Nineteen years ago, at the PopTech Conference in Maine, I first learned about Canada Post’s custom postage stamp service, Picture Postage; Megatrends author John Naisbitt mentioned it in his talk.
Being a lover of postage, and of customization, you would have thought I’d have jumped at the change to craft my own stamps, but it’s taken until now for the stars to align: at the end of November I ordered a sheet of stamps using the MMXX! card I’d printed on my letterpress as the image. I’m not entirely satisfied with the result: the service imposes a design requirement to use one of its frames around your chosen image, and the only not-completely-ugly-and-intrusive option is “shadow,” but even that imposes a certain pall of ugliness on anything it wraps around.
Nonetheless: I have stamps. That I designed, typeset, printed, and photographed. That’s pretty cool.
A sheet of 50 stamps came to $80.88 with taxes and shipping included, or $1.61 for each stamp, a 75% premium over the cost of a regular 92 cent stamp. So I won’t be replacing them as my everyday postage of choice. Delivery took 17 days from my initial order.
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I am Peter Rukavina and this is my blog. I am a writer, letterpress printer, and a curious person.
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Comments
Here's me posting another
Here's me posting another 'Cool!' comment :D
I had no idea! Wow. Thanks
I had no idea! Wow. Thanks for sharing all that you do with us.
I still think these are
I still think these are gorgeous, no matter the frame. These should become collectors' items!
I was going to add -
I was going to add - collectors' items - also, and probably used only for special recipients who will appreciate them and not just toss the envelope in the garbage or the shredder or the fire. Something positive, though, is that these are P stamps, so they will increase in value every year - every mid-January Canada Post increases rates (other than that one time a few years ago when there was a big jump in rates). Remember that the 92 cent P stamp is actually higher as 5% GST is added to the stamp price, so the premium is actually a little bit lower than 75%, but still worth every penny!
This is very cool. I had to
This is very cool. I had to look at the other framing options, and you did choose the most unobtrusive. I guess these (mostly really cheesey) frames must be mandatory to keep some sort of brand integrity in place? But it's still really cool.
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