Stamp catalog

A stamp catalog is an important tool for collectors. There are several worldwide catalogs available but also many that are country-specific or on specialized areas. They are illustrated, now mostly in color, with pricing (to be taken with a grain of salt unless you know how pricing works), dating, identification, details and notes to help you identify stamps. That said, worldwide catalogs can be quite detailed but can be hard to understand at times and by natural limitations of a printed book/books/website, do not contain everything you might want or need to know. Be realistic.

All print catalogs have an introductory section that is a must-read to understand stamps and how to use the catalog. Stamp Encyclopedia will try to provide some understanding of th basics you need to know, but understanding how certain catalogs handle listings is also an important thing to learn. So yeah, some study is needed but can be taken in small doses to prevent headaches.

Each catalog system uses its own unique numbering

General worldwide catalogs
The major worldwide reference in the Americas is the Scott Catalog, published yearly. It is now up to 12 volumes plus a US Specialized catalog although a more basic US section is included in the worldwide set. The Scott Stamp Monthly magazine lists new issues to enable collectors to keep up to date.

The listing style is to separate out semipostals, airmails, postage dues, etc., etc. into individual sections for each country. The ordering of countries is, of course, alphabetic, but some countries that others including Stamp Encyclopedia consider as separate entities/countries are listed behind a major country listing while some are not. So, the index/indices is/are your friend.

The Scott catalog prices are idealized in that they reflect the highest quality possible. But the market scheme today is to sell fast and so real prices are often heavily reduced from Scott assuming the seller knows what they're doing. Still, Scott pricing allows collectors to separate absolutely cheap stamps from better ones.

The Scott Catalog has recently emerged into the electronic age with its first digital online version, available by subscription. The first edition has been truly underwhelming and much more needs to be done to bring it into the 21st Century.

The Michel Catalog, is another worldwide multi-volume print catalog, with volumes arranged by geographical area and renewed every couple of years. Meanwhile, the Michel Rundschau monthly magazine provides catalog listing/new issue updates.

Michel catalog prices are highly inflated. Dealers worth their salt sell for much less. Yet their pricing remains a good guide to separate cheap stamps from better ones.

Its Germany and German-related volumes are highly detailed and are a part of the whole catalog system. Its style is to include (for example) semipostals and airmails with "regular" stamps. the Michel lists a number of things that other catalogs do not such as wartime locals, SCADTA and the Trucial States issues. The print version is in German, but if you are experienced in using stamp catalogs, the symbols used become clear. For the extensive notes, Google Translate is your friend if you don't know German. However...

Michel also has its catalog in a digital online version accessible by subscription. It auto-translates everything into English. This is a proper digital catalog that has 3 user levels. The higher levels have features such enlarged images and saved searches.

The Stanley Gibbons catalogue is another English-language catalog, with various paperback volumes arranged by geographical area. Great Britain and the British Commonwealth are collected in separate volumes. The area volumes are updated every few years with Stanley Gibbons Monthly providing updates/new issues in the meantime.

Stanley Gibbons prices are also inflated. Any dealer who knows what they are doing will discount their prices by quite a bit. Again though, Gibbons catalogue pricing shows the right difference in pricing cheap stamps vs. expensive ones.

The Great Britain and Commonwealth volumes are quite detailed and are a part of the whole catalog system. It also includes semipostals and airmails, etc. within the basic range of listings with back of the book issues following. It is generally more detailed than, say, Scott, and is more logically arranged, there are moments of too much detail for the majority of collectors, especially for classics.

The individual catalogues are also available in PDF format, quite reasonably priced and the way to go in this writer's opinion.

Stampworld (https://www.stampworld.com/en/) is a free online catalog that is also a sale site. You will need to sign up after several uses. It is also arranged by continent. It is very basic, perhaps all you will want or need for the moment for simple dating or identification. Many of its images are far from perfect. Stamp details are kept off the main listing but can be found by clicking on an image.

Its pricing can be all over the place sometimes.

It separates countries into year groups and has semipostals and airmails, etc. into separate sub-listings. It is rather "old-school'' but it is fairly comprehensive and importantly, free.

Colnet (https://colnect.com/en/stamps/catalog) gets a mention, another catalog and sale site. The content is user submitted. Each country is organized by year and at last look there are quite a few individual stamps still missing. There is much more detail given for individual stamps and better quality expandable images overall compared with Stampworld. It does have other catalog's catalog numbers, thinly disguised. You can search by topic/theme, a big plus (assuming the submitter included that info). But this writer thinks the organization is clunky (by year) and again is very "old-school".

The basic library
For you 'Mercans and English speakers without a "native" catalog, the Scott catalogs are the common important reference for you. US dealers will know what you are talking about, and if you use Scott albums, the ordering of issues will make sense to you. But you may not have the hundreds of dollars to spend for a set of Scott catalogs.

First of all, prices normally don't change drastically if at all from year to year. If you're not concerned with keeping up with new issues every year, and you want a reference for home, older Scott catalogs can be had quite cheaply via Amazon or eBay. The "Friends of Library X" are always helping public libraries sell off old versions with the cost of shipping now becoming the major concern over book price. When ordering, We suggest you check that it is not being shipped in the standard plastic bags used to ship books, since the catalogs are very heavy and will break through them.

The cheap method is to use your public library system. Many libraries keep up with the newest Scott catalogs in their reference sections and will often have older versions available for checkout. Remember that these are backbreakers, so unless you can back up your car to the door, maybe borrow just one volume at a time?





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