How many stamp collectors left in North America?
First of all, I understand that accuracy is impossible to achieve , but are there young, new stamp collectors emerging? Or is this hobby (and market) an inverted pyramid? .. just wondering.
Comments
declining hobby.
Will never die completely. But in another 50 years prob 90% less per capita than 40 years ago.
When I was a kid in the early 80s I had numerous stamp collecting friends.
I do not know a single kid these days among friends and relatives that collect.
So there is your sad but honest reality.
not sure why you would think North America being that high?
Less than 5% of the World population lives in North America.
I would think it would be much closer to that percentage. There is little reason to think stamp collecting is much lower in certain countries. Except maybe some 3rd world countries or others that have more pressing issues, like civil war, poverty etc
I would say from personal experience, Americans, British, German, and Russians have strong concentrations of collectors as well. Tends to attract people who love detail , history, geography. Most people I exchange with and fellow penpals and those who love the hobby , most are from British Commonwealth Countries, or former. Also Russians and Germans. I have no idea why, But this is my own personal experience
There will be very, very few serious philatelists among Millennials and members of Generations X, Y, and Z, likely numbering a few thousands in the Americas and Europe combined, and I'm being very optimistic.
The various strata of true antique furniture.market have followed the same pattern.
Lots of reasons - discussion boards in the various fields note that people have less free time. That is not true - they use their time differently. They stare at their cell phones, they 4instant message with others, they read forums instead of books (guilty).They choose to be busy ....Ditch the modern "time savers" (wasters) and you will have all kinds of time.
prices are going down, because the internet makes it a LOT easier to find stuff.
I used to sell books and I always used this example:
Say there is a RARE book with maybe 4,000 copies that survived the years.
Pre Internet there were 20,000 used/rare books stores.
Say 5% of the surviving books are available for sale = 200 copies
The rest collects dust in people's attics, basements whatever.
On average ONE out of 100 dealers has this book in stock.
You need to contact 100 dealers to find that book. That's semi rare.
Now almost all dealers have their better inventory online.
Say 75% of the books are online: That means with one or two internet searches you have about 150 copies of this book to chose from. Not rare at all any more.
Maybe the C3a should be put up for auction on HipStamp with a starting price of $1 and find out what it is really worth to this community of buyers! I have to doubt there are many millionaires trolling HipStamp looking for a bargain C3a at half a million dollars!