Monday, September 19, 2016

"What are worldwide stamp collections worth?"

This is the title of a new thread on StampCommunity started by dealer KReleya. (Thanks to Jim Jackson for alerting me.) KReleya (who is also a dealer) looks at various categories of worldwide material sold on eBay and has come up with low, high, and sample prices per stamp (or per pound, in the case of bulk) to use when estimating value. When I was buying Blue Volume One collections on eBay I kept a similar list for a couple of years, and came to roughly the same figures (for collections of under 20K stamps--there weren't any larger ones that I knew the size of).

What KReleya confirms, is that you cannot use a single value per stamp that will work with every type and size of collection. That is, two or three cents a stamp makes sense for a Volume One with a few thousands common stamps, but would seriously underestimate the worth of a large album.

Unfortunately, unless we have a count of stamps (preferably by country) and a lot of photos, it is still something of a crapshoot. And without a mess o'photos, you don't know whether the album is padded with stamps that don't belong. But it is still a helpful metric to know where an item is worth more serious consideration. Many thanks to KReleya for taking the time to compile the data and share his experiences.


Saturday, September 10, 2016

Yet another complete Big Blue Volume One. But this one comes with pictures!

Another collector, Bud, has fulfilled the daunting challenge of completing a Scott International Volume One. Jim Jackson posted the news in a "reply" to one of my original blog entries, but I want to make certain this gets the attention it deserves.

From Jim:
I am pleased to announce that Bud is posting scans and comments about his completed Big Blue (Scott International Part I 1840-1940 Album) on my blog.

Yes, all 34,700 stamp spaces are filled!

And all of Bud's Big Blue's filled pages will be scanned and shown!

It is expected that 3-8 country scans from Bud's BB will be posted every month.
http://bigblue1840-1940.blogspot.com/2016/09/buds-big-blue-introduction-and-index.html

This will be the first time that every page from a complete Big Blue has been scanned and published on the Internet. Moreover, Bud has been very kind to several of us over the past several years by sharing his experiences with completing the Big Blue and it is great that he is making this information public. I've been particularly curious about what Bud will do next. I'm not certain what I would do if my Big Blue was complete, so Bud's thoughts are especially interesting:
Although every space in my BB is filled, the activity of collecting goes on. Preening, that is replacing stamps lower in my preference list with stamps higher up, will continue indefinitely. Supplement pages will, no doubt, mushroom.