Stamp Mate & Colnect - two things that make my philatelic life much easier...

While working on my album pages, I have been also working on creating databases for my collections that include Catalog correlations between the major catalogs (Scott, Gibbons, Michel, Yvert) and any Specialist Catalogs I have in my library. 

For that purpose I use Stamp Mate, a program developed in a couple years ago by the Catamates company in I believe Europe (I think they are in Slovenia???) It's a very flexible program that is connected to the online stamp idenfication site Colnect, which allows you to import information from Colnect into the program.  For me, this serves as a "base" upon which I can then use to fill out relevant information regaring stamp varieties etc for different countries.

The last few days I have been working on my Australia collection, starting with the Federal Commonwealth Postage Dues.  Here is an example of what I have done in my Stamp Mate for listings  (you will want to open it to see it more clearly) :

This is the listing of the first part of the 1946-1956 Redrawn Plates issue of Australian Dues.  The two listings with images I imported from Colnect using the "Add Stamps Automatically" function.  I then entered the Catalog Number info that is not in already in Colnect (here that is "Specialist" - which is a special personal field I created in the program to represent the various specialized catalogs I have.  For Australia pre-1966, this is the Brusden-White Australian Commonwealth Specialist Catalogue series numbers).

I then click "edit stamp" and then "save and New (Clone) Action" to create new listings for the varieties of the base stamp not already in Colnect - editing infor such as colors, the catalog numbers etc) for each variety I want to include in my database.  As can be seen here, for the 1d value, I have created listings for five varieties (here, color shades) listed in the BW Specialist Catalog but not in the main ones.  I then put "var" after the catalog number for the main catalog listings.  So here, while I have five variety listings for Scott Australia J0072 (noted as J0072 var), they have discrete numbers in the Brusden-White column.  Very nice and organized and, when I get done, provides me catalog number correlations and information regarding what to look for in terms of varieties that are not listed in the main catalogs that just might be lurking unknown in a dealer's stock.  To quote a popular Stamp Forum Webmaster..."Knowledge Is Power!"

The program itself is not that expensive (30 Euros IIRC) and for me it's the perfect cataloging software to let me know what I have, what I want, and just what exists in general.  And its flexibility to allow personalized customization is a definite bonus.

Once I have finished all the catalog data entry, I can then use Stamp Mate to start planning out my album pages. Not in terms of design, but as I organize my collection chronologically with all varieties of stamps for a given year together (Defins, Commems, Charity, Dues, Officials etc.) I can use the "Year of Issue" box to filter all the stamps issues in that year that I have listings for.  That way I don't have to have four or five catalogs open at one time while working on making the page layouts on Excel, just Stamp Mates!

One issue some collectors might have with this system is that Colnect, the online stamp (and other collectibles) identifier/catalog, does not always have complete listings for many nations.  Colnect's information is provided based on a Wiki model, contributors provide information that Colnect's moderators then add, and other users can help improve information, correct errors etc.  Overall Colnect has become a very good resource for stamp collectors - its stamp section now lists over 660,000 items.

Here is a sample of their listings, this is from Portugal for the year 1951 - showing the catalog cross references provided, which are so handy if you buy stamps online from dealers in other parts of the world.  Here we have numbers for Michel, a major US catalog producer, Yvert and Portugal's Afinsa. Also nice images you can click to get a larger view, and lots of technical information.  Again, no catalog values, but just having the cross-reference of the catalog numbers and the technical information is very valuable.

However, working on my French colonial/post colonial pages that I have posted on here so far, I found plenty of gaps.  So, one of my new philatelic projects is helping to fill those gaps on colnect by submitting information, images etc. It's actually quite easy to do, and is a great way to expand the global philatelic "knowledge" base.  One area I have also been helping Colnect with in the past few months is New Issues.  I discovered that this was one of the weaker areas for Colnect for nations outside the EU and North America, so have been doing research and contributing information, images etc for new 2017 (and in some cases 2016) issues that they lacked for many nations. Been having a lot of fun with this, and its given me a new appreciation of the beauty of design of many new issues from around the world this year.

