Mint Never Hinged - Unused and Unmounted ~ More Food for Thought

There is an increasing gap in prices for mint never hinged stamps - those with original gum that have no hinge mark or other gum disturbance - and mint hinged stamps, those that have a mark on the gum where a stamp hinge used to be.

Some stamps that have been hinged have superb centering. Should those stamps be automatically rejected from being in a stamp collection? Especially when never hinged copies that are poorly centered are actually less attractive?

Some stamps are almost impossible to buy in never hinged condition, or at least impossible to buy at a realistic price. Lovely examples of hinged stamps may be readily available and very desirable. Should those lovely stamps be ignored? Especially if you'll never be able to afford a never hinged copy?

Just some food for thought regarding the current "mint never hinged craze."

Unused Stamps - Do You Want to Collect Mint Never Hinged, or Mint Hinged?

Some people collect postally used stamps, and we applaud them for doing so. Finding high-quality used stamps to include in a stamp collection can be much more challenging - and therefore rewarding - than locating the same stamp in unused, mint condition. And although there are some notable exceptions, most postally used stamps are less expensive than their mint counterparts. The difference in prices allows the typical stamp collector to include many more used stamps in his or her collection than would be possible with unused stamps.

That's why the folks at The Stamp People chose to offer for sale a large number of postally used stamps in addition to mint stamps. Doing so allows them to help that many more people build their stamp collections.

But enough of that - this post is intended to discuss the relative merits of collecting mint never hinged (unmounted) stamps versus mint hinged stamps.

Often, although not always, there's a significant difference in price between a mint never hinged stamp and its hinged counterpart. Both types - hinged and unhinged mint (unused) stamps - have their original gum. But when a mint stamp has been affixed to a stamp album page by a hinge, its gum is disturbed to one degree or another.

When removed, some high quality hinges leave only an extremely light mark on the gum that can be difficult to see unless the stamp is held at an angle or "against" the light. Other hinges, when removed, leave a much more significant mark or even part of the hinge itself remains attached to the stamp (known as a "hinge remnant").

In contrast, mint never hinged stamps, by definition, have never had a hinge attached to them and so there cannot be any hinge marks or hinge remnants.

But how important is this?

Well, the value of a mint never hinged stamp may be only 5 cents more than a hinged copy, or it might be hundreds of dollars more. It all depends on the rarity and condition of the specific stamp.

So whether a mint stamp has been hinged or not can have a very significant affect on its value. But consider these facts:

• although it may be worth much more (or maybe not), a mint never hinged stamp will also cost more to buy. It increases the value of your stamp collection more than a hinged stamp would, but it also costs more to add to your collection. Would you rather have more stamps in your collection (as you could with the more inexpensive hinged stamps or used stamps) or fewer but more valuable stamps? Only you can answer that question - your collection is whatever you want to make of it.

• do you want to "buy gum?" By that we mean, you will probably pay a significantly higher price for mint never hinged stamps, even though the only difference between them and the same stamps when hinged is those little marks on the gum. How important is that to you? Do you often look at the backs of your stamps? (we think not, once they're mounted in your stamp album) Again, only you can answer that question - it's your stamp collection and you're the one who gets to decide what's important and what's not.

• Early (vintage) mint never hinged stamps carry a sometimes huge price increase over their hinged counterparts. The reason? Stamp mounts didn't exist back then. If a stamp was going to be mounted on an album page, it had to be done with a hinge. That's all there was (although some people used stamp selvedge for the same purpose, it leaves an even worse gum disturbance than stamp hinges). And because most collected stamps were, and are, mounted on stamp album pages, there just aren't that many unhinged vintage stamps around. They're much harder to find, and they're much, much more expensive than a hinged stamp. So if you insist on only mint never hinged stamps in your collection, you may have some difficulties finding older stamps - and you'll probably have some serious money involved.
  

Postally Used Stamp Collections - Popular or Not?

We've recently read that nowadays, stamp collectors are not as interested in postally used stamps as they are in mint never hinged stamps (unused and unmounted).

We disagree. And we disagree quite strongly. Here's why:

1. The number of stamps now being issued throughout the world makes it an almost impossible task to collect worldwide mint never hinged new issues.

For the vast majority of stamp collectors, the expense of collecting worldwide mint never hinged new issues would simply be too large, because of the now-huge number of stamps that would be involved. And in a time like now, when several countries issue more than 100 stamps per year all by themselves, the amount of time involved to assemble the thousands of new stamps coming out each year would also be prohibitive.

It's easier to collect mint never hinged new issue stamps when you only collect stamps from one or two countries. But take a country like the United States just as an example. The first class, one ounce letter rate stamp is now 42 cents. Multiply that by one hundred or so (an estimate for the number of new stamps that will be issued) and that's $42.00 if all those new stamps are purchased at face value at the post office - the cheapest way to buy them. But wait - there's a new Express Mail stamp and a new Priority Mail stamp. Between just those 2 stamps, there's another almost $20. So now we're at about $62.00, and we haven't even included the postcard rate stamps, the 2 ounce stamps, the international letterpost stamps, etc. The total could easily be $80 or $90 or more. And that's just one year and one country, purchased at the post office. If a stamp collector is buying older mint never hinged stamps he or she would need to buy them from a stamp dealer, at a much greater cost.


2. While it's true in many cases that mint never hinged stamps have a higher catalog value than their used counterparts, there are many exceptions where the postally used stamp is worth much, much more than the same stamp in mint condition (even when never hinged).

3. Finding specific postally used stamps for a collection is generally a much greater challenge - and usually much more fun and rewarding - for the stamp collector. You can't just go to the post office and buy them. And most stamp dealers don't stock inexpensive used stamps - they just don't want to spend the time that would be required in order to catalog and stock inexpensive used stamps (for an exception to this general rule, visit www.thestamppeople.com - they sell expensive, classic stamps, but they also sell wholesale bulk lot stamps and individual inexpensive stamps).

4. How many people enjoy buying a "mystery box" of stamps, or bags of stamps, or bulk lots of stamps? You might be surprised by the answer. For a very long time, this has been one of the all-time most popular ways of buying stamps. And as popular as they've always been, sales of postally used, wholesale priced bulk stamp mixtures are going up even more, not down. This is true for kiloware (on paper stamp mixtures) and also off-paper stamp mixtures.

So bottom line, we think collecting postally used stamps is alive and healthy.