Surprised And Disappointed ...

so I have all my secret santa stamp packages labeled and ready to go and I go to the post office to get postage amounts and buy stamps ... I ask for ten of the new $1 wave stamps and a sheet/booklet of the santa reindeer stamps ... the guy looked at me like I had grown a second head. He claimed to have never heard of either ... there was a USPS 2012 Stamp yearbook on the counter, I opened it and showed him the stamps... nope never seen em. Admittedly I live in a rural part of Missouri, but in a town of ~17000 people. Does the USPS not distribute new stamps to ALL post offices?

Anyhow, if you get a secret santa from me, these were the stamps I WANTED to use.

I have the same problem...i asked for a particular commemorative stamp and they told me they are not sent automaticly ..the post office has to order them !

I tried for the Waves of Color at a couple of the Post Offices in town, no luck either.

Went to my post office yesterday and also asked about the "waves." I was told that they had no intention of ordering any of the high denomination stamps. Suggested I check at the downtown main post office. I rather doubt that they'll have them either. This all goes back to what I originally said about this series, the metered labels will be used 99.9% of the time by postal workers (unless a collector demands real stamps). As a collector I'll probably buy some of these eventually; however, the general public doesn't give a flip if it's a stamp or label on their package just as long as it gets to where it is supposed to go. This may be the stupidest series of postage stamps that USPS has ever issued since it serves such little purpose.

It serves the purpose of lining the pockets of the USPS with money from collectors buying these issues.

Of course, in 20 years the used versions are going to be worth more then the new because they'll be used so rarely.

I'm ordering a bunch and using them on SASE's .. at least I'll have a few used copies

The Santa & Sleigh stamps were sent automatically to each post office. That's documented in the Postal Bulletin. If a postal clerk tells you otherwise either he's lying or ignorant of procedures and you should ask to speak with the Postmaster.

In all fairness, though, there have been reports that initial distributions of the Santa & Sleigh stamps were grossly underestimated and many post offices sold out of them very quickly. At that point, the responsibility is on the individual post offices to requisition more and it may be that some smaller post offices opted not to.

However, the Santa & Sleigh stamps should also be available from APC's and through many retail sellers (like supermarkets, drug stores, etc.), if your local post office doesn't have any more.

As for the Waves of Color stamps, the post office is correct that no automatic distribution of those stamps are being made. Post Offices must requisition them on an as needed basis. If the majority of post offices don't want to be bothered with them, they may intentionally not order them in deference to using their postage meter.

Of course, you can always order them through SFS as they are certainly available, just not automatically distributed until each post office requisitions some for their own stock.

Very curious as wt1 notes that the Santa and Sleigh seem to be selling well and some/many post offices have sold out of them. Just visited my local post office and the clerk was actually selling last year's issue, the one with the ornaments, because he was cleaned out of all the new ones.

If a forever stamp was issued when the postage was different than today do they charge the old rate, or since they are forever they can charge the new rate for older issues as long as it has a forever? That would be a great savings for the USPS because they don't have to reprint to get the new rate.

stampcoder, I'm in total agreement with you on who will be purchasing the "Wave" stamps - just us collectors. However, you'd have to go a long ways in convincing me that sales to collectors will be enough to justify the entire production cost of this issue. As wt1 has indicated in previous threads, USPS is producing billions of stamps that go unsold. As a taxpayer, vice stamp collector, it enrages me to see complete mismanagement of my tax dollars and rooms full of never-to-be-used stamps like the Simpsons and Flags of Our Nation. Now add one more to this list - the "Waves."

Exactly the point of "Forever" stamps. The stamps are sold at the current first class rate (currently 45c) and will always be accepted as first class postage no matter what the rate increases to in the future.

When postal rates change to a higher amount, as in the upcoming 1/27/13 postal rate increase to 46c, all "Forever" stamps will be sold at that new rate from that day forward, regardless of how old or new the stamp may be.

On the other hand, if you have "Forever" stamps purchased at the old rate, no additional postage is required.

Here's the official quote the USPS uses for all of their stamp issues:

"Forever stamps are always equal in value to the current First-Class Mail one-ounce rate."

I have to agree with you there. There should never be boxes/rooms full of commemorative stamps left over. There should be enough printed to meet demand, so they sell out, or come close to it. Remaining stamps should be available from USPS SFS until they sell out. Definitives, on the other hand, print all you want. That's the point to a definitive. It also kind of annoys me that we get new definitives every year. Definitives should be the same design every year for a number of years. The high value waves stamps should probably be around for close to 10 years before there is a design change. But we all know, that's not going to happen.

I know the USPS makes a good deal of revenue from stamp collectors. But, how much PROFIT do they really make when there are warehouses full of stamps that they are never going to sell.

I don't know if anyone has much noticed this, but all of the stamps that have gone off sale (or are going off sale) are all denominated ones for various uses, including postcard rate, high value Priority and/or Express Mail stamps, etc.

All commemorative stamps issued since the "Forever" concept hit common usage are still available at SFS back to 2011. They may not be offered at local post offices anymore, but I think the idea is that they will be offered for sale through SFS until they sell out (or until they realize the real estate needed to store unsold stocks of stamps exceeds the value of keeping them on the shelf). The only Forever stamps that seemed so popular they sold out early were issues such as Owney the Postal Dog and the Edward Hopper sailboat painting commemorative.

I have been doing an "unofficial" count of the 2012 stamp issues and the quantities printed, and as far as I can see, no first class "Forever" commemoratives were issued in quantities less than 20 million. The only exception to that number is the Lady Bird Johnson Souvenir Sheet (12 million) which had limited nationwide distribution and the individual player panes of the MLB All Star Issues, which were limited to 3 million panes each of the individual players.

It wouldn't bother me to see the USPS cut their commemorative stamp printing orders in half on all new commemoratives, which would encourage collectors to either purchase them at the post office in the first few weeks of availability or lose out. With the number of stamps constantly being issued, it would be of little consequence to the USPS and may actually save them some money as they wouldn't have to find storage for the unsold remainders. Collectors would benefit too, as the lower quantities printed usually correlate to a better resale value on the secondary philatelic market.

(Final Note: The reference in the previous quote about being a taxpayer would have the USPS quickly point out that no taxpayer monies are used to support the USPS or its printing of stamp issues.)

[edited spelling]

That makes far too much sense for them to even consider it. :-)

wt1 is correct, of course, that USPS is supposed to be self-supporting. However, we've all noted their consistent financial woes. Some have suggested USPS losses to be to the tune of $2.5 million daily! Others quite correctly say that, if this was truly a private company, they would have declared bankruptcy quite some time ago. The reason they haven't is that they are underwritten by the US government. Talk has already begun about a possible federal bail-out to help keep USPS afloat. As a taxpayer, should I have concern about USPS' consistently poor management? Why certainly, because ultimately we - the taxpayers - are going to have to rescue them from themselves! Now I know there are other problems beyond the control of USPS created by Congress, and the impact of the internet and other parcel services; however, many of their problems are self-inflicted. Rather than attempt to cover them all, my focus here has been just on this one area. USPS is extremely poor in analyzing the market place and estimating the types of stamps and volume necessary to support their customers. How can you not order enough Christmas stamps to cover the Holidays? And now, at the risk of really butchering a metaphor, we have the "stamps to nowhere" with these Waves. Sure looks like mismanagement to me.

When you know you have plenty left over from last year.

I also have been offered ornament stamps from last year.