Collecting The World

I'd like to point out a newly published stamp article on different approaches to Collecting the World in Linn's (now online, with printed copies being mailed to subscribers). The title is:

"If you want to collect the world, find a way to make it work for you" in Linn's Stamp News, September 20, 2021 (monthly issue) pages 103-106. The subtitle for the article is "a representative collection of stamps from around the world might help you discover intriguing new collecting areas to pursue."

Discussion (with illustrations) includes Scott International versus Minkus Supreme Global albums, plus the addition of extra pages for multiples, items on piece, etc.

Best Regards,

InforaPenny

"make it work for you " is the most important learning part, that is because it is developed over time . No two collectors do the same thing .

Seems our hobby has quite a bit of 'make it work for you' such as poor quality modern hinges, costly and restrictive preprinted albums, catalogs that do not reflect actual market values.

Perhaps given the competition for leisure time our hobby should seek to do better than 'make it work for you'.
Don

That doesn't look quite like the French pages from the average worldwide album - may be more likely to alarm than inspire

What you start with as a worldwide collector is very rarely the way your collection developes over the years . There is a big learning curve as your collection expands and your interest are refocused .

Comment from floortrader about how "collection develops" is really a perfect nutshell summary for my collection and, I would guess, those of many others. Well said.

I have gone from worldwide as a kid ... to U.S. and Canada .. to covers of all sorts .. to many topics ... some postal history, etc. But I missed the World so have gone back to basically collecting many countries, but just what moves me. Could be a single stamp, a set (or 5 or 6), a series, classics, modern, a range of Scott numbers ... it's whatever I like.

Indeed.

I've only been collecting for a short while, but I have developed quite a few interests already. For me, I'll come across a stamp or postmark that I find interesting. Then, I get sucked down the rabbit hole of wanting to understand the issuing country at the time of issue. I recently did this with Romania. Wow, that's a cool fascist stamp. What's the story behind it? I have my favorite areas (Austria & Belgium), but I don't want to limit myself when there's a lot of interesting things to learn. It helps that I have very little interest in completion.

Edit: I ended up learning a bit about Romanian history (which, I have to discover to be quite interesting) all because of a stamp! I guess I view stamps as a means to an end.

The article "If you want to collect the world, find a way to make it work for you" from Linn's Stamp News, September 20, 2021 is now posted on the website of SESCAL's Literature exhibit as a flipbook and free PDF download at:

https://sescal.org/literature-exhibit/

Scroll down to find it under 2022 Competitive Exhibits.

Best Regards,

InforaPenny

Thank you InforaPenny for posting that article. Agree with Floortrader that if one tackles the world. Things will evolve. That France page is a good example of the evolution. many world collectors have a run of Scott Internationals that have been augmented (especially pre 1960) by blank pages to put all those goodies that Scott didn't have a space for. Many aren't really that expensive either. The blogs "Big Blue" and "Filling Spaces" are must reads for those who want to dig in.

The "A Stamp for Every Country" is another way to approach it. There is even a printed album for it.

For the past four years I've been working on a "One Unused 19th-Century Postal Card from Everywhere" collection, which satisfies the worldwide itch for me without draining my bank account.

I've always found stories of people trying to collect the world interesting. In one of Andrew Mcgavin's older "Tips of the Trade booklets, he talks about a man who's goal was to collect as many stamps as he could that cost 10p (15 cents) each or less, over time he wound up with 100,000 different stamps in 250 albums. It filled a complete wall of a room (sadly no photo). He had lots of fun but when it came time to sell he wound up getting 2,200 pounds (not sure of the dollar equivalent). The albums were cheap ones, but cost almost as much as the stamps. But he had a lot of fun doing it and got some money back.

Landoquakes ------Sounds like a story from around the 1970's when that amount of different stamps was a impressive goal . Now today, that would not be that outstanding .

Around the year 2000 , Cherrystone Stamp Auctions had a article in their auction catalog about a consignor who placed his collection up for auction and he had 200,000 worldwide different stamps , the article stated that very very few collectors have ever hit that level ,the writer /owner of the firm stated ,he knew of possible five collectors to ever achieve that level as stamp collectors .

Now in 2022 , I believe there is a 300,000+ all different worldwide collection in existence .But it is not just 15 cents stamps ,some serious money would have to be needed to get to that level .

Hmm.. How far can one go with a world collection with low catalogue stamps? The fact that one collector did such a thing to 100K is an accomplishment in itself. I suppose items that catalog a dollar or less would fit something like that. I wish more large collectors would count all their different stamps. One guy in y club stopped at 175K... I suppose it seems daunting. I sit an watch something (or listen to something) and count up an album. Very true that now there is more stamps there are plenty of low cat stamps to get to a pretty high level. Do we have a current count of how many stamps there are? I've been using 620,761 through 2010 (courtesy Keijo) Via Linns https://www.linns.com/insights/year...st-dead.html one could get the count through 2016. My guess through 2021 maybe around 750K or so. I think someone on the forum already has done this somewhere. 300,000 different is quite an amazing feat. Still less than half the stamps issued!

I took a quick look at the active collectors list on another well known collection site. It shows 77 collectors with 100,000+ collections. The largest one has 314,000.