I’ve been collecting used postage stamps for about 14 years and have
found the hobby to be something that I quickly developed a passion
for.
I live in Australia, so my primary collecting interest was Used
Australian Stamps. In the begginning I bought Australian kiloware on-
paper from every ad I could source in Philatelic magazines, with the
clear purpose and hope of tracking down the seller with the most
satisfying product.
I spent a lot of time sorting and soaking, pressing, drying and
grading. When I had accumalated a large amount off-paper, I would
spend a long day taking small handfuls at a time of the off-paper
stamps, sorting them into seperate piles of duplicates on my kitchen
table and benches, until I had exausted the off-paper stamps.
I would carefully go through each duplicate pile and locate the
single best stamp amongst them. I did this by making a second short
duplicate pile with all the stamps that appeared to have no detectable
imperfections (fine).
I would scrutinise the second pile unill I had isolated the absolute
finest or superb stamp amongst them. That stamp would go straight into
a stockbook for my collection.
Finest stamps 2 & 3 went towards my two young sons collections.
When I’d completed going through all the secondry piles of duplicates,
I would reprocess them into piles of all-different stamps.
I would then continue sorting, soaking for a few more weeks until my
next big day when I would repeat the piles of duplicates process to
locate the number 1, 2 & 3 stamps for our collections.
The piles of all different, having only been built from the impeccable
secondry piles of fine looking stamps, were then used for Internet
Trading all over the world in lots of 100, 200, 300 All Different
Austalian Used.
I advertised in an Internet Traders List that I had All Different
Australian Stamps in lots of 100, 200, 300 with no tears, creases,
missing perforations, thin spots, heavy or smeared cancellations, off
centered designs or dirt, basically stamps with no visable faults and
that I would like to trade for the same from other countries. I never
looked back. I calculated that I traded 20 000 stamps in the first 12
months.
As I was quick to send my end upon receiving an initial e-mail
request for a trade, the recipients were usually so impressed with the
high standard of my stamps, they usually returned the favour with
their own very high quality. Nearly all trades resulted in retrades.
I accumalated many different collections from all over the world. For
an example, when I put my Canadian collection together, using the same
piles of duplicate system, I had a total of 18 different packs of 100,
200 or 300 from Canada to work with. It was almost as if some infinite
intelligence was involved as each pack seemed to consistently contain
completely different stamps from the others.
That’s just a little first story about how I got started.
Any Begginning Collectors interested in Australian used are welcome to
check out the Stamp Giveaway at: