Will Stamp Collecting Survive?

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And by the way, to the topic at hand, there are any number of collectors in their thirties and forties who have not waited until retirement to revisit (or visit) stamp collecting, and as near as I can tell, more come to the hobby all the time.

Our club has done Boy Scout merit badge presentations, science and learning expos, and meetings at libraries for interested kids. Some things are more successful than others, but actively introducing a kid to stamps is the best approach.

We also have tens of thousands of stamps they can pick through with few limitations, so they get to leave with stamps.

Cjd, that's great news, maybe there is hope yet.

I've mentioned this before, but one of the Boy Scouts had written up a very nice collection of modern Ukraine, used, on piece. That's all the way to philately.

This seems to be a related topic of discussion. While commuting to work this morning I had a brain storm (OK I woke up). What is the prime focus of stamp collecting. I see it as two major topics. Geography and History. This got me thinking. What if one could get into a school to give a short presentation on either topic (depending on what class you can get into) on stamp collecting and its relation to the subject, and what one can learn from this tie in. I do not know where they stopped teaching these subjects in schools (or if they have stopped them) but it seems that most teachers I know would relish some time off during their day. What say you? Does this sound like a good thing to do (assuming one can)? It could add a few collectors at an early age to the ranks, or you could get knifed in the hallway on the way out (!). Comments?

An educational talk in schools about stamps focused around history and geography might be a good idea. If kids realize they can actually own a piece of the things they are learning about, it may make some light bulbs go off. For example, imagine if the topic was the history of Germany. You could bring in a small "exhibit" of German states, colonies, inflation issues, Danzig, Saar, Plebiscite issues, Third Reich etc, showing the unification and then subsequent dismemberment of Germany following both world wars. One could bring in and talk about various colonial issues if the topic is "The Scramble for Africa". The possibilities are endless.

I am not so sure this is about the subject matter. There is a lot of lip service given to "today's youth", their attitudes and their interests. The point is often made that philately is competing with electronic gadgets, games, and time.

As I touch upon in my first post, I believe this is more about the technology. Telling a young person to go to the library and use a hard copy catalog is not going to work. Philately desperately needs to figure out how to use technology to reach new, younger potential hobbyists. This means the development of apps and other digital online assets. Rightfully or not, today's youth want instant, real-time access to information. Telling them they must go to a library or join an organization to be able to get that information is simply not going to get young people interested.

I know that this is not a popular perspective. Many of us believe that hard, diligent work is what is required to become an 'expert' and proficient with our beloved hobby. This is what we all had to do to get where we are and feel that other should follow the same path. My only comment to this is, 'how is it working for us now?'

We need the major organizations to support the development of philatelic information technology. The old model of charging for access to philatelic information, either via subscription or membership fees, will never work with today's youth. Waiting until Amos or some other commercial entity finally gets around to developing a 'killer app' only means a deeper hole for us to dig out of, frankly a organization like APS should have seen this handwriting on the wall 15 years ago.

There will always be room for advanced, copyrighted works. I am not advocating that every book or article be published free of charge. But our most basic information, that of identifying a stamp and basics of collecting, should be available in real-time and free of cost. Ideally you should be able to take a picture of a stamp on your mobile device and have the ID back in a few seconds.

So why has not an organization like APS not developed this kind of killer app and offered it for free? Without question this would be an incredible difficult thing to 'sell' to the existing membership. We are talking about investing $50-$60k into something that we would offered free of charge. How many members would be willing to buy into something a long-term vision like this? Not many. In my opinion THIS is the problem. It's risky, it's scary, and it will take alot courage to invest in this approach.
Don

Litho

I thought CAPEX 96 was great. There were aisles and aisles of exhibits. However, the sad point was that there were hardly any viewers. Most of the people there were at the dealers for most of the time.

The material on display was fantastic. Much of the material I could only dream of having but well worth examining them. I never did see all the exhibits because there were so many and I had so little time to see them.

Chimo

Bujutsu

Through my own experience I have noticed that . . .

. . collectors also like other topics, themes and motives,

. . collectors who collect cars sometimes colect car stamps,

. . collectors who like horses on plates, cups, crystal, rugs, embrioder, etc, also like horses on stamps, and . . .

. . collectors who like geography and history in books and artifacts also like geography and history on stamps.

Collectors collect. Period.

Popularity Rating of ATA Topics http://www.americantopicalassn.org/
2011-13 membership Directory
1 - Railroads / Trains
2 - Ships / Watercraft
3 - Space
4 - Birds
5 - Medical
6 - Christmas
7 - Music
8 - Aviation
9 - Maps / Glaobes
10- Butterflies
11- Cats
12- Scouting

ebay, March 2015 http://www.ebay.com/
Topical Stamps Total - 662,248 Worldwide
Animal Kingdom (127,253)
Animation, Cartoons (12,328)
Architecture (13,808)
Art (45,956)
Cultures & Ethnicities (4,328)
Famous People (45,545)
Flags & National Emblems (2,202)
Holidays (8,983)
Military & War (7,740)
Music (7,748)
Nature & Plants (41,573)
Organizations (13,600)
Royalty (10,108)
Science & Technology (5,594)
Space (45,799)
Sports (75,459)
Transportation (66,768)
Collections, Lots (2,970)
Other (74,625)

Delcampe dot net (Worldwide like ebay) http://www.delcampe.net
Stamps / Topics
See all items from these subcategories 3,436,610 New auctions.
Their list of topics, etc. is very large and setailed.

There are many web sites / dealers who have thousands and millions of stamps on their sites under the topical or thematic or motice idea.

It's big business. It;s fun.

Just look at our own over 31,000 Stamp Community topical postings, with probaly much more than 500,000 readings from forum readers worldwide. https://www.stampcommunity.org/

edit: added links

There is a High School next to the library I go to and computers also.

