"Penny Approval" Services: Are There Any Left?

Back in the mid-1990s, I went on a stamp acquisition binge and by far my favorite source turned out to be the "Penny Approval" service offered by the Empire Stamp Company. They would send four books, with one price on the cover for any of the stamps contained within--usually 3, 4, 5, and 8 cents each. They would also include a request card with each shipment of books with a few questions about what you collected--as a result, I spent many enjoyable hours and filled LOTS of empty spaces using this service.

Does anyone offer a similar service today? Google turned up but a scant few results that may be out-of-date.

It would appear that the circuit books offered via APS might be the closest extant alternative to penny approvals, but it seems a bit overkill to me to join the APS just to use that one service.

Your thoughts, please...

APS membership gets you plenty of classified ads for what you are looking for in the monthly journal


Peter

I too remember that company. They advertised in Linns for years. I sent them approval requests many times, they absolutely refused to respond. I complained to Linn's and they told them they never heard of me.

Just think of the labor,time,losses and postage costs involved for penny approvals.

APS stamp store is quite useful, maybe not for "penny " stamps, but for reasonable prices and good service.

Thanks, everyone, especially for the APS Stamp Store suggestion. Did some looking and there is ample better-grade material listed at realistic prices that I'll eventually need to buy.

Eh, maybe I'll just buy single-country packets, or old albums off of ebay, for the common stuff.

Just be aware, the APS store does not vet the stamps they receive for sale.

I've returned more than I've kept for being "not as described". Buy with care and if buying something valuable, have APS certify it before it ships. If the cert returns negative, they notify you for a ship no-ship decision. If you want, they'll refund your money, including the cert fees you paid up front. They then back-charge the seller for the cert and make them either remove the listing or correct it.

I agree that the APS store does not vet the stamps they receive for sale. However, they have the option to ask a question which I use whenever something looks wrong to me. They normally respond within about 24 hours by email and correct the listing.

As a regular customer of the APS store, I am quite pleased with my purchases, but as uboatnut points out, the buyer must always be alert. Their scans are not the best quality. Overall, I am a happy camper with them. I, too, lurk in ebay for common stuff bargains since my trust level there is much lower.

Ken

Did I miss something here ,the OP was asking about 3 cent to 8 cent stamps.....penny stamps ! But the discussion went to the APS sales books ,does the APS sell penny stamps in their books ,if not why go there ?


If you want penny stamps go to the collections section of ebay . You will find penny stamps with many offers from many sellers . Sure there are few bad ones but a lot of good deals, we are talking about good sellers offering stuff from $1.00 to $10.00 all of which are penny stamps . There are some good deals out there for penny stamps ,read the reviews to find out who is good and who is bad .

I agree with Floortrader. Do a search in worldwide collections and lots for off paper mixes and you will find several hundred results. There is a seller named vilgal that sells 6oz of off paper mixes for $12.95. This comes out to less than a penny apiece. There are a bunch of others there too--most have representative pictures so you can see the type of stamp you are getting.

Jackie

I know Mystic Stamp Company does approvals where they send packets to your house and try to send stamps that fit your taste. Unfortunately, I have never taken part of that myself, so I have no idea what the price range is. Maybe worth a call?

Approvals are sooooo yesterday's news what with the interweb and all.

I have tried mystic approvals, but stopped now as it was getting expensive.

I have another approval service with Kenmore stamp, they are similar to mystic but slightly more reasonable price in my opinion.

Outside of that I have bought quite a lot with ebay and hipp stamp.

I am now tempted to try the 6oz ww mixture mentioned above, but afraid of getting overwhelmed.

The Stamporama forum has an approvals like feature with most approvals starting at 5 cents or more. Stamps are visually shown so you select what you want. They may not be identified by a catalog number. There is no middleman.

Thanks for the replies, everyone.

The whole point of this post was to find a source of books/sheets/old album pages of common stamps sold as singles on approval for less than CV.

The gotcha with ebay is that it's not a good source for those one or two stamps needed to complete a set or fill an album page that, together, are worth less than a dollar. Usually, one ends up finding the needed stamp on offer only as part of a complete set.

@Swscfdc87: I did buy stamps on approval from Mystic back in the day. For WW they weren't responsive to my requests for specific countries and time periods. However, the US classics they would send were usually in Fine or better condition. Nowadays, I am sure all of us on this forum would first peruse ebay for less-than-common stamps.

@rogdcam: I agree, for most stamp acquisition needs the WWW has rendered traditional approval services obsolete. However, if a service that meets my very specific needs still exists, I would use it.

@angore: MANY THANKS! I stumbled on the Stamporama approvals site some time ago and couldn't for the life of me remember the URL. That looks like exactly what I need.

@stampboylife: I once did business with Kenmore but ended that relationship after getting enrolled in their New World Issues service without asking for them to do so, and then being billed for it despite never receiving the stamps. I also bought a packet of Cuban stamps from them that was perhaps 80% faulty stamps. CAVEAT EMPTOR.