Winds Of Change In The Philatelic World

But those that do are noticed by the hobby, and of course they are a part of it. The hobby need them, too, not just the "great unwashed".

In the auto industry things like the C3a and other expensive stamps are called "halo" products. Ford has the GT and Cadillac has the Celestiq etc. They attract people to the brand with their ooh and ahhh factor. They say that there is no such thing as bad publicity, but I am unconvinced that strong Siegel sales have any impact on the average collector's outlook on the hobby.

I suspect that the "average" collector occasionally buys a lot from Siegel too. Not the big lots, but there are plenty of smaller ones.

No, what is drying up are new collectors who interact with the hobby based on the Golden Age model of local stamp clubs, stamp shows and established stamp dealers. And the new collectors simply collect differently - they focus on themes more than nations (exception, collectors in newly industrializing countries with rapidly growing middle classes who are repatriating their colonial and pre-1990s postcolonial issues from the West) and are not so interested in technical varieties of stamps (perf, shade, watermark, plate flaws etc) from the classical era that have been the heart and soul of naion-based collecting that has dominated collecting in the West until recently.

But look at the number of new members who sign up on the various online stamp catalogues, or the numbers of views that content creators on social media are receiving, and it is clear that there is a steady if smaller steam of new collectors entering the hobby from all over the world, Similarlh, look at the constsnt flow of new members who join stamp fora, which are clearly replacing the old set-time and location stamp club as virtual 24 hour stamp clubs

The new collectors are there, they just collect differently than, say, the silent generation and Baby Boomer generation of collectors, with GenX collectors (like myself) in a sort of transition era in what and how we collect.

This is a great and refreshing take on the health of the hobby and a reminder to me at least not to take my nostalgia for how things used to be as a tool for assessing current states of affairs.

Between ebay/hipstamp/delcampe and other smaller online retail sites, the rapid growth of online stamp catalogues, programs like album easy, and online fora and social media, I would say the paradigm has already begun to shift quite dramaticaly, and in the end I think it will be net positive for the hobby as the hobby becomes more democratized and accessible, and to a degree "returns to its roots" and stops focusing so much on the whole "return on overall investment" mindset that many especially older generation collectors seem to have.

Considering that, what, 90% of all stamps have a value less than US$10 or so, perhaps it is a paradigm shift that needed to be made in the first place. The commercializing of the hobby over the past century and a half I think has reached a point where perhaps some of the fundamental lure of the hobby at its base essence has been lost on some segments of the organized hobby in the West.

There will still be a place for the upper end glitz and glamour that high end sales of rarer stamps have. Everyone likes a bit of Dynasty mixed in with their Roseanne . But in the end the meat and potatoes of the hobby has always at the lower end common stamps and the focus of hobby as investment, especially since the 1990s, I think has done much more harm than good for the hobby overall.

For example, the whole Stamp Grading nonsense has simply stagnated or even depressed the market for solid condition sub-90 classic USA material (for which I will not complain too loudly since it has made the prospect of my addig some classic USA to my collcection feasible when in the 1990s the some items seemed like I'd never be in the market to consider adding to my collection) and poor Stanley Gibbons has pretty much been driven to collapse thanks to its over focus on stamps as investment to keep its stock investors happy and losing site of its core market who want decent catalogues and high-quality supplies (which alas the supplies SG will no longer supply direct, having sold off its supplies license to a third party producer).

Note - some aspects of the hobby will need supplier - basics like tongs, stock books and pages for temporary or long term storage of collections, perf gauges, watermark fluid and UV light for those who get into variants. And there will remain a role for professional dealers who handle mid-value and high value material simply due to the fact that fakes forgeries and enhacemects of such material have become so common that such dealers will remain a vital link in the system to help collector sort the wheat from the chaff and avoid being swindled. But that covers, what, maybe 10% of all stamps ever issued.

