Went to my first stamp fair today. It was small, which isn't a surprise. My city is smallish. Also not a surprise was most people were in the (guessing) 50-70 age bracket. My main complaint was that many of the exhibitors (mostly collectors who deal to finance their hobby) didn't seem to 'notice' or acknowledge me at first. They mostly were too busy with their own stuff or talking to each other. It was when I showed signs of interest in specific items that they started to acknowledge me, and were very congenial. . Also, several were too busy sorting through their stuff to notice potential customers.( I see this kind of inattentiveness often at events, and its a peeve of mine. Pay attention to customers, not your cell phone or whatever) Bought some nice stamps at good prices, a stock book and I'm hoping to win the door prize! I'll post picture soon. All in all, an hour well spent and fun
Glad you enjoyed the stamp fair! I went to a stamp exhibition/show yesterday and picked up a few stamps also. I was impressed by the grand champion exhibit which featured a nearly complete 1851 1c Franklin sheet and many scarce position pieces. My bother, sister-in-law and niece were shocked when I told them that this was an exhibit worth in excess of a million dollars. There were over 3000 frames of exhibits and some of the entries were really interesting, really a global candy store in a sense.
They were mounted this way for the auction Its so nicely done I'll probably just keep them as they are. There is the historical description of each stamp below the stamp itself too. Those were at the silent auction, I got both below the catalogue price. Good bargain I also bought small packs of stamps, including a nice set of Indian ones. I'll post them tomorrow. (If I don't, I"m sure you'll remind me, Tu7) Glad you liked them!
Nice that they were so beautifully presented. Do you have a folder or something to put them in? Yes, I would love to see the other stamps too.
For older stamps, I keep them in a stockbook. For newer stamps, I put them in an album. These I'd put in page savers and keep them in a binder. (The Album is much larger than normal 8.5 x 11 pages)
I use stock books for older stamps to avoid hinges. Also, I tent to move them around and reorganize as I get more, so this way its easier than if I used mounts in an album. ​But hey, to each their own. Nothing wrong with other methods.
That is a good point about hinges, clear glassine mounts are expensive but would provide an alternative. I think what I like about stockbooks is how well they do protect the older stamps, as you say though......
I haven't had the opportunity to go to a stamp fair. I would like to go whenever they have one in my area.
I have visited some stamp displays/museum but have not tried going in a stamp fair since it is very rare to have such fair here.
Well maybe they are not professional sellers, so they lack something that a REAL seller would have......to actually take note of your customers! Perhaps they participated just for fun, or just to share their collections with a wider audience instead of making money from it, so they don't actually take things too seriously? Exactly how are these fair organized anyway? Was it organized by a person? An organization? Do they have to rent a place for it? I would love to go for a stamp fair if I have the chance
Fairs in London are organized and the dealers are 99% professionals, you get the odd group who have stalls for things like Arctic stamp society, Falkland Islands society etc and yes they pay for the privilege of been there
