This is the opportunity of a lifetime, for those looking to start a worldwide completionist collection. These 43 odd 6-inch thick volumes housed a three-generation lifetime collection that we purchased in November 2023. We have gone through it and taken out all the material that was suitable for our auction.
I stripped most material up to 1960 out of the albums, and then I had Will and Josh lot the remaining post 1960-material, subject to the following stipulations:
- Ignore any used material.
- Leave any mint hinged stamps prior to about Hong Kong. After that I had them pull hinged mint that fit our other criteria.
- Leave anything cataloguing less than $1 per stamp, and any sets where there aren't enough to equal at least $10 of catalogue value.
As a result of these stipulations, there are still thousands of post-1960 stamps in these albums. There will be many used stamps that catalogue more than $2-$5, as we completely ignored used. There is a significant amount of mint hinged material up until at least Great Britain, including lots of Machin Heads and Regionals. The mint may go past that, but my recollection is that after Japan for sure, we pulled most mint, though we would have left any where the catalogue value was under $1 per stamp. So, although the bulk of the stamps are under $1, and a lot are 25c or 50c, you will find plenty of goodies also.
In terms of the pages themselves, the pictures show that all the issues are represented after 1960, and in most cases up to 2014. Prior to 1960, the pages are like Scott Junior pages, where most values are illustrated, but not always every single stamp, or every single variety, but probably 70-80% of the basic stamps are shown. The previous owners fleshed this period out, by inserting blank pages, most of which are still in the albums.
As I said, there are about 43 albums. I haven't done an exact count in a while, but it's give or take 2 volumes. It will take about 13 bankers' boxes to ship these, and it will cost about $900 to ship them all within Canada - possibly slightly less now that a lot of material has been removed. At $50 a box, it should be closer to about $650 in shipping.
The binders are all in good shape, nothing torn or falling apart. The pages are generally all in good condition as well. So, this is a real opportunity. We just don't have the space to continue storing them, and we're never going to get around to stripping them. I had thought of taking them to shows, but that is not really what my business is geared toward. Our core competence is specialized modern and meticulously described stamps sold in this auction, and we have decided to make that our focus.
The successful bidder will be invoiced first for the albums, and half the estimated shipping, with an adjustment to be invoiced, once the albums have been shipped and the true cost is known.
