How To Keep Track Of Your Collection?

Hi All,

I have now, from some countries, a lot of stamps.
But I don't know how I can track my collection.

So my question is: How do you track your collection.
With a Database or which program?

I hope that you all will help me,

Many Thanks,

Rik

Microsoft Excel works for me. It is readily available and easily modified to include any information I might require.

Checkout this previous thread with further suggestions:

https://goscf.com/t/21503&SearchTerms=Excel

I'll worry about properly tracking my collection when I retire. Until then, I rather enjoy sorting through misc boxes and albums and findign items I didn't know I owned!

I do it the old fashioned way - with a mark by the catalogue number in the Scott Classic Specialized catalogue 1840-1940.



I take the book with me to the local club meeting etc, where I have "instant" access to what I have and what I don't have.

www.ezstamps.com

Probably my collection isn't large enough yet, but I like to go with the old cerebrum when it comes to keeping track of things.

I've tried to keep a record of my collection before with Excel, but to no avail. Maybe I lack the patience, or maybe I realized that the great bulk of my collection wasn't really worth time in keeping a digitized record - I don't know.

I suppose to each his own - although I feel that for most users a spreadsheet application works very well.

I would suggest Google Docs (https://docs.google.com) for spreadsheet use. It features most of the functionality of Excel but with the benefit that you'll never lose your files due to hard-drive loss, and also the fact that it allows you to easily share your data with another person if you were, for instance, wanting to exchange want lists for trade.

I use Excel spreadsheets, but only for items above a certain cut-off catalogue value. Items below that, they don't matter too much, anyway.

Okay thanks all.
But can someone let me see a layout of such an Excel file?
So what kind of information should I put in my Excel file??

Many Thanks

That is a good question, Rik, re: Excel and what to put in ... I use catalogs at the moment .. I had a computer program for my US and Canadians and I liked it a lot but then my comp. crashed and I lost everything .. I have not had the strength to do it again. And I am inept at programs like Excel, but if I can find someone to coach me on it maybe I will give it a try.

Well, my Excel spreadsheet is mainly intended to track the value of my collection, and to help my heirs and succssors when I drop off the twig. I only list items cataloguing at least £10 in Gibbons. I use columns for the SG No. and whether mint, used or on cover, on separate lines where necessary (so I might have one line for mint, one for used, and one for covers), the quantity (including ½ or whatever if the item isn't fully up to scratch), the catalogue value of a single item, and the total value for that item for the catalogue year. I have values listed by year in columns for 1955, 1984 (simply because I have those catalogues) 1998, 1999, 2000 and 2002 to 2012.

It can make very interesting reading.

Okay, thank you very much for your explanation.
I gonna try to make something in Excel.
If someone has some additions, those are always welcome!

Just scan your stamps! how easy is that?
a picture saves typing in excel, which will end up just a bunch
of text, with no reference to you collection.

Re-creating a Stamp catalogue is just re inventing the wheel.
and a real waste of time.

You have a Hagner full of Netherlands, for example
just scan the page, 30 of your stamps in their existing condition.

Okay that is also a superb solution, but how do I scan multiple stamps from 1 type?
Should I scan all the duplicates, or just one?

EDIT: I realize me, that I don't have a scanner.
But can I make photo's of them?
Because I have a digital compact camera...

I realize me, that I don't have a scanner.
But can I make photo's of them?
Because I have a digital compact camera...

A fellow member of my stamp club gave me these that he made up. They are quite simple but do the trick for me. Some of the numbers were cut off when I rotated the page but you get the idea. I just photocopied them multiple times and kept one blank set for when I work on a new country.



Dianne