Scott's New Album For Used Cd Stamp Collectors

Has anyone seen the new Scott Album for collectors of used US Stamps:

https://www.amosadvantage.com/usedsingles

Looks like everything is a single. No connected se-tenants.

Kind of a neat idea.

They used the "National" brand too.

Kind of neat indeed.

Gee if only other album makers could have done that; oh wait - White Ace.

Maybe Scott/Amos is the Apple of the stamp collecting industry. Some else has an idea, it's poo-pooed. Apple does the same thing and suddenly its cool.

But if that's what it takes to get individual spaces for setenant issues who am I to complain?

White Ace obviously needed better marketing, because I had no idea they did that.

I'm being obtuse... how are album pages for used postage stamps different from album page for mint stamps?

Everything box is a single stamp. No connected se-tenants.

Hmmm.... interesting. I've seen used collections using regular pages and the individual stamps are just hinged in their appropriate positions in the spaces for pairs, blocks, etc. Also, isn't the purpose of these pages really more for those who collect "single stamps" rather than "used stamps"? I see se-tenant pairs and blocks that are definitely used, which conceivably are not accommodated by these pages. Someone who collects used stamps including se-tenant pairs and blocks would need to have regular pages anyway?

It just seems to me like an answer in search of a question.

*shrug*

What do you do if you get a used pair or used block of connected se-tenants?

If USPS issued stamps in a se-tenant strip of 5, for example, the ordinary non-collector consumer normally would separate a single stamp and use it on a mail piece. These album pages are directed at collectors who encounter many such single stamps, taken from se-tenant strips or blocks, with many days, months or years elapsing until they found or collected the other stamps. In that situation, when the album provides only a space for the complete strip or block, it is aesthetically unattractive to mount a single stamp in the space. These pages solve that problem by allowing neat mounting of a single while you search for the others in the block or strip.



With these pages, you break up that pair or block. If you want to mount them as a pair or block, these pages are not for you.

It seems strange to think that any stamp collector who has a used se-tenant would want to separate it into the individual stamps thereby decreasing its visual appeal as well as value.

You could use Whir Ace pages and mount both.

Oh wait...

The "used" part of this album comes from the fact that almost all se-tenant stamps (blocks, pairs, or strips) get used as single stamps. Stamp users (as opposed to stamp collectors), generally tear them apart to use them. So, an album for used stamps has to provide spaces for separate stamps, not connected stamps. Creating an album for used stamps apparently seemed most workable if every stamp had its own space instead of the usual spaces for connected pairs, blocks, and strips.

This album seems a bit odd to me, and I'm not sure what market Scott is going after by publishing it. I imagine this album is aimed more at beginners who would likely focus on used stamps. I can't see a huge market for it otherwise. Along with the new "North, South, and Central American trains" and baseball albums that they've just released, Scott seems bent on creating a group of topical and beginner albums aimed at "fun" collecting more than serious collecting. They must assume that many collectors would be happy to add at least one topical album to their current collecting, or how would this work? And maybe beginning collectors might be lured into the hobby by starting with an easier album for used stamps or an album for trains or baseball? How these new collectors would even know about these albums now that we no longer have stamp stores, I have no idea.

The idea of separate spaces isn't a bad one, but in some ways it's strange. For decades, Scott has laid out its pages for connected pairs, blocks, and strips -- sometimes even entire sheets of stamps. With this new album for used stamps, they go in the other direction. I've never been bothered by having boxes for pairs or blocks of four which seems logical to me. But I have to say when some of the strips of stamps are so large that the boxes have to be angled across the page, I don't like that. Sometimes a strip is so long, the stamp box has to break through the margin of the page. Some of these "keep-stamps-connected at all costs" page layouts get a bit strange. In the new album, Scott apparently drops all of that.

