One must kiss a lot of frogs to find a handsome prince. And those needles can be right at the bottom of the haystack.
But they are out there.
Some of the world’s most valuable stamps are listed as unique. But usually “the only known” would be more accurate.
Very few stamps are actually literally the only example.
So that means there could be others out there.
Here are some things to keep your eyes peeled for.
US Grill stamps
At the top of this article is the famous Benjamin Franklin z grill, this example is the 2-cent Andrew Jackson. Less rare, less valuable, but still a great find for most collectors.
The 1868 1-cent Benjamin Franklin Z Grill stamps are extremely rare, which is why one sold for nearly $3 million in 2005.
It’s a legend. And there are only two. Known.
Grills are impressed patterns in stamps designed to soak up cancellation ink.
There might be hundreds of times the known number of Z grills, because although these stamps were a short-lived experiment they were issued to the general public and around 1,000 of the rarest types were printed.
That’s a tiny number for an economy like the US in 1868, but it’s not nothing.
The Z grills are the most famous but most of the grill stamps are rare and some are very valuable.
The grills can be very hard to detect. Sometimes discernible more easily by touch than sight. So if you find US stamps of the appropriate date - 1867 to 1875 - then handle with care.
Chinese Red Revenue stamps
Red Revenues come in a wide variety of styles. Some are hyper-valuable, most are worth finding, all are attractive. You can bid on this on at auction by clicking the image.
A wide range of Red Revenue stamps can be found, some are worth fortunes, most are valuable by philatelic standards.
The stamps were tax payment receipts, overprinted to replace a delayed delivery of new postal stamps. The first attempt was aborted after just 25 stamps were printed. These are priceless.
But the other variants -there are eight overprint styles in 5 face values - are also desirable, many of them worth hundreds of pounds.
It’s also one of China’s prettiest and most loved stamps.
1922 US 5c Roosevelt blue with 10 perforations
Stamp collectors love mistakes, and this one, being hard to spot, is a great one for everyone to study. Image courtesy of Robert Siegel Auctions.
This issue has real potential to be a discovery because its so easy to slip past the untrained eye.
Only stamp collectors count the perforations on stamps.
During the printing of this fairly standard but nice enough US-presidential-portrait stamp, repairs to a perforation wheel resulted in the settings being changed. A number of stamps got 10 rather than 11 perforations along the top edge, some down one side.
These rarities can make towards $10,000 dollars in good condition and there are almost certainly many more used examples out there.
Plate 11 Penny Blacks
Many newcomers to stamp collecting are surprised how commonplace Penny Blacks, the world’s first stamps, are.
The resounding success of the postal experiment means that even though black stamps were replaced with red after around a year, there are millions of surviving Penny Blacks.
But, not all are equal.
As the black was phased out, new plates were made to print the new Penny Red, but the first was needed to make more blacks. This final, emergency printing makes plate-11 printings of the Penny Black the rarest variant.
All plates are unique, but you need sharp eyes - if you find any Penny Black you should check it carefully, or seek advice.
Plate 11 examples are often closer to grey than black, and there is a missing or trimmed ray on the corner star in the south-south-west compass point area.
Plate 11 Penny Blacks can be worth thousands.
Great Britain 1900 1s Green & Carmine with Watermark Inverted
You need to see the watermark to know this stamp was accidentally inverted during printing. Click the image to bid on the stamp.
Watermark inverts are great errors to find, and you need to be looking out for them.
This lovely stamp in its bright contrasting colour scheme is highly sought after in upside-down printings.
You’ll need to look at the reverse of the stamp and have sharp, expert eyes to spot the flipped watermark.
If you see it, it could mean your stamp is worth thousands of pounds.
Queen Victoria high-value definitives from 1867
The 1867 and onwards issues of high-value definitives are all worth looking out for.
These are early surface-printed (rather than engraved) British stamps and admired for their design and quality.
High value stamps are always scarcer than their every-day, low price counterparts.
