US Circus Themed Sheetlet Only Available In Stamp Yearbook

I will most likely just buy a sheetlet from an ebay dealer separate from the yearbook.

That would seem to make the most sense, only if the price is reasonable. Since someone (the ebay seller) would have to buy the entire Stamp Yearbook to acquire the sheetlet, the "limited edition" sheetlet could become pricey. If it hits $40 or $50 on ebay, then it pays to simply buy the Stamp Yearbook at $64.95, as the other stamps in the Yearbook set would easily compensate you for the extra $15 or so.

As for me, I think I'm going to settle for a FDOI cancelled sheetlet at face value (plus the cost of the envelope) as a used example is better than none at all.

$64.95? What are you complaining about? I'll see you & raise you $1000 for a limited edition Blue-Print

This from Australia Post late in 2013





Did I say "Only 100 available", oops sorry, in the May-June 2014 Bulletin it's "Limited Edition of 150" How did that nasty typo get in there....

That's scary. The USPS already admitted that they were copying the Australia Post idea in creating this special souvenir sheet and only making it available to those who buy the Stamp Yearbook.

Also interesting is that the Scott Catalog editors "have not yet decided" how they will treat the Souvenir Sheet in the US Stamp Yearbook (i.e. only listing it in a footnote or will it have a legitimate catalog number). Remember, the USPS is making available first day cancelled examples of this special souvenir sheet without a Yearbook purchase; it's just that the mint examples of the souvenir sheet are only available to those purchasing a Yearbook.

I guess my final question is how are those 2013 Australia Colonial Heritage Intaglio Collections doing on the secondary market? If they are limited to only 150 examples, and they cost $1000 at the time of purchase, they must be quite pricey to acquire by now.

Australia Post have been selling these 'special' releases for quite some time now. If you were to stay on top of these, you'd fork out a few thousand dollars on top of your ordinary stamp purchases. I used to collect Australian stamps, but gave up simply because of these money-grabbing releases. Given the number of them I doubt they command a premium.

I think it was New Zealand Post who started the whole thing about owning something special with their limited release folders. These contained individual color prints of one stamp, a hand-signed FDC and a special souvenir sheet or imperforate or overprint one that was only available in these folders. I think the first one was sold in the mid 90ies. They were pricey at NZ$200, and there were only 2000 available. The bonus was, that if you subscribed to them you ended up with the same certificate number for each issue (for what it's worth). I have no idea how they are doing on the secondary market now, but NZ stamps are not as popular here as US ones, of course.
What I like about NZ Post though is that you end up being rewarded for your stamp purchases at the end of the year. For every dollar spent you get one point and 150 of these nets you a souvenir sheet which is not available for purchase for free. One year I received a full set of imperforate sheets of one issue. Not bad, and I wish USPS would do the same...

Of course, with the number of stamp collectors (presumably) declining year on year, postal authorities have to come up with new ideas how to promote their stamps and owning something 'rare' appeals to many...
The last one to jump on the bandwagon was Guernsey as they issued an imperforate press sheet for Alderney recently - at a print run of only 250 (or 2000 souvenir sheets), an interesting subject beyond the Channel Islands (Ian Fleming) and given a modest mark-up of GBP2 per press sheet I'm surprised it hasn't sold out yet: http://www.guernseystamps.com/index...press-sheet/

The advertisement on the USPS page says that the yearbook will include a total of 94 stamps. That probably means that the postage value alone will be in excess of $50.00. So the yearbook actually will cost about $15.00 Not a bad purchase price for a fully color multipage book

Glenn Estus#8232; President, Vermont Philatelic Society

http://www.vermontps.org

editor, The Vermont Philatelist

First Day Columnist, Stamp Insider http://www.stampinsider.org

http://empirestatepostalhistory.blogspot.com/

http://nypostalhistory.blogspot.com/

http://vermontpostalhistory.blogspot.com

So, if the US Stamp Yearbook is available for sale in local post offices around the country, I would think that Scott would have to list it.

Besides, they've already broken their own rule with the Bill Picket sheet and Looney Tunes imperfs.

Scott is riddled with listing inconsistencies and I doubt the possibility of another one will stop them. Take the 1 cent Franklin issue of 1851 for example. If a stamp came out today with printing varieties as small as the ones on that stamp, there's no way Scott would give them all major catalog numbers. They'd all be listed as minor-letter varieties. There are many other examples. At the end of the day, they do the best they can and make the call as best they can.

Is the Circus sheetlet with FDC available to purchase? I couldn't find it on the USPS store site. If someone finds it, please post a link here.

Not available for purchase yet but it supposed to be based on previous announcements (though that could always change). Not even the final design of the souvenir sheet in question has been posted by the USPS yet.

Linn's Stamp News has just posted the "preliminary design" of the special "Circus Posters" souvenir sheet to be included in "mint" condition only to those who purchase a 2014 Stamp Yearbook:

http://linns.com/news/us-stamps/862...uvenir-sheet

Those who do not desire to purchase the yearbook will be offered the availability of a cancelled first day cover of the souvenir sheet.

Wt1, is the above address correct? I keep getting an error message,

Peter

Hmmm...let's try again:

http://linns.com/news/us-stamps/862...uvenir-sheet

Very funny! Now the earlier link works, as well as the second one you posted! I tried it at least ten times and it came up with an error message every time. Oh well, maybe my daughter is correct after all. She is a middle school teacher and media specialist. She teaches kids how to use computers ( really? ) and tells me that computers are evil!

Peter

Actually, I came up with the "error", too, so I re-posted both links. It seems as though Linn's updated their article slightly, so it may be that the link didn't work while they revised the content of the article (just a guess).