The hobby is not dying, it is transitioning into a new era where the focus is going to be more on enjoyment of the hobby as a hobby rather that as a way to secure wealth for collectors for the future. Younger generations have said they focus more on the experience in their hobbies, and this is the mindset I think younger adult collectors entering the hobby are bringing

I spend money on the hobby because I enjoy it as a hobby that lets me escape the craziness of the world and explore the vast cultural diversity and historical evolution of the societies that produced the stamps. The value in enjoyment and mental stimulation I receive during my collecting years will more than make up for whatever financial gain or loss I may have when I do eventually liquidate my collections in a few decades (I am 52 and knock wood hope to have another three decades or so of collecting).

How many love emails are neatly tied up with ribbons and placed into a box? How many, "It's a girl" emails are held in that special place?

One growing area of human interest recently is genealogy. Postal history brings those prior names and times to life.

There are many reasons the pretty scraps of paper and the items to which they are attached are saved.

It will continue.

"Anyone who thinks the hobby is dying should go to Siegel and check out the prices of the Indian material of the Magnolia sale."

"And how many people do you think work at that level? Just because an inverted Jenny recently sold for $2 million, that doesn't make the overall hobby healthy, only a small number of people at the very top end."

The rich keep getting richer. Strength at the top end of the market says little about the hobby as a whole.

"I suspect that the "average" collector occasionally buys a lot from Siegel too. Not the big lots, but there are plenty of smaller ones."

You have an rather high opinion of the level of the average collector.

I agree with this. And I think that plenty of "average collectors" buy at some auction every year. There are plenty of lower level lots, and collection lots to be cherrypicked and turned over, etc.

"No, what is drying up are new collectors who interact with the hobby based on the Golden Age model of local stamp clubs, stamp shows and established stamp dealers."

Both can be true. Fewer new collectors and those new collectors interact with the hobby differently.

"The commercializing of the hobby over the past century and a half I think has reached a point where perhaps some of the fundamental lure of the hobby at its base essence has been lost on some segments of the organized hobby in the West."

There was a commercial aspect to the hobby long before you were born.

" focusing so much on the whole "return on overall investment" mindset that many especially older generation collectors seem to have"

I am not foolish enough to think my collection will make me money, but I am not rich enough to not be concerned with how much of a loss I will take.

"the whole Stamp Grading nonsense"

No one is forcing you to buy graded stamps. Don't like them? Ignore them.

"The same too would occur should the major philatelic institutions go by the wayside. With international platforms like ebay, millions of collectors will continue to find ways to buys and sell collectibles to one another. Sure, the lack of authoritative catalogs could reintroduce a "wild west" aspect to pricing and valuation, but hasn't that always been the case? Some enterprising individual(s) would step in and fill the void, recognizing that there is money to be made."

All you are saying is the leaders of the old institutions will be replaced by new players.

I did say over the past century and a half.....I clearly understand that commercialization is not some new change to the hobby. But I do think that what we have seen in the past 2-3 decades has affected how many in the organized hobby view the hobby as a whole.




I don't buy them. But I do think that the practice of grading has had an affect of distorting the overall market, with a small elite of stamps rapidly rising in value because of an "expert" assigning a number suggesting "close to perfection" of 90+ while the vast majority of stamps that fail to make that cut have generally stagnated in value or lost value in the marketplace. Like I said though, I don't complain too much, it brings classic US stamps within reach of my budget that I might not have otherwise been able to consider acquiring.

And whether the high valuation levels of the "blessed" 90+ rated stamps holds up in the coming decades is another question, especially as younger collectors tend to be much less interested in Classic-era stamps and more focused on topical themes.

You can buy graded topical stamps.

Time and again, someone's local market is confused with "the overall market". Grading does not occur outside the American market So, it does not influence "the overall market" but mostly the market for US and, maybe, Canadian stamps. What you do see is strong demand for good quality stamps.

How can anyone ignore the fact that scarce, rare, and even unique multiples have been destroyed in the hunt for huge singles?