Candidate Statement of APS Director at Large
As a Life Member of APS I’ve devoted myself to growing the number of adult and youth stamp collectors and growing APS membership. When elected to the Board I will devote myself to continuing the efforts already begun. Stamp collecting needs a welcoming face and the APS StampBuddy program, which I created, is now in full swing at every APS StampShow and AmeriStamp Expo. It has a strong presence at many of the 31 World Series of Philately shows. StampBuddy reaches out to non-collectors through presentations at senior living communities, genealogical societies, libraries and many other venues. APS cannot remain passive in building our hobby. The APS Entry Level Adult and Youth Committee, which I chair, brings together our best stamp educators and creative thinkers.
Every year the April issue of the American Philatelist lists a recruiting Honor Roll for the previous year. For 2015 I was listed as the second biggest recruiter for APS membership in 2014, right behind Donald Sundman of Mystic Stamps.
We know that many stamp collectors are not involved in organized philately. I set out to find them and introduce them to APS. The easiest place to find unaffiliated collectors is on eBay. At my request, APS set up a program to auction donated material on eBay and to make a directed effort to show the relevance of APS to each collector’s interests. That program, called ePAM, or eBay Pathway to APS Membership, is now in Beta test.
World Stamp Show NY2016 will have a Welcome to Stamp Collecting Pavilion. I am on the NY2016 Organizing Committee and have been tasked, as Chairman of the NY2016 Entry Level Adult and Youth Committee, with building an entry level adult and youth program that will occupy 5000 square feet including a 30-seat theater. I’ve asked APS to produce two professional qualities movies, one for youth and one for adults. The APS Board has approved this. When NY2016 is over we will leverage everything we learned to carry over to APS activities.
I’m a former teacher so I am able to see stamp collecting from a youth and young adult perspective. But I am also a business man running a multinational engineering and manufacturing company with offices in the US and China. I have a degree in electrical engineering and a graduate degree in counseling; kind of left-brained/right-brained. I will bring my common sense and business acumen with me.
I’ve also chaired a number of non-profit boards and believe that every Board member ought to have a portfolio: some area of major interest where they can bring new ideas and methods of implementation to a Board. My portfolio will include increasing the number of stamp collectors and growing APS membership. As a member of the innovative APS Membership Committee I am alreadyworking closely with the committee.
The future for our hobby looks bright if only we begin to understand how collectors have changed. We need to do better branding. We need to use new technologies such as online learning, and virtual stamp shows. We need to go beyond exposing our youth to stamps; we need to figure out how to turn them into stamp collectors. If elected, that’s where I am heading. I would love to hear your ideas, especially when they are a little out-of-the-box.