Here is an image from some of the the 2017 issues of Vietnam I submitted for addition earlier today :

Colnect of course is not the only online stamp "catalog" around. There is also Stampworld.  But the two have some key differences.  Colnect is more "reference" oriented - it provides information on catalogue numbers for stamps from the main (and some regional) catalogs (though where there is no info, as with new issues, they have their own "placeholder" Colnect codes that can be later updated when catalogs do assign number for the new issues).  Stampworld, on the other hand, has its own unique numbering system.  And there is a reason for this - Stampworld provides "values" for stamps...though what those values are based on I have never been able to conclude.  Colnect does NOT provide catalog value information, and any information you import into Stamp Mate from Colnect will not have catalog values - you'll have to enter those yourself.  For me, that is perfectly fine.  I'd rather do that kind of data entry myself rather than use "market data" of unclear provenance.

Hopefully you all find these programs/websites helpful. I have found them to be invaluable in helping me not just organize my collection, but deal with that issue that plagues collectors who use the internet to buy material - the different catalog systems used in different nations.

Links :

Stamp Mate 2015 by Catamates

Colnect Stamp Catalog

Comments? Questions? Ask Away!!

Re-thinking how I organize my stamp collections...

We philatelists can be a fickle lot.  We are always looking for the best way, at the most economical price possible, to display our collections as we get more and more stamps.  Sometimes the ideas we have to achieve this end up having an Achilles Heel that we did not consider before, but appears when we move further along in the organizational process.

Those of you who have followed my blog over the past year or so know that I house my collection on Vario Stockpages.  You also are quite aware of my fondness for specialized catalogs and my desire to organize my collection so that it is easy to fit in varieties listed in specialized catalogs along with the "mainstream" stamps listed in the general catalogs such as Scott.

I thought I had worked out an excellent system.  I would create a "key" using a spreadsheet program to create "pages" that would reflect the content on the Vario pages I had or would include in my albums.  Once made I could print these outlines out on paper and place them in the back of the correct album.

I would thus have a paper copy with my albums, plus a digital copy I could save. And the result was this setup :

Algeria Key that I had set up in a spreadsheet and then printed out.

Then a disaster happened - the original master copy I had created with ALL of the album layouts I had developed (around 60 different countries by that point) became corrupted and I could no longer access it.  

So I came to a fork in the road - do I re-enter all that data and had lost, or go in a different direction in terms of how I created a "key" that would let me know where stamps would go on a Vario page.

I decided on the latter course, in part because the old system had one major flaw - it was difficult to include more than one catalog number per cell without the page being confusing.  Also, it did not really provide an easy way to know what the exact nature of the "varieties" would be.  

So, I started rethinking the idea of how best to create a system that would accomplish all of the following

1. Show Catalog Numbers for both Scott and whichever specialized catalog I used for that nation, if any.
2. Indicate what exactly the variety for minor-number listings of stamps were - was it a new color shade, a new perf type, a constant plate variety?
3. Provide a little information about what the stamp depicted or commemorated. This was something I had thought I would not really need, but over time I did miss this element that you get with album pages.

To accomplish these goals I realized I needed to provide the information much closer to the actual stamps in the album, not simply printed at the back of the album.

My first idea was to create small tags that I could insert next to each stamp. Then all the information would be right there with the stamp. After a bit of playing around I found that spreadsheet programs would work best to create these tags and then I could just print them out (on acid free paper) and insert into album next to stamps.

This was the result 

Page from my Algeria album with the "tag" idea implemented

It does fulfill the three requirements I listed above, and would remove any doubt to any future dealers who might end up with my stamps as to what I have.

After getting some collector feedback from the various stamp bulletin boards, however, I came to realize one thing - the tags were definitely overshadowing the stamps.  As the owner of Stamp Boards commented, it looked like I was "collecting paper tags" as well as stamps.  And he was right.

