22kt Gold Replicas Stamps

I recently icked up a large collection of these at an estate auction only because no one else was bidding on them. Nice collection but they take up to much room in my closet. The things we collct!

Are they actually gold? Or painted?

I'm sure that they are plated they are on covers (franklin Mint)

Some related information is contained in this previous thread:

https://goscf.com/t/8712

Plated over thick paper... no gold value...
you would likely have to burn about 250,000
of them to (maybe) get 1/2oz or more of gold
out of them...

They're lovely accentuators for album pages, though...

a friend of mine collects these - you can email me if you are selling /CA

Here's just the order blank from a 1981 four-page spread in a newspaper featuring an offer for these 22kt gold replica stamps:



At a cost of $5.50, plus 50c shipping PER REPLICA, with three (3) shipped 8-10 times per year, it came up to something on the order of up to $180 per year to subscribe to the program.

(Incidentally, $180 in 1981 is equivalent to more than $480 in 2014 dollars, when adjusted for inflation.)

In any event, it proved to be an expensive proposition, especially for those on a fixed income who thought they were "investing" in something worthwhile only to find out later that they were worth only a fraction of the purchase price on the secondary market.

And... un-countless thousands of people bought these
as stated "gold replicas"... not gold flake plating
on paper, which is what they are... yet, I know of no
class-action suit against PCS for false advertising...

http://www.ripoffreport.com/r/Posta...ree-2-318646

These "atamps" are aluminum foil with a layer of gold that is about 1 to 2 atoms thick on top. The cost to extract the gold from these stamps would be far more than the value of the gold, even if you had thousands of them.

On the other hand, they are pretty and would go nicely in a collection of weird stamps that were made to fleece unknowledgeable collectors and "investors".

I have a couple hundred of these as well in my collection and wouldn't mind getting rid of them

Kimo... they are *not* aluminum foil...
they are gold foil on paper...

Thanks disi. There have been several series of these put out by different companies. I am sure you are correct about this particular series being on paper. Some of the others are on aluminum foil.

As I mentioned in another thread, a few years ago my local stamp dealer offered me a HUGE commemorative binder full of these at $0.35 per... I passed.

The American Dream came out with 24k gold plated sterling silver stamp replicas starting in 1992. It stated that the U.S. Postal Service had licensed the engraving, minting, and issuing of the 25 stamp collection.The ingots are 2.21mm thick in same sizes as the actual stamps. They sold for $79.00 per ingot per month, and you could get 1 per month for 25 months with a subscription. They took Master Card and Visa. They stated 50,000 sets were made in total and the die set is defaced. I included a few photos, I guess this may have been an great sham! It has the U.S.Postal service letter/stationary from Gordon C. Morrison, Asst Postmaster General, has President Ford with Photos in the literature, and the U.S.Marine Corps mentioned. This went on for over 3 years and sold out. Pretty slick.

One of those sets has been sitting in a local consignment/antique store for several years with a $450 price on it.

Interesting. 14oz. of silver is around $230.00 today. The set has the USPS logo on the back. No liquid market I guess.