Color!

I love US stamps and almost all my stamp purchases are US, particularly Christmas and souvenir sheets.

But I have noticed, and I am sure this is nothing new to anyone else, that many foreign stamps are so much more colorful and vibrant than US stamps. For example, Granada Christmas stamps.

Is there some logical reason why some countries put so much more pizzazz in their stamps?

For many years the U.S. emphasized quality intaglio engraving (flat plate and rotary press) on their stamps for security reasons over using different colors since many engraved stamps could only be printed in one color by one printing plate. Flat plate engraving could also be produced in two colors by using two different plates with the vignette or key plate in a different color than the border or duty plate. However, this could result in misalignments and/or inversions between the two different colored parts on a stamp. This change mostly started in 1957 with the Giori press being able to print engraved stamps in different colors. (An earlier U.S. red cross stamp had a red cross stamped on a mostly blue colored stamp.) Most presses that do print in different colors use more modern printing methods.

Eye appeal, of course!

Grenada is one of many island nations that issue stamps exclusively for collectors - like their selection of Disney stamps. Kids, especially, are fond of big colorful stamps (I'm just a big kid, BTW) and many countries are happy to meet the demand!

Brian

Another way of answering that question. Grenada, in my opinion, is one of the countries that rely on income from their philatelic sales. They make their stamps (stickers?) colorful to appeal to as many people as possible.

Peter

This answers are very helpful.

What would be some other countries that fit into hat same category of producing "sticker" stamps?

There are more than I can count! Most of the time, these nations are grouped into geographies like "Dunes" (middle eastern nations), "Island nations" (in particular, Caribbean and South Pacific island nations), and former "Eastern block" nations (Soviet Union, Poland, Romania, etc). These barely scratch the surface!

I'll add one more thing - a philatelic term known as Cancelled To Order (CTO). This term is used to describe stamps from nations who postmarked stamps to be sold to collectors as used stamps. Most of the time, these stamps have small postmarks that barely touch the corner of a stamp and original gum on the back. Values on these stamps is usually minimal.

Cheers!

Brian

Neal, some of the countries that I feel fit the profile you've asked about are (and this list is by no means meant to be complete):

Any country with the word "Grenadines" in it's name
Any country with the word "Cayes" in it's name
Antigua
Barbuda
Grenada
St Vincent
Turks & Caicos
Nevis
St. Kitts
Guyana
Ghana
Gambia
Sierra Leone
Tanzania
Burkina Faso
Tuvalu
Kiribati
Wallis and Futuna
St Thomas and Prince
Mongolia
Bhutan
Liberia
Maldives
Montserrat
Burundi
Central African Republic
Both Congo's
Djibouti
Dominica
Mali
Uganda
Micronesia
Benin
Chad
Guinea
Guinea Bissau
Madagasgar/Malagasy
Senegal