Plus, there is one other consideration here - you can print out a page of tags onto acid free paper, but you still need to separate them, which means a lot, and I mean a great deal, of cutting with scissors. Thinking about all the albums I have and plan to make in the future, I could already feel my hands starting to cramp up!  

Then a collector on the Stamp Boards forum made a comment about how the Stanley Gibbons albums were organized.  The stamps are only on the right side of the page, with catalog information and illustrations provided on the left page opposite. (this is also the setup I believe Mystic uses in its USA albums).  So the albums look something like this

Stanley Gibbons "Imperial" album setup :

Illustrations and text one side, the stamps themselves opposite

It was the "Eureka" moment I was looking for.  This kind of setup would achieve the three goals I wanted to achieve with the information, but not make the pages so cluttered that it distracts from the stamps themselves.

And this is the result 

Page from my Algeria album with the info page opposite to the stamps.

The look is I think quite clean, yet provides all the relevant information I need at a quick glance - which stamps do I need, where does it go on the page, what is its catalog number, why is it a variety.

Now since Vario pages are 2 sided, the way I will lay out my albums will be to have a double-sided info page inserted between two Vario pages. Print out on acid free paper, place into a page protector, and voila, done. No fiddly cutting tags!

So now I am in the process of creating these info pages for my albums. Yes it will be a lot of work, but since my base file corrupted, I have to do it anyways, and it's a fun project that helps me learn more about what the various specialized catalogs include.  Plus, when money is tight and I can't spend a lot of money on stamps themselves, this is a cheap way to enjoy philatelic time.

RIP Marvin Frey...and the question of sourcing stamps for your collection. (Repost)

This is a repost of a blog article from my 1.0 blog originally posted on 18 September 2015

Heard the sad news earlier this week that the owner of Bellmore Philatelics in Massapequa Park, New York, Marvin Frey, had passed away.  I have been dealing with Bellmore off and on for many years. I was a huge fan of their "in home approval service" where they would send out an assortment of old albums, dealer cards etc and let you pick the items you wanted at a percent of Scott catalog value.  For me it was a wonderful way to re-activate my collecting interest after several years away, and most of my French Colonial purchases made over the past few years have been via Bellmore.

Alas, with the passing of Mr Frey, Bellmore announced that it will no longer be providing its approval service.

For me this brings up a question that all collectors have to deal with. What is the best way to source items for your collection?  These days, the internet of course provides the collector with options to purchase items that simply did not exist before the Internet Revolution. Before you were limited to what local dealers (or dealers within your country) could offer, and comparison price shopping was at the same time quite difficult.

Today though the collector is truly blessed with a cornucopia of options, from general auction sites such as eBay to collectibles markets such as Delcampe (my favorite) or Zillions of Stamps, to all sorts of individual dealers who do maintain strong internet presences posting their pricing and stock lists for all to see. There are also several approval services, my favorite being the approval branch of British auction company Universal Philatelic Auctions. They provide amazing customer service and work very hard to send you selections to look over that fit your collecting interests.

In some ways today is definitely the best of times to be a collector, since it is now much easier to find the items that you want for your collection AND be able to compare prices to find the best deal to fit your budget.

Still, I am going to miss receiving those approval selections from Bellmore. It was a fun way to pass an afternoon and allowed me to exactly see the condition of the stamps I was going to purchase. Sadly it's increasingly rare to find approval services that give you the luxury of viewing at home first before you buy. Pictures on the web of front and back of stamps help, but there is nothing like seeing the actual stamp in person before you buy to make you feel confident you are purchasing what you want, and of course there are lots of horror stories about items listed on eBay or other sites that turn out not to be as described. But as the excellent service from UPA shows, stamp dealers that provide approvals still do exist.

