are already sorted by country, I place then back in the envelopes that they have come in or put the ones that are in baggies (remember how my ultimate goal was to get glassine envelopes?...lol) in an envelope and file them back in the boxes.

5)So I won't have a big batch of cataloged stamps to catch up on later I try to place those stamps in my stock books. I have two, 3-ringed binders with 6 pocket stock pages in them. One is for my MNH and the other is for the MH stamps. Someone here had mentioned that the pages are easier to deal with and stamps can be moved about easier than an album. I try to place the stamps in the same numbered order as the Scott catalog has them.

6)For my canceled stamps, those I don't record. Being I have many more of these and in dups, I hinge them and place them in my H.E.Harris albums. The extras I am saving for two young ladies of a member here on the forum.

Being I live in a small apartment I really don't have the space to soak stamps and let them sit until they are dry, so when I do buy kiloware I try to buy ones that have already been soaked off paper if they are canceled. Once they are sorted by country, they go in envelopes and are placed in my canceled box.

Any stamps that I am particularly trying to buy from an auction (sets or singles) I go for the MNH or MH. When those arrive I sort them by country and they go in my MNH box. When I seem to be in between cataloging (and generally they do already come recorded with the Scott numbers) I'll place them in the MNH stock books.

Wow, after putting this down in steps it seems that I am pretty well organized person. Not true. You should see my kitchen cabinets and laundry...lol

The one really important reason, at least to me, that I am recording the info on the better stamps is because later on down the line, when my family is trying to figure out what to do with my collection (either keep it for themselves as I hope they do and keep the collection going) or sell it, then they will know what there is already and not be starting from scratch. If they sell it then at least there is information on the value of the collection as a whole, for whoever they are selling it to.

Believe it or not, I have a small collection of postcards and antique books that I have collected that has a notebook with information on the cards and books. That way my family will know the difference between the market paperback or hardback books that can be donated to someplace else and not toss the valuable books in as well.

Donna

Man! Donna, you are hooked...no hope for you now :)

(you should look at philatelic journalism)

I follow pretty much scb's route,
but I have yet to find a better initial sort, (for a WW collector)
than by country first, followed by value tablet.

Especially if you have a database, a physical sort amongst a
gaggle of stamps is extremely easy.

aside from my stamp and some cover albums and 5 red file boxes I am mainly disorganized...i go through it all quite a bit..cataloging this one, putting another in a large glassine and once in a while finding one that fills a space in my albums..i pretty much have enough for the rest of my life..but of course will keep adding !! If I find something I think someone may be interested in, I list it on the internet...

One of the great thing about stamp collecting is that every collector can go their own way depending on what interests her/him, but we can still swap / buy / sell easily because of common catalogues.

I love the freedom to do it the way I want. So for what it's worth - I collect primarily by theme. Pretty any stamp I like can be put in a theme (apart from the oldies and interesting modern non-thematics like the GB Machins, which I collect by country). But apart from these, I go for THEMATICS and SCENES. Scenes are any stamps of places, some I collect by country, other by type of scene - eg bridges, lighthouses, places of worship, etc - I just find enough stamps on some topic that seem to go together. So I have some pages of Roman buildings, pre-Columbian sites in America, etc etc.

Most of my stamps though are in more conventional themes. Again organised as I feel like rather than following anyone else's ideas. Birds, other animals, flora (flowers, uses of plants, farming etc), sports, transport, science & technology, art, the arts, "La Vida" (a catch all for anything else either fun or in some way about the human condition), and so on.

So when I get a new lot of stamps, once off paper, I first sort them into a big strong but light cutlery tray I've customised to give me enough sections for each my broad categories.

When any section of the tray is getting too full, I sort the stamps into a "holding album" - a stock book for one or a group of themes where I store stamps in the same order as I keep them in my albums.

When this is getting too full, or when I'm in the mood, I put the stamps into an album - decent A4 4xD Ring binders, on black double sided stock sheets so each stamp can be clearly seen. If it's a topic I've already dealt with, then I update the album leaves, adding new leaves when necessary, and using a new binder when the old on has got too full. If I'm not in the mood for something it doesn't get done.

I'm developing a system for keeping track of my stamps too, which will also make it easier for my family to get something back for it all after I've popped my clogs - but that's for another time . . .

The disadvantage of this approach is that it takes time and is idiosyncratic, so will get less cash when sold - but hey I do it 'cos I enjoy it and find it gently creative in a very non-stressful way. Which is the whole point, plus this way you end up with lots of interesting pages to look at too.

Rod, I know I can get long winded, but writing is another one of my hobbies. I wrote short stories for my kids and have written for local
newspaper columns and newsletters.

I'll try to keep it short and simple....lol....maybe.

As with any organisational task, try to touch each item as little as possible. Don't make four piles that you will subsequently ort int another 4, create a sysytem (alphabetical as an example) and sort the stamps into each country, put them in an envelope and sort them out later. You create smaller tasks which makes the overall task a little easier to complete.

64idgaf Thats good advice indeed...handle each stamp as little as possible..if only I could follow that advice..i seem to go over the same boxes again and again looking to pull out a plum..i am sure I could be doing something else philatelic with the wasted hours !!

Fernando:

I got a laugh from your detailed list 3, 4, ... 451

I assume there are many hours of enjoyment in the missing steps.

KirkS