This series - 5-shilling (1867), 10 shilling (1878), £1 (1878), £5 (1882) - are all good looking and can bring in from the hundreds to thousands of pounds.
Italian Gronchi Rosa
Meant to be a gesture of friendship, instead the Italian post office offended their Peruvian counterparts. Image courtesy of Gothicstamps at Wikimedia.
It's possible that tens of thousands of these stamps were simply sold into use and stuck on letters.
Unfortunately, this pleasant airmail issue from April 1961 used Peruvian-Ecuadorian borders that had subsequently been redrawn.
Not a good start for a stamp linked to a presidential visit.
The Peruvian ambassador sent a strongly worded complaint and the stamp was withdrawn but not before just short of 80,000 sets of the stamp had been sold. Attempts to recover and replace the error were made, but it's certain many escaped.
The stamp is listed online now for over $30,000.
1840 GB 2d Blue
You won't find many examples like this, and all 2d Blues are attractive to collectors. Click this image to discover this item.
Alongside the Penny Black in post offices in May 1840 was a sister portrait of Queen Victoria on the twopenny blue.
With the exception of the colour and the cash price the stamp is basically the same as the black, but printed in much smaller numbers. The 6.4 million or so blues are just a 10th of the number of blacks.
The most treasured blues need to be good condition, with well-cut margins. These can make 10s of thousands of pounds.
Vatican World Youth Day stamp, 2023
Made with good intentions, but with unfortunate echoes of a violent past, this Pope Francis stamp was withdrawn very quickly.
This is very young for such a valuable rarity, and it’s another withdrawal.
Times change. While once stamps celebrating “explorers” and “discoveries” were commonplace issues, in 2023 the Vatican’s stamp for World Youth Day showing Pope Francis on the Henry the Navigator monument in Lisbon was deemed an unseemly reminder of the death and destruction that accompanied Portuguese empire building.
The stamp was quickly withdrawn, but some were sold into general circulation, and examples are already trading for over £1,000.
Oops.
1929 Postal Union Congress stamp, GB 1929
This specimen copy really captures the detail in the design of this classic. Click the image to discover the stamp.
“Britain’s disgrace” fulminated Gibbons Stamp Monthly when this £1 issue was produced to mark the London meeting of the titular congress.
They didn’t like the price, which they felt was exploitative.
But, collectors liked the design of this beauty from the off, and it’s been much-desired ever since - an apogee of British Imperial style.
Condition is a big variable, but these big, beautiful stamps can go for hundreds of pounds.
1857 - 1861 US perforated issue
These were the first perforated US stamps, a set of presidential portraits in a very typical style.
But, the innovation of perforations was ahead of the rest of the postal machine. The stamps were designed for and printed on a grid for imperforate stamps. This meant the new perforations often cut into the frame of the design. This puts good condition survivals at a premium, and attempts to remedy the situation on the fly produced a number of collectible variants.
A full set of unused examples goes for over $20,000.
The Pan-American invert, US 1901
A frame the right way up contrasted with an inverted central image makes this type of error one of the most popular.
Quality control is both the enemy and the friend of the rarity hunting collector.
The legendary 1918 Inverted Jenny defeated checks long enough for a single sheet of 100 to be sold.
That sheet was snapped up by a collector who remembered this 1901 error, produced with the same two-stage (frame-and-image) printing process.
More of the Pan America inverts (an issue to celebrate the 1901 Pan-American Fair Exposition in Buffalo) were printed, and some were sold and used. All of them are valuable.
To further taint the memory of the fair, the President, William McKinley was shot while attending and died shortly afterwards.
China Year of the Monkey, 1980
In lucky red, with a lucky 8 and a lucky monkey, it's demand rather than supply that puts the price of this stamp up. Click the image to see this exciting group.
This stamp is not hugely rare, but it is very sought after.
Lots of China’s Chinese New Year stamps are very attractive, and are worth collecting from