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Buying new U-S stamps

The Stamp Collecting Report, I'm Lloyd de Vries.

Where can you purchase new issues from the U-S Postal Service? The obvious — and
traditional — answer is “at your post office,” but increasingly, that’s not the case.
Not all new stamps are distributed to all post offices. Still, that should probably
be your first hit.

If one post office says no, you might try another. Some are more collector-friendly
than others. Size doesn’t matter.

And if the window clerk can’t help you, ask to speak to the “stamp distribution officer”
to see if the office can get the issue.

The Postal Service has a large mail order operation, which you can access from eBay…
From shop-U-S-P-S-dot-com… Or by calling 800-stamp-24. There’s a small postage and
handling fee, but it’s less than two dollars.

That mail order operation is generally the best bet for special stamps — high values,
odd values or even stamps that were issued a few months ago.  And it may be easier and
cheaper than running around.

I recently needed some of the Patriotic Spiral coil, which was only available as a roll
of 10-thousand stamps. Price: 47-hundred dollars. But I could order strips of ten by
mail for less than five bucks. Guess which I did?

I’m Lloyd de Vries of The Virtual Stamp Club. For more on stamps and stamp collecting,
visit virtual-stamp-club-dot-com.

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