So, What to Collect?
What will keep you engaged for years—having fun, building your miniature world, thrilling in the hunt—without overwhelming your budget or leaving you adrift in an ocean without shores?
Some Common Stamp Collecting Options
Before you buy anything, it helps to understand what's actually out there.
New Issues (Modern Stamps)
Every post office department in the world releases new stamps constantly. The appeal is obvious: they're cheap (well, they used to be cheap), available, and require no expertise.
The problem: new issues hold no value, the volume is overwhelming, and there's no natural endpoint. Mint issues after 1940 are often sold as postage at a 40% discount from face value—the labor to affix 3¢ stamps exceeds their worth.
Topical Collecting
Collect stamps featuring a subject you love—wildlife and animals, sports, space explorations, trains, ships, aviation, art, flora, historical events and people.
The problem: the stamps themselves are often common and unremarkable with little retained value. It can be lots of fun, but it's hard to build something you can point to and say "I finished this."
"A Bit of Everything"
The classic beginner approach: collect stamps from everywhere, organized by country.
The problem: it's genuinely impossible to complete. You're swimming in an ocean with no shore in sight. Most collectors who start this way eventually quit or narrow their focus.
Single Country Collecting
Focus on one country's stamps—usually your own.
The problem: it depends entirely on which country and which era you choose. Some paths are achievable. Others are financial dead ends or take no time at all to complete.
What to Avoid (The Short Version)
Most problems in stamp collecting happen when people buy expensive stamps before they know the risks and how to avoid them. Regumming, reperforation, altered cancels, cleaned used stamps sold as unused, forgeries—these issues exist. Luckily, they mostly target expensive mint stamps, high-value rarities, not the affordable used stamps where beginners should start.
Carefully evaluate sellers on eBay and Hipstamp. Yes, those are great places to start to learn how to bid, but they are usually not the place to purchase expensive stamps. You will gradually learn about SAN (Stamp Auction Network) and the reputable auction houses for more expensive stamps or large collections for sale. That is not a long list.
The rule is simple: build your skills and judgment with affordable (primarily used) stamps first.
When you believe you have built your skills, deal with reputable sellers—yes, that means moving on from eBay to auction houses.
The Fork in the Road
Every collector faces a choice:
- Collect casually—enjoy what you find, don't worry about completion, accept that it's a pleasant diversion without structure, or
- Collect intentionally—define boundaries, set achievable goals, build something you can eventually achieve and just possibly finish.
Neither is wrong. But they lead to very different experiences. If you're drawn to the second path—if you want to build something meaningful without spending a fortune—then the next question is: where do you focus? I believe collecting classic stamps is that answer.
Why Classic Stamps?
Classic stamps—from the era when postal systems were being built and nations were forming—offer something the other options don't:
- Defined boundaries: The classic era has a finite number of stamps. You know what you're collecting.
- Achievable goals: Unlike "collect everything," classic collecting has realistic endpoints.
- Historical depth: These stamps connect to real history—not just postal ephemera.
- Value retention: Classic stamps hold value better than modern issues.
- Clear quality standards: Grading and condition are well-established, so you know what you're buying.
The catch? Classic stamps cost more than new issues or common topicals. But the cost reflects real value—and the satisfaction of building something complete is worth it.
What Are Classic Stamps?
Classic stamp collecting focuses on stamps from the early era of postal history—generally the mid-1800s through the early 20th century. These aren't the stamps you buy at the Post Office today.
Stamps are artifacts from a time when letters were the primary form of long-distance communication. Nations were forming or disappearing, and printing technology was evolving rapidly. Unlike modern stamps—mass-produced and deliberately collectible—classic stamps were printed with early technologies, exquisite hand engraving, then handled, folded, cancelled, mailed, and exposed to time and travel.
They were expected to be used once and discarded. The fact that many survived at all is part of their appeal.
Two Paths to Classic Collecting
This site focuses on two structured approaches—the Classic United States and the Classic WorldWide. Both share the same philosophy: structure beats randomness, and achievable beats infinite. This site also focuses first on building "foundation collections" that get beginners going with results that can later be built upon if they decide to take the hobby much much further—as I have.
Path 1: U.S. Classic Foundation (1847–1947)
Collect each and every major stamp design from the first 100 years of U.S. postal history. This "design-type" approach ignores variations in perforations, watermarks, special printings, reissues, etc.—focusing on the 535 unique designs that the Post Office Department issued to deliver United States mail to people like you and me.
535
Unique Designs
~$10K
Total Cost
1
Country
Best for: Collectors who want deep focus on American postal history, prefer a tighter scope, and value the ability to complete their collection in a reasonable timeframe.
