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Alternatives to Collecting Stamps
Have you considered alternatives to postage stamps? There’s nothing wrong with collecting stamps on their own, but there are other options to consider as part of stamp collecting. It doesn’t have to be either/or – collect whatever interests you and brings you joy.
Some other items to consider:
- Postal stationary – Will typically have pre-printed stamps and are government issued. For example postal cards, envelopes and air mail letters (aerograms).
- Sheets – There are many types of sheets including souvenir sheets, sheetlets, mini sheets, full sheets and strips/coils (stamps from a roll).
- Blocks or Plate blocks – Collectors typically look for blocks of 4 and prefer blocks from any corner of the sheet. Plate blocks extend this concept and usually contain some printing information in the margin (usually the sheet/plate number).
- Revenue Stamps – For a long time these were ignored by collectors, revenue stamps were used to pay taxes on various purchases (see my Revenue Stamp Collection for examples). These can be quite sought after now by collectors.
- FDC’s (First Day Covers) – Older FDC’s may simply be a plain cachet or a plain cachet with a specific commemorative hand-stamp for decoration. Newer FDC’s can have beautiful designs with bold colors. The designs of most FDC’s will bear a relationship to the topic or design of the corresponding stamp/s. Affixed to the FDC will be the stamp/s franked with a cancellation whose date matches the day that the stamp was released. Often the first day cancellation will bear a unique design intended to be used for a single day only. A single stamp may appear on multiple cachets with different designs.
- Cachets: OK, so this is not an area that I’ve focused on in my personal collecting journey. It is an area that many people enjoy collecting though and is a field of it’s own. There is a draw for many to collect used cachets with evidence that they have traveled through the mail system. Perhaps they were posted from some obscure location to an equally obscure destination. Perhaps there is evidence of a misdelivery, weird routing or an odd cancellation.
- Cinderella’s – Anything that looks like a stamp but is not valid for postage (see my Christmas Seals Collection for examples). Some classify Revenue stamps as Cinderella stamps (which might be technically correct) but I separate them out on this site as Revenue stamps are government issued and fairly well cataloged.
You can find more detailed information and examples in my blog post on Alternatives to “Just Stamps”.