There are Scott catalogues, up-to-date, in the reference section and older ones always taken out, and I mean always, in the regular shelves of books.

People are using old paper harrdcore stamp catalogues over and over.

I sell Stamp Collecting.

I think Don is exactly right. The value of information today is not, as it was in the past, based on how few people "own" it, but on how how fast how many people can access it. This applies no less to the subject matter of philately than it does to anything else.

I might add that today's adults (particularly this one) want instant, real-time access to information as well. For me, part of the allure of collecting is that it's time spent away from a computer screen/smartphone, etc. That being said, I agree 100% that our hobby needs better digital tools and I'd be among the first to sign up for something like an online catalog database.

I think better digital tools would go a long way toward attracting new collectors and keeping them interested through the early stages of collecting. I know the topic of digital tools has been discussed at length here, but there's so much that could be done (but probably won't). Just think if Scott sold their album line as printable PDFs. Now imagine if you could look up a particular stamp or set in their online catalog/databse and then print just the (preferably illustrated) page you need for that stamp or set. New collectors could easily start and continue a collection without really facing the album dilemma we all deal with at some point, which can be a serious discouragement to new collectors. That's just one example. Imagine a smartphone app that immediately ID's your stamps for you. Problem is, these things can take a major investment and the market for such things is probably not large enough to warrant the expense of developing them.

To some extent, I can understand the reluctance on the part of catalog publishers to supply a current online catalog. The loss in sales would be staggering. But couldn't the publisher license access to such an online catalog? I purchase a new US Scott specialized about once every 5 or 6 years. While Amos won't seduce me into buying a catalog more frequently than this, they could entice me into a small monthly subscription fee. At least, unless the fee made it cheaper to buy a catalogue every year or two, I think they could. Would licensing fees be enough to counteract the loss in sales? Would the current crop of young collectors be willing to license such a product or would they expect it, like much of the info on the world wide web, to be provided free of charge? Couldn't the publisher recoup some of their potential losses by having to produce fewer paper catalogues? Questions to which I have no ready answer ...

It's a dilemma for the catalog publishers, to be sure. If digital sales cannibalized too much of the print sales, my guess is that declining print numbers would cause their per-volume publishing costs to increase. If they have to raise prices too high on the print version, they'd risk losing their biggest customers - libraries. On the other hand, they could probably get as much as $20 or $30 a month out of someone like me, who currently only buys 1-2 year old used print catalogs.

On a related note, I think it was in this week's Linn's where Chad Snee was basically saying that this is the last year for the catalogs in their current, 6-volume format. Next year's set will likely change to 7 or more volumes, perhaps in a non-alphabetical arrangement, such as by geographic region and/or era. Personally, I think they should go the geographic route as having all the stamps of, say, Western Europe all in one volume would be very handy. I may even spring for a brand new volume or two if they do something like that. It'll be interesting to see what they do.

I have wondered this very question. I recently, 2 years or so ago, started collecting US stamps at the age of 32. There is a very nice local stamp library here in Denver colorado, th Rocky Mountain Philatelic Library, that has been very helpful. I can go there and get cheap stamps to fill the many holes I have in my young collection. Going in there the first few times I got the "Are you lost?" Looks from everyone there. IF I were to guess, every time I go there I would say I am about half the age of everyone there. It makes me wonder how many people my age are taking up the hobby.
I enjoy the collecting side more than anything. It appeals to my ADD and OCD personality where I love figuring out what stamp is what in a random bulk lot, and filling my collection with nicer and nicer stamps. As long as a stamp fills a hole, faults be damned! With that said most of the front of my collection is lacking, mostly because We bought our first house 3 years ago and just had our first child, so not exactly rolling in money. I buy off ebay when I can but wonder what a lot of other people on this topic have wondered. How low will the market start to get if it gets more and more flooded? I saw a bulk lot that someone was selling that had easily $50,000 in stamps go for $7,500. While I would kill for a chance to bid on a lot like that, just isn't in the cards right now, but maybe in the future.
It would be nice if I could go to clubs and talk and trade stamps, but the clubs I tried left a lot to be desired for what I'm looking for. Most meetings I went to, we hardly talked about stamps. The conversation was filled with who had what surgery and who recently died. I just didn't have anything in common with the people in the group, and I'm not exactly finding a lot of "30 something stamp club that will get your cultural humor references."
I know our local library does thing with kids and clubs to try and get more people involved, but from my point of view, I feel the hobby will just decline in popularity till it levels off. But by the td my generation starts retiring, who knows what might happen. I just can't see a lot of people continuing to collect them. I feel more and more it's going to be more lots of stamps that have been inherited like the example I put above, and people having no clue what to do with them so they just throw it up on ebay with a bunch of pictures and just selling them off for pennies in the dollar. I just hope I'm lucky enough to be online and have the money to snatch it up! Anyways, I'm rambeling.

Yes, a company like Amos stands to lose the tradition catalog source of income. Just as Time Warner and hundreds of newspaper publishers have lost theirs. Amos and other philatelic publisher are simply going to have to move into the digital age or they will slowly die. They will have to figure out new ways to generate income.

For example; develop the basic catalog and offer it online for free. They can offset a small amount of the cost with banner ads some advertising but this wouldn't represent a huge profit center. As a new source of income they could offer "add-ons' to the basic free catalog. This might include higher resolution images, advanced search capabilities, and perhaps access to real-time value information (as opposed to the current bogus fantasy values that are published).

Frankly this kind of app is not far off and will probably end up being done by an individual. When this happens a company like Amos will end up without market share. I realize that Amos is headed in this direction now but the worse thing they can do is roll out a half-baked, for profit product. A full blown commitment is needed for this to be successful.
Don