Monthly Archives: December 2011

Linn's is reporting this week that a collector in Sweden bought a cheap world wide collection at an auction and there was a rare syllabic character (plate number) on a 6 sen 1875 Cherry Blossom issue-rare to the tune of being worth perhaps $200,000 on a stamp that is otherwise only a few dollars. This is an extreme example of diligence and luck but there are many varieties and errors that do turn up from time to time misidentified in general collections and which can mean big finds for the average knowledgeable philatelist.

 Here are a few hints on what you need to know to increase your chance of philatelic "finds": Know the various types of the one cent and ten cent 1851-57 US. There are six main types of the one cent and four main types of the ten cent. The stamps all look very similar but can vary in price from $5-$30,000. I once found a rare 10c type mint in a cheap European made US collection that was worth $30,000 but I once missed a

The Endowment Effect is a concept in behavioral economics which states that people tend to increase their idea of the value of an item depending on whether or not they are the owner. The Endowment Effect was first hypothesized by the economist Richard Thaler and is an example of a big name for an idea that has been pretty obvious to stamp collectors and stamp dealers for many years. Apfelbaum engages to buy about 500 collection per year. These are collections from collectors who have contacted us to sell their stamps. For the most part they are the collectors who made the stamp collections so they are well versed with the quality and popularity of the material that they own and are aware of the prices that they paid for their stamps. They are, too, aware that stamp dealers have expenses and profits to make and that markups on philatelic material run a third or more. And most collectors have a modest Endowment Effect-they like their stamps and believe they have made many wise purchases

Stamps were collected from 1840 onwards and within a few decades specialized collectors were trying to get their favorite stamps used on cover as well as off cover. But the earliest collectors collected both their stamps and covers only by country and it was not until about 1920 that the first thematic cover collectors came into being. They did not think of themselves as thematic collectors and today their descendants would recoil at the idea that they are in any way related to Topical collectors. But the fact remains that, at its core, Postal History collecting is thematic collecting. Pick a Postal History specialty -say transatlantic Mail or Civil War- and its core is an emphasis of the non-philatelic story being told rather than the stamps and covers themselves. Philately developed as a picturesque assemblage of the stamps and covers of a particular stamp issuing entity at a particular era in time, whereas thematic collecting uses stamps and covers to tell a non-philatelic

Hard as this is to believe, throughout the 1950's the United States Post Office issued an average of ten stamps per year with a total face value of 30c. Last year there were over 150 issues with a $77 face value. When one is tallying up where collector dollars get spent it is hard to avoid wondering what would happen to the price of older stamps if the USPS (and foreign Post Offices, which are usually not much better, and often much worse) had issuing policies that were more conservative.

Over the last twenty years the United States has issued over 3500 different stamps with a combined face value of over $1700. And since most of these stamps are marketed in sheets of twenty a devoted collector could easily have spent $30,000 or more over the last two decades on his collection with the post office on new issues alone. Put this kind of money into quality United States stamps and you would produce a collection of real value. In US philately $30,000

A few years ago I read an article about how smaller town diamond merchants send their stock to each other by ordinary First Class mail. The article said that outside New York the incidence of First Class mail going astray is nearly nonexistent. Apfelbaum's send out thousands of packages per year, mostly through the postal service, with almost never a loss. Companies send their valuable packages out Registered or confirmed delivery largely so as to protect themselves from dishonest recipients or door men who would pretend that the package didn't arrive, rather than because of Postal Service concerns. Think about it. When was the last time you sent a bill or birthday card that didn't arrive. The reason that virtually all First Class letters reach their destination is that we have an honest, professional and relatively well paid group of men and women working for the USPS. And the pension system that so many Congressman complain about helps too. Only a fool with vested years in

Its hard to believe that the post office's troubles are as bad as some are saying when a simple two part solution can fix so many money issues. The Post Office announced that it is closing half of the main sorting facilities that it operates and that this will save the Post Office $6.5 billion per year. That's a lot of money. And the result is that instead of postal delivery for first class mail coming on average of two days in the postal stream it will come more like two to three. In years gone by, perhaps sensitivity to quick delivery influenced some users but today anything that is truly time sensitive is emailed or onernighted. As an additional savings, the Post Office is planning to eliminate Saturday delivery, a communication delivery service anachronism, which will save billions more. USPS accounting, like most multi billion dollar companies, is opaque and it is difficult for outsiders to penetrate into the inner workings of the organization and the cost of various components

Stamp theft, despite the scare stories that you sometimes hear, is really not much of a problem. We rarely have a customer inform us that his stamps were stolen and the APS's stamp theft committee almost never sends out an advisory of a stolen collection. In the 1970's stamp theft was more of an issue than it is now and the change from stamps being an actively stolen commodity to an infrequently pilfered one tells us a lot about the changes in our hobby and our world in the last thirty years.

