Welcome to the shop!
Items listed in the shop are accumulated over the last 40+ years of collecting and hoarding. They are not listed for a living, hence the shop is not registered with Delcampe as a professional seller. Since we live in the beautiful Swedish countryside, there are 15 minutes by car to the nearest post office, which is the reason why shipments are sent every Tuesday and Friday.
All shipments get beautiful postmarks to go with the postage stamps that are usually used as franking - at no extra charge. Shipments are franked with se-tenants from booklets (not that commonly seen as postage). Motives of the postage stamps are chosen according to what the buyer seems to collect. You might drop a note with a special request.
Sending letters from Sweden is expensive when comparing to other countries in Europe. This fact has molded the sales conditions, and since it is not possible to compete with low shipping costs in other countries, the sales conditions are catering to an audience that are interested in purchasing somewhat more than a single postage stamp or cover. You are however more than welcome to purchase that single item that is missing in your collection. The flat rate shipping and handling fee comes in handy as you can buy as much as you wish for one invoice, and still only pay the flat rate s&h fee.
Questions you might want to ask?
Q: Why don't you accept PayPal for payments?
A: First of all, I would like to keep expenses down so you can buy low priced items and I still have a profit. PayPal charges a commission, Mangopay doesn't. Secondly, situated in Sweden there is little to do with PayPal and withdrawing funds from PayPal it has to be to a bank in Sweden, and the funds must be exchanged to the local currency (Swedish kronor) at a rate that PayPal decides, which is not to my advantage.
Q: Why does many of your listings have a complete date in the title?
A: Collectors of postal history needs to see when a letter/postcard was postally used, which is confirmed by the date in the postmark. When writing the date in the title of the listing it is possible to see that the date is readable. Whether the date is within the correct period of usage is not always possible to distinguish without proper literature. It also makes it possible to search for a certain date for those who for instance collect birthdays.
Q: What about lower bids?
A: Lower bids are welcome, but keep in mind that margins on mint postage stamps are small. The shop settings are that lower bids of 10% are accepted automatically.
Q: Your shipping and handling fee is expensive, what do I get for the money?
A: Yes, postage rates are expensive in Sweden, I confess. But, my shop has a flatrate fee (Pauschal in German), so you are welcome to buy as much as you want for one payment request and only pay the flatrate fee. Furthermore, I always use postage stamps for franking and a readable postmark is applied at the local post office. In other words, when buying in my shop the packaging is also a collectable worth your money spent.
First and foremost I am a collector
It's really difficult for me to answer the very simple question that many people ask: “What is your collecting interest?”
To keep it simple the answer must be: “I collect anything philatelic related to the country of Latvia”, but, I am highly specialized.
What I do not collect are off-cover used stamps and stamps cancelled to order (CTO), any “made for collectors” items, such as special cancellations and cachets on covers, first day covers (FDC's) and related things. I do collect mint Latvian stamps, but nothing fancy, just by the Michel catalogue numbers, and I've got most of them.
Now that I've covered the basics, let me tell you what really tickles my fancy:
- (Traditional) Independent Latvia, solo usage covers/postcards by Michel catalogue and correct postage rate and time period.
- (Thematical) Lettonica - anything philatelically related to Latvia, but issued by other postal services than Latvia.
- (Traditional) Riga, the capital of Latvia - under the occupation of foreign powers (Ober Ost, USSR, Reichskommissariat Ostland)
(latest update: 9 May 2024)