Path 2: A Stamp for Every Country (Worldwide 1840-1940)
The Smithsonian's National Postal Museum created a free worldwide album with one stamp space for every country that has ever issued stamps—including many nations that no longer exist. It's structured worldwide collecting at a manageable scale.
~800
Stamp Spaces
330+
Countries
Free
Album Download
Best for: Collectors who love variety, want to learn about the whole world through stamps, and prefer a defined scope that's actually achievable—not an ocean without shores.
For the Ambitious: Advanced Collecting
A large part of this site focuses on helping beginning and long absent stamp collectors get going on this wonderful hobby. Of course, there is much more to do after achieving your successes with your first foundation collecting. The real meat of the site presents a number of very different paths along the road to Advanced Stamp Collecting:
The Big Blue - The Next Step in WorldWide Collecting (1840-1940)
Once you've completed "A Stamp for Every Country" and want to go deeper into worldwide collecting, there's the Scott International Album Part 1 (1840–1940), affectionately called "Big Blue."
This is a serious undertaking: approximately 34,000 stamp spaces across every country's classical issues. It's not a beginner project—it's a lifetime journey for those who fall in love with worldwide collecting.
The essential resource is Jim Jackson's Big Blue 1840-1940 blog—a country-by-country guide with checklists, expense analysis, and decades of collector wisdom. I also present my Big Blue Collection as an interesting (at least to me) way to collect the Big Blue.
My Collection of United States Classic Stamps
My Classic United States collecting goals are now well set. For the period before 1847, I collect what interests me and adds historical perspective to my collection. For the classic period of 1847–1903, I collect Used stamps by design type, followed by Unused stamps by design types, but with considerably more flexibility to expand to items with merit.
These Used and Unused classic stamp issues are then followed by Plate Proofs on card (which have between 500 and 2,500 quantities known for each of them), Roosevelt Presentation Album Small Die Proofs (which have 85 known copies of each), and Atlanta Trial Color Plate Proofs on card (which have 100 known copies of each). This results in a collection of beautiful proofs, which are generally much rarer than the related stamps, to complement my Used and Unused stamps.
After 1903, since there are very few issues with proofs available after the 1903 issues, Used and Unused stamps suffice. Supplementing the individual stamps and proofs are blocks, various studies of types and colors, and other postal history. To me, this best presents both the postal usage and art of philately.
This collection represents my passion for building something that personally interests me, while also satisfying my psychological needs for creative and critical thinking, organization and order, seeking and finding, deal winning and asset building. While this collection is solely for my own personal satisfaction, I do believe it may have some enduring value as well.
My Stamp Platings and stampplating.com
Welcome To The World's Most Challenging Jigsaw Puzzle
The 3¢ U.S. Imperforate Stamp of 1851-1857 is certainly one of the world's most studied stamps. An estimated 362 million copies of this stamp were issued between July 1, 1851 and December 1857. Among the many ways to study this stamp, "Plating" is one of the most interesting. Plating is the practice of identifying an individual stamp's position on a printing plate.
Imagine a jigsaw puzzle where all the pieces seem to look the same. However, after carefully inspecting your pieces, you see that each piece is different and clearly has its own unique position in the puzzle. Then imagine those pieces are not packaged in a pretty little box—instead, you must search throughout the world to find them. Finding those pieces and completing that puzzle is the challenge and fun of plating—and plating is likely the most challenging jigsaw puzzle imaginable.
Reasonable Rarity - the Roosevelt Proofs and Atlanta Trial Color Proofs
There are a number of rare philatelic items that are not expensive. The two most obvious items to me are the 1881 Atlanta Trial Color Proofs, with 100 quantities issued, and the 1903 Roosevelt Presentation Album Proofs, with 85 quantities issued.
Interestingly, Roosevelt Presentation Album Proofs of 1903 and Atlanta Trial Color Proofs of 1881 are generally not identified in philatelic rarity censuses. However, they are rare, and certainly rarer than a number of items included in recognized rarity censuses. There are very few stamps with this rarity and they are all quite expensive. It is also not that proofs are excluded from rarity censuses, because a number of proofs are included.
In my view, the historical, political, and artistic merit of both Atlanta and Roosevelt Proofs makes them both very attractive additions of "reasonable rarity" to one's collection. In addition, if one is collecting stamps with the First 100 Years Album style, proofs present wonderfully in pages following used stamps, because proofs follow exactly the design type concept of this album style.
It is my belief that all types of proofs are the most interesting, rare and undervalued items in United States Classic stamp collecting. Even the plate proofs on card have only 2,500 quantities issued. While this is not rare, it is certainly much fewer than any stamp issue.