The reason for the reduction of stamp thefts is threefold. First, stamps have languished in value so that on a "value to difficulty of fencing ratio" they are an inefficient product to steal.  High end TVs, computers and jewelry have made much more appealing targets over the last thirty years and stamps that are stolen are often taken as an afterthought of another robbery. Second, most criminals like the easy and big money and that money is in drugs. One could make the

International stamp shows have long lead times. The announcements have already begun for the next US based International show which will be held in New York in 2016(http://www.ny2016.org/)  International shows are held under the auspices of the FIP (Federation Intenational de Philatelie) a group that arranges international competitive exhibits and certifies stamp shows. The United States gets one show every ten years and they have been held on the sixes  (the 1946 show was held in 1947 to honor the centennial of the first United States stamp and the 1996 show was similarly moved back a year because of the sesquicentennial of the same issue). Sipex was the international show held in 1966 in Washington and it was my first International. (Sipex has the honor of having the lowest value US souvenir sheet issued in its commemoration. It shows what a difference marketing is today to realize that the Post office issued a souvenir sheet with a face

There is no more valuable substance in the world by weight and volume than original gum. Consider -the gum on a thousand mint US Ten Cent 1847s if miraculously removed, commingled and weighed would total about an ounce. And the value of such gum on the stamps is $12,500 for each stamp according to the latest Scott catalog (the difference between an" og" price and a "no gum" price) which makes our magic ounce of og worth a cool $125 million (a US #31 has a $20000 premium for og making a thousand of them worth $200 million.) And og is increasing rapidly in value. The price of Nineteenth Century stamps with original gum has far outstripped the price of the same stamps without gum over the last twenty years. And this is for a substance that is invisible when you mount your stamps and requires the utmost care so as not to compromise or damage. And that is when you are fortunate enough to have bought og in the first place. I can't tell you how many certificates from ten or

Increasingly, the political calculus seems to be the game of chicken. In the US debt extension negotiations in Congress this summer the idea of compromise was considered unacceptable, largely by the Republicans. In the European debt crisis going on now, the Germans have taken the same position. The idea that intransigence is a smart political strategy is a foolish one. Sometimes it works but when it breaks down the unintended consequences are terrible. Philatelists know the devastating effects of WW I from our hobby and postal history- the Occupation issues and locals and regionals that were created as governments fought for territory and order. But what is often unseen in philately is human suffering. The consensus of historians is that WW I was caused by a colossal game of chicken. After the assassination of Arch Duke Ferdinand, central European countries each felt that the others would back down in the face of military mobilizations. It didn't happen that way. Over fifteen million people,

The current Euro mess has seemed to have little impact so far on the stamp market. The Euro has fallen some 15% against the dollar and the financial system in Europe is in turmoil but prices for European stamps seem stable. There is little buying from the weaker European areas, countries like Italy and Spain which would see serious devaluations of whatever currency they moved to if the Euro failed. And we are seeing no increased selling by European stamp holders attempting to put their money in dollars pending a devaluation. My own sense is that most stamp collectors and dealers are like most other consumers and they are still divorced from the financial turmoil that is going on around them. What concerns money center banks and government financing really has little short term impact on what most of us do anymore. Maybe we have become anesthetized to bad news. Last summer we watched the travesty of the United States nearly defaulting on its debt because of

 Yesterday's post (about a private delivery service that operates at Airport TSA checkpoints to allow passengers to send back to themselves items of value that they unintentionally brought to a plane and are to be tossed as not acceptable boarding material) got me thinking about what is the major cause of the Post Offices budgetary problems. Sure, the United States Post Office is a large, slow bureaucracy, but also it is prohibited by law from entering new markets and offering new services without Postal Commission permission. This is terribly cumbersome and inefficient, and lobbying and competing business special interest groups attempt to curtail any Post Office changes that might impact on their business. The USPS rarely capitalizes on its most competitive advantage.  There is no other business that stops at virtually every address in the United States each day to make a delivery and an aggressive marketer could easily cash in on that fact. How about lottery