My current catalogue library...and my love of specialized catalogues! (Repost & Update)

As my last post indicates, I have quite a few specialized catalogues in my collection. I LOVE specialized catalogues. Part of the reason is due to the sheer number of varieties you often find listed, which makes shopping for stamps all the more fun if you have the chance to find a variety that is only listed in specialized catalogues in the stock of a dealer who does not know.  To quote Glen Stephens, the moderator of collection forum Stampboards, "Knowledge is POWER".  Another reason I love specialized catalogues is that it lets me set up my albums to include spaces for all known varieties. No, I may not ever own many of them, but one can always dream, and there is always the thrill of the chase.

And finally, for collectors in the USA, the realization that Scott does not list many items that would be considered basic issues in other countries is a frustration that only the overseas specialized catalogues can redress, at least until such time as Scott finally provides listings in its Classic Specialized Catalogue. One of my current bugaboos with Scott is its complete failure to list the Parcel Post stamps of Algeria.  First released in 1899 (twenty-five years before the first Algerian-specific postage stamps) the Parcel Post (or as the French say, Colis Postaux) issues have a strong following in France and are considered a basic part of any Algerian collection, and the Maury catalogue lists almost 220 major number varieties (and lots of minor varieties to boot!)

A selection of Algerian parcel post stamps from a Delcampe listing. Just don't spend time looking in the Scott catalogue for them! 

The oddest thing about this Algerian parcel post question is that Scott DOES list similar parcel post issues for mainland France, which were added to the Classic Specialized catalogue in I believe 2012. So for Scott not to list the Algerian issues is even more anachronistic now than it was when the French parcels were not listed either.  Scott editors, if you read this, please consider listing these issues - there is plenty of market data available!

So what do I have in my library currently. Here is the current listing :

1. Scott 2015 Classic Specialized Catalogue 1840-1940
2. A complete set of 2012 Scott General Catalogues - all 6 volumes
3. 2009 Scott US Specialized Catalogue (I will probably get a newer version this year)
4. Maury Timbres de France 2011 edition
5. Maury Timbres de l'ex-empire français en Afrique 2006 edition (I wanted to update to the 2014 edition but it has gone out of print already!)
6. Maury Timbres des bureaux et anciennes colonies français en Europe et Asie, 2011 edition
7. Maury Timbres des DOM-TOM 2009 edition (catalogue for the current Departments and Territoires d'Outre-Mer, except St Pierre & Miquelon and French Antarctica, which are in #8)
8. Maury Timbres des Principautes et Terres Polaires, 2011 edition
9. İsfila Türk Pulları Kataloğu 2014 edition
10. GJ Catálogo Especializado de Sellos de la Republica Argentina 2009 edition
11. Stanley Gibbons Specialized Australia Catalogue, 9th edition
12. Stanley Gibbons Specialized New Zealand Catalogue, 5th edition
13. Stanley Gibbons Specialized Brunei-Malaysia-Singapore Catalogue, 4th edition
14. Afinsa Catalogo de Sellos Postais : Portugal, Açores e Madeira, 2005 edition
15. Afinsa Catalogo de Sellos Postais : Portugal, Açores e Madeira 2000-2012 supplement
16. Afinsa Catalogo de Sellos Postais : Colonias Portuguesas, 2011 edition.

Unfortunately the Afinsa catalogues are no longer produced as the publisher went bankrupt in wake of the Afinsa Ponzi Scheme Scandal but copies can be found in the second-hand market with a little searching.  Maury no longer lists catalogues on its own website, my guess is all the latest editions are out of print as well, though again the aftermarket will have copies.

Over time I am sure my collection of specialized catalogues will grow. I desperately want a copy of the Unitrade Specialized Catalogue of Canadian Stamps but the current 2015 edition is out of print, though the 2016 edition should be available in late 2015 and that will be purchased this year!

EDIT : Since the original post my collection has grown and now also includes :

1. Brusden-White Australian Commonwealth Specialists' Catalog : Kangaroos, 2015 Edition
2. Brusden-White Australian Commonwealth Specialists' Catalog : King George V, 2014 Edition
3. Brusden-White Australian Commonwealth Specialists' Catalog : King George VI, 2015 Edition
4. Brusden-White Australian Commonwealth Specialists' Catalog : Queen Elizabeth II 1952-1956, 2015 Edition
5. Brusden-White Australian Commonwealth Specialists' Catalog : Postage Dues,  2014 Edition
6. OBP Belgium 2016, 61e, 2 volumes (vol 1 - Belgium, vol 2 - Ex Colonies)
7. RHM Catalogo de Selos do Brasil 2013, 58e
8. Unitrade Specialized Catalogue of Canadian Stamps, 2016 edition
9. Stanley Gibbons Collect Channel Islands & Isle of Man, 2016 edition
10. Filatelica Chilena, Catalogo Especializado Chile 2006
11. China Stamp Society Specialized Catalog of China to 1949, 2016 edition
12. Michel Germany Specialized 2014, 44e, vol 1 1849-1945
13. Stanley Gibbons Great Britain Concise Stamp Catalogue, 2015 edition
14. Philatelica Hungarica 2016-2017 Hungary Specialized
15. Stanley Gibbons Specialized India Catalogue, 4th edition
16. Zonnenbloem Indonesia 2016, 54e
17. Farahbakhsh Stamps Of Iran, 54e, 2015 
18. Sassone Italy Specialized 2016 v. 1, 75e
19. Hibernian Ireland 2014, 2e
20. NVPH Netherlands and Former Colonies 2016 Speciale Catalogus, 75e
21. Campbell Patterson Specialized Catalogue of New Zealand Stamps, 2015 edition
22. Tracinda South Africa Stamp Colour Catalogue 2013, 32e
23. Ciardi Catalogo Especializado de los Sellos del Uruguay, 2006 ed

You may be thinking wow how can he use all these catalogues, most are not in English!  Well, I fortunately have fair to good reading ability in nine different languages (French, Spanish, German, Italian, Portuguese, Dutch, Turkish, Arabic and Persian) as a result of years of training as a graduate student in Islamic History at Ohio State.  But, I find that most catalogues are organized in such a way that someone with little foreign language knowledge can, with the help of online translators, get the main jist of what the catalogues are saying.

The great debate....hinged vs never hinged...and the evil legacy of Crystal Mounts....(Repost)

This is a reposting of a blog entry from the first version of this blog posted on 1 August 2015

It's a debate that has rumbled through philatelic circles since at least the 1950s (famous US Stamp Dealer and author Herman Herst Jr wrote about it in many of his articles, collections of which have been published as Nassau Street and Fun And Profit In Stamp Collecting and both of which are entertaining and educational reads well worth checking out!). Should mint stamps be collected as hinged or never hinged.  Or perhaps more to the point, at what point chronologically should a collector stop collecting mint hinged stamps and only seek out never hinged copies of issues.

A look at stamp catalogues from various regions is little help as none seem to agree to any date in particular. Generally, Scott sets its values for mint as never hinged for most nations around 1945 or so. Some countries a little later, some (like the USA) in the 1930s. Scott also, at least in its Classic Specialized 1840-1940 Catalog, provides pricing for never hinged for issues before their cutoff date. One thing Scott very rarely does though is price items, or even give a rough guide to value, for hinged items AFTER the transition date. Does this mean hinged items issued after the transition date are worthless???? Surely it can't, but how do you value the items if there is no guide, even a rough one.

Other catalogues, as I note above, use different dates.  The Gibbons catalogs make the transition form hinged to never hinged with the coronation of George VI in 1937.  Again, no guide is provided as to what kind of a discount should be given for items issued after 1937 that are hinged, and even more perplexing, neither is any suggestion of a degree of premium never hinged items issues before 1937.  At least none is given in the three specialized Gibbons catalogues I own (Australia 9th ed, New Zealand 5th ed and Malaysia-Singapore-Brunei 4th ed).

