Please believe me when I say I’m not making this up.

I bought a collection from a woman who inherited it from her aunt. Her aunt went to great lengths to mount her stamps.

She put the stamps in black, split back acetate mounts. She then used tiny pies of adhesive tape to seal the opening on the back of the mount. She also put little pieces of tape on each side to prevent the stamp from falling out. She then used hinges to mount the black mount to the album page. The only thing she didn’t use was Elmer’s glue!

The stamps are all common and low value. It will take days or weeks to release those stamps from the clutches of all of that mounting and adhesive tape.

This collection is worth very little. It will take too long to remove the stamps and remount them. Because the stamps are all common, it’s easier to buy other stamps that are already loose and start collecting with them.

The mint stamps are worth a tiny fraction of face value. Why? If you’re going to use the stamps up for discount postage, there is going to be a lot of work involved in getting those stamps out of those mounts before they can even be used. If I need to put a lot of work into removing those stamps, you’re not getting my standard rate that I use to buy discount postage. Because when I buy discount postage, I expect to put in some small amount of time counting and sorting denominations. This collection will take much longer to process and time is money. This person will be lucky to get 10-20% of face given all of the work that will be involved. If they want more money for the mint stamps, the owner is going to have to remove the stamps from the mounts and put them in some kind of order by denomination.