How Do We Get The Younger Generation Involved?

Share.

Share you enthusiasm.
Share your knowledge.
Share your time.
Share your story.
Share your work.
Share your learning.
Share your best moments.
Share some encouragement.
Share your stamps.


Sounds simple, and it is simple. The only hard part is not having it work with a younger person and wanting to give up. But character consists of what you do after the second or third try; always try one more time. (This is my cancer survival lesson.)
Don

That works in NYC, we get 14-16 kids every month with several who have been members for years. We have had kids who traveled 2 hours each way and were members from age 11-18.

Stamp Collecting Scavenger Hunts!
Philatelic Escape Rooms!

We had 15 yesterday at the Kids Stamp Club in NYC.

I've gotten my 9 year old nephew excited about stamps. I found a list a few years ago that had a list of stamps with microprinting on it and a list with hidden things in it that you have to use one of the USPS decoders with. He loved that there were "secret messages" and "secret images" he had to find. Also, when I send him birthday/Christmas/ect cards I use a stamp I know he'll get excited about (the magic souvenir disappearing rabbit or dinosaurs). I gave him one of the MANY Mystic catalogs I have and he's really enjoyed it thus far.

I agree with Don - share, share, share!

Is that list on stampsmarter Don? I"m sure it probably is!

You guys crack me up with all your old fashion ideas .....silly for you to think that kids are going to want to do what you did when you were younger .

Come up with total different approachs ,that haven't been done before . THINK OUTSIDE OF THE BOX .


If you ask me ,but you didn't -----Look at what you got to work with . That is where I would start .


Kids wants friends ,kids want to talk to other kids and hang around with them ,they all commuicate with cell phones ,they don't want to be seem with fat old white men , they want somewhere to go ,they understand going to fast food resturants ,Parents are willing to take their kid to a fast food resturant for one or two hours and drop them off. All kids today want to do what other kids are doing in other cities.

Now your starting to see what they want ----Hang out and follow the crowd not sit with some old fart who is trying to sell them stuff that has no meaning to their lifestyle .

@floortrader while I agree with some points you mentioned, dont think its completely true..My 7 yr old thoroughly enjoyed her first stamp club meeting.She was picking 3 cent world stamps out of a big bucket and also bidding on the auction on my behalf-There was not one kid there and she wants to go back.. at home she enjoys putting the stamps in album and locating them in globe.. I think the fact that she is doing this activity with her dad makes her happy..

she enjoyed Dad time. Don't conflate the activity with the relationship. My kids compete to go with to Stop'N'Shop so they can pick snacks and push the cart, but really just to get alone time.

Floortrader is spot on. For teenagers, if love stamps became signs of lust used in High School to elicit "relationships", philately would be reborn (redefined?) :)

For a hobby which is centered around history you would think that people would have at least a small grasp on it. Negative Nancys have been predicting the end of stamp collecting for over 100 years. Back in the early 1950s when television came on to the scene, folks said it would 'ruin kids'. Parents were told that it would lower kids' IQ, turn their brains into mush.

This sentiment is related in this 1954 Saturday Evening Post with the 'stamp collecting' front cover.

Now, some 50 years later, we still have curmudgeons spreading their negativity but this time it centers around how 'video games' and 'computers' are corrupting the kids and making them unreachable. How many times does history have to be repeated before the pessimism fades?

This is less about the 'kids' and more about 'cranky old men'.
Don

Well said Don!

Miss the point DON .....There was this crazy guy in Boston around 1950's who came up with the silly idea of selling stamps in Boy's Life Magazine ,in comic books and matchbook covers . What a crazy place to sell . Then he went to five and dime stores like Woolworths and sold HONOR-BILT packets for 10 cents to kids like me ......and guess what ........My collection foundation is built on this guys offers to young kids ......yes a collection worth hundreds of thousands of dollars is all started with the idea of selling cheap stamps to kids ....by the way his name is H.E.Harris .........

I am not missing the point, I am making a point.

My opinion is that the issue here is not that 'times have changed', the issue is that old men have not changed. 'Times' always change, every generation has had new fangled things to distract them. The only constant is thinking and sounding like your grandfather.
Don

Miss the point ----There was a guy in San Fransico who wanted to sell his PEZ container collection so he used a computer to make a marketplace . Today his company is not the gorilla in the room ,in the stamp collecting world it is the biggest and MONSTER to the stamp world .EBAY made more money for stamp sellers than all other transactions in the last 100 years total


Over the last 25 years ,I been working at over 150 fast food resturants for hours each day ......store managers are dying to get people into their dining rooms both in the afternoon and evening hours ----the places are empty .
They would be happy to give away that 10 cent packet of stamps that I mention above if you came inside . Every kid in America knows where the fast food resturants are around his house before they can write their name .
YOUNG KIDS---FREE PLACE TO GO-----KIDS THEIR AGE ---FREE STAMPS ---HAPPY PARENTS TO GET RID OF THEM-----ON LINE CONTACT TO OTHER KIDS with same interest,each resturant would have a "display your stamp stuff" website " . Can you understand kids in Boston showing other kids in Chicago their stamp page or doing a show and tell on their I-PHONES to each other . THINK BIG and THINK OUTSIDE THE BOX .

"Professional fisticuffs". Haha! Why is that not used anymore?

I'm not a youth per se, but in my 20's. I think both sides made good points. I came from a family of collectors (hot wheels, coins, etc.) and would participate briefly when I was younger. I do agree with the sentiment that kids aren't interested in what their parents/grandparents are doing. I was never into collecting like my elders, and was sometimes bothered by the tediousness of it all. However, it grew on me as I got older, and I believe being exposed to it by people important to me when young as a large reason why. So while the impact isn't immediate, I do believe it's still there, but grows later on. I would also add that a good history education adds to the meaning of the hobby. To know more about the time period of older stamps adds greatly to their sentimental value.

...And if all else fails, it doesn't hurt to show them some of the most expensive stamps in the world, to get their heads perked up! It was a good starting point for myself.

What if there was a video game that involved traveling around and finding rare stamps? Show lots of pictures of really cool stamps, and the game could be all over the world. Get them interested in the collecting game, and then transition that into collecting real stuff. The game could even start out by getting stamps from the mail from home and neighbors.