Where To Start

I need a little help, I usually sort my WW stamps by country and then store in envelopes, when these get too full I put in plastic shoe boxes. Here's my issue when I get low on stamps I buy more and start the process over until I get caught up and start over. So I never start putting into my albums only keep sorting. SO............ How do you guys do it. Should I stop and work on one country? Wait until I retire 11 years. What do guys suggest?

Although my situation is not entirely similar to yours, I found it helpful to focus on a single country (or two or three...). I choose those countries and postage for which I had the most interest and coincidentally the best coverage. Specializing is a great way to get deeper into the hobby rather [than] wider. I also made the decision to collect only up until a certain date. While it differs from country to country, roughly it is until about 1975 or so [with focus on classic era, say up to 1940-45].

I also developed an informal secondary criteria which is much wider than 1 or 2 countries [to satisfy my need to accumulate]. Let say for arguments [sake] it is North America and Central Europe. So my areas of preference would be:

1st: US, Hungary, Switzerland
2nd: NA and Central Europe
3rd: Everything

Within each country though you may find eventually that you have to make decisions on whether you specialize or not or what areas to collect. Will you collect revenues, official stamps, duck stamps, etc. The natural progression as you gain more experience and delve deeper is to also start collecting postal stationary, covers, postal history.

At the same time you are focusing you could continue to accumulate WW if you have the time.

LOL! I keep saying the same thing - I'll get to them when I retire!

Interesting! It sounds like you buy what I call wild harvest stamp lots and then sort them to a certain point and then continue with buying more lots of very mixed wild harvest type buys.

The next step in sorting is starting to get your interested. Very healthy stamping direction.

There is just so many different steps in sorting wild harvest lots. So many different ways of collecting the same set. So many different way of storing each sorting step.

All the very best! Always Happy Stamping!

Why don't you just get going today? Pull out "Abu Dhabi" or "Aden" or whatever, and start mounting them in albums - otherwise I don't see great deal of point in having them.

I'm kind of in the same boat because I'm always buying mixtures, soaking kiloware, etc. I just make it a point to sort every lot I buy within 24 hours of receiving so they don't pile up. I put them in 6.25" x 3.5" glassine envelopes, labeled by country. They may sit there for days, weeks or months before I get around to them, with more stamps coming in regularly.

As far as mounting, I just look through my "backlog" and pick a country to work on that night. I usually follow a "squeaky wheel gets the grease" policy - the fattest envelopes are usually the ones I pick. In a 2 hour evening session I can go through up to a couple hundred or more stamps, either mounting them or adding it to the duplicate pile. This of course depends on how familiar I am with that country's stamps and how easy it is to find them in Scott, whether there's perfing and watermarking involved, etc. Sometimes it can be slow going, but I always feel like I accomplished something by the end of the night.

I have album pages for about 3 dozen or so countries, most of which contain only stamps acquired by various mixtures and lots. I do have my favorites that I work on regularly, whereas other might only get worked on every couple months or even just once or twice a year. It's really pretty amazing how many different stamps and how complete (in certain areas or years, etc) of a collection one can build with just buying penny stamp lots and bulk lots by the pound.

Qaman it sounds like you really enjoy acquiring, accumulating, and sorting stamps. Until you are motivated to begin mounting stamps in some fashion, if your current activities provide you happiness and a sense of fulfillment, why change anything?

I have to agree Shermae it seems I like sorting by country, kids say I am an organized hoarder. I do have a couple of WW albums I have put stamps in and need to get back to putting in stamps and separate the doubles out. I never did US for a long time but about ten years I started going at it pretty hard - used only so this needs completed first. I do have a pretty good collection of used duck stamps just need a few of the newer ones.
Rileysan yeah hopefully we can make it long enough to retire. I will say I like to work on stamps because it is relaxing from a tough day, I'll see if I can get some pictures up on some of the areas.

I never really collected WW stamps, but over the years have accumulated quite a small collection of various WW stamps from bulk purchases and such. I went the soaking, separating by country, and storing in envelope route for a while. But, now instead of an envelopes I use stock pages. I have 1 or more stock pages for WW stamps and after soaking and drying the stamps go into the appropriate stock page. That way I can organize dups. and when I have some spare time I can research and sort by catalog number. I find storing in binders is easier to locate for trading, etc. and also takes up less space than shoe boxes and envelopes.

But, I completely agree with shermae, this hobby is not about "keeping up with the Jones'." We each pursue philately for our own personal goals and satisfaction.

Hoarding!Yeah! More more more!!

I have gone to keeping the countries with larger quantities in manila folders.
My US Album is getting better, but have only mounted through 1973. The early 1800's are mostly blank.
But then I decided to collect Germany, and Israel. Later I scored a SG British Album. But the plastic totes keep piling up.

I find it mildly entertaining.

Many of us likely have some hoarding threads within our personalities. Most collectors do. I know I buy a lot more stamps than I ever have time to "arrange," so there are stacks of plastic, dust-protected containers in my stamps bureau crammed with sets organized by country. Who knows, perhaps I will literally skip from hoarder to seller in my retirement.

If you have tons of WW duplicates you might considering contributing them to the APS Stamps Teach http://stamps.org/Stamps-Teach-Donate program. I sometime buy Kiloware at a good price and just have it shipped directly to the APS program.

I found it helpful to think about and write down my collecting goals. I kept running in to paralysis in buying new material because I didn't know what I had accumulated and I had the nagging suspicion that I might already have it. So, I defined success in my collection as 'having stamps mounted in the album'. This helps me curb my accumulation tendencies and helps me focus on processing and mounting material rather than shopping for more accumulated stuff. When I am tempted to shop, I shop in my closet! I find many things I have forgotten!

It helps to write it down. List your favorite countries / topics / areas in order. Post it in your workspace if necessary. If I know I have recently processed an area, I feel more comfortable buying new material for it as my albums are up to date.

Just bought more kilo ware what can I say. I did start putting an album together with Machins, went to the admin ware site for Machins. I also started a topical for WW cattle on stamps. Ajman and Dubai will be next.

Haven't started the countries yet but am still buying lots from specific sellers I found in Limbs many don't advertise anymore. I try not to buy the "cheaper" lots as I get a lot of doubles and low end. Good and bad news my daughter just bought a house so I am planning on using the large upstairs room to set up my stamp room looking forward to it. Still putting stamps by countries into plastic shoe boxes to sort someday.

I am finally putting Dubai on pages. I mainly hinge my stamps general worldwide. I did just buy a nice group of stamps off The Artful Hunger, nice stamps thanks. I won't work on anything until after the New Year when winter finally gets here in ohio. Also been buying 1000 at a time from a few regular sellers from Linns.