That makes me wonder how many collectors will buy and use these pages to replace the weird angled boxes for strips and entire sheets of stamps? Maybe in the page sets and supplements Scott sells, they should include two different pages for se-tenant stamps, one with large se-tenant boxes, the other for separated stamps? Let the collector choose the version they prefer to collect. Or they could collect both. Scott now sanctions separating (used) se-tenants as a collectible, so why not? Sounds good to me.

It might be fun to collect railroad stamps or baseball stamps, but I haven't been particularly tempted by Scott's albums because these specialties seem more likely to work on blank or quadrille album pages where I can choose which stamps to include. The whole "American" trains idea seems really odd to me. Why not trains around the world, in general? Is there something special about "American" trains? Is there something wrong with Asian or European trains that they should be left out? Scott certainly doesn't need to put every train stamp ever issued into their album. They could include blank pages for that. But what's so bad about train stamps from Japan or India or Europe? Wouldn't train stamp collectors also want them in their albums -- even if the pages only provided for selected train stamps from those countries? I would. I suppose Scott thought it would require many more pages, so maybe their reason was just to keep the cost down. Baseball on stamps is a pretty self-limiting subject, but there must be other baseball stamps not in the album (Japan has issued some, so has the Philippines, etc). Topical collecting confuses me because I really don't know how you even decide which stamps go in your album and from which country? I suppose it's just whatever you "like". Again, that's what makes me think blank pages are the best way to collect these topicals.

I'm also surprised by Scott's choice of subjects for these new albums: used stamps, trains, and baseball. Why those? Aren't the most popular topical subjects birds, fish, flowers, and others? Why not start with them?

Personally, I'd love to see Scott issue an album for Art (or maybe just paintings) on stamps, a subject I keep thinking about collecting. It's huge, but it could be limited to only paintings, leaving out other art, and it could omit many stamps from over-issued countries we're all familiar with. Maybe just include some representative art stamps from them? Or maybe an album for "American Art on stamps"? That might work if it included worldwide stamps picturing American art. But I'd still prefer having no national limits on a subject like art.

I will say these three new albums are interesting and refreshing efforts by Scott to do something different, thank goodness, but they're also strange in some ways. And so far they don't tempt me in any way given their choice of subject matter and extremely limited number of pages and stamp spaces. Now just wait . . . they'll sell thousands of them. So what do I know?

P.S. I'm pretty sure White Ace albums included a space for the se-tenant block AND spaces for the separate stamps, as well. But I could be wrong about that. I'm glad Scott doesn't do that since I'm not made out of money (as my wife keeps reminding me).

Yvert produces a Musée Imaginaire album for French art stamps

https://www.yvert.com/A-185012-2-al...61-2017.aspx

Probably more interesting to make your own and decorate the binder.

White Ace did do this and its what separated them from all others.

The proper solution would be to create pages of just the setenant issues separated. If people disdain collecting both setenant and separated, they need not purchase the "separated" pages. Those pages could be interwoven with the "normal" pages or one could keep those pages together at the end of each years supplement. I think Scott has gone overboard in giving a space to everything; they only needed to create pages of separated setenants.

Now coils are an entirely different matter. Since the stamps are no longer physically connected it seems like madness to collect strips of them in the same way as connected coils. Too bad there's no happy medium, where the coilstamps are still physically connected but have self adhesive backing. Gapped coils seem so artificial.

I have an H. E. Harris "Independence" U.S. Album that I bought for my grandson about 10 or 11 years ago. It has spaces for all US stamps, in both individual and block formats for all of the single and se-tenants up until 2006, printed on both sides.

It was an excellent beginner's album for him. Too bad it appears that Whitman no longer supports the format.

I hope it's okay to post a link - because I did find one that looks just like it in a google search here:

https://www.coinsupplyexpress.com/i...-harris.html

...but I imagine they are few and far between at this point.

Al

EDIT FOR P.S.: Correction, Whitman apparently does still carry it as a kit:

https://www.whitman.com/store/Inven...p-Kit+4HRS6B

But I only found it by a explicit search for "Independence" on their site. It didn't come up at all via their menus.



Al