Since I am focusing at this time mainly on the French colonial world, I also have a set of Maury catalogues for France and empire.  Here there IS some help, as Maury prices everything from start to its general transition date of 1960 in both never hinged and hinged varieties. Interestingly enough, the degree of premium for Never Hinged items in the later 1950s vs hinged is not that large, usually around 33% or so. After 1960 prices for mint stamps are for never hinged only, though one could argue that the discount should not be too huge for hinged if the examples of the late 1950s pricing ratios are taken into consideration.  Similarly the Afinsa catalogues for Portugal and Colonies offer pricing for both never hinged and hinged stamps up to 1953 and the Centenary of Portuguese Stamps issue. The İsfila catalogue for the Ottoman Empire and Turkey sets the date at 1938, while the Guillermo Jalil catalogue for Argentina sets it at 1940, with both catalogues providing pricing guidance for never-hinged items issues before their transition dates, though not after.

Stamp mounts only began to become common in the USA with the introduction of the Crystal Mount by the HE Harris company in the 1950s, though there were some predecessors that, to be honest, were more work than worth the effort to use.  I remember Crystal Mounts well, since that is what my father used when he introduced me to stamp collecting in the 1970s and 1980s. I remember spending many an snowy upstate NY evening helping him mount his various collections with these mounts, that only came in a small range of sizes so that one had to fold over part of the mount to secure the stamp inside. 

Crystal Mounts in their packaging from the 1980s...images that bring shudders of horror to me today.

Until the introduction of mounts based around stamp height in a much larger range of sizes (such as the Scott Mount by Prinz and similar mounts) these were considered the best mount for keeping stamps never hinged. And millions of US collectors used them in the period from the 1950s to the 1980s (and some still swear by them)

(rant) I truly LOATHE Crystal Mounts (/rant). It was always way too easy to bend perfs as you folded over the extra plastic, and stamps often have a hard time "breathing" when they are in tightly folded ones.  When I inherited my father's stamp collection, I discovered that removing stamps from mounts was rather akin to extracting a coin that has fallen thru a grate - often frustrating and infuriating.  You need to be very careful removing the stamps from a Crystal Mount, and you often need to put it under some weight afterward to remove the -curl- that the mounts often create after years of storage.  Really poorly stored collections housed in Crystal mounts often have yellow staining where the gummed strip was positioned, and occasionally the gum will even glaze from moisture trapped over time.

When I was heavily building up my first stamp collection in the 1990s, I used the traditional album pages and Scott Mounts, as I've noted in my first post.  At times it felt like I was spending as much on supplies as I was on stamps. But this time around I have decided to use Lighthouse Vario stockpages and it is so wonderful NOT to have to factor the cost of mounts into my stamp budget AT ALL. Although they have come down in price from what they were in the 1980s when I was trying to convince my father to switch to Scott mount and stop using Crystal mounts (an arugment he eventually came to accept in the early 1990s) they are still not cheap especially when you consider the range of sizes you need if you are a worldwide collector.

But back to the original question - hinged or never hinged.  In the end, this is something that each collector has to decide for himself or herself.  De gustibus non disputatum est. My general rule of thumb is hinged is fine until 1960, and from 1960 onward I will only buy never hinged issues. By 1960 you really have huge supplies of never hinged material for most nations available in the marketplace here in the USA, and stamp mounts by 1960 were much more commonly in use. Some nations I may make the never-hinged only transition a bit earlier, but 1960 is, for me, a pretty firm date for all nations. Now, if given the opportunity to purchase pre-1960 material in never hinged form at a fair price, then I will not turn my nose up at it either, but for me at least, there is nothing wrong with a hinged stamp, provided that the hinging by previous owners has not done any major physical damage to the stamp over the years, such as thins on the back.  For my part, so long as the stamp remains in my possession, I will not harm it further with another hinge.  But let us be honest, we admire our stamps for the designs on the front, not to fetishize the pristine-ness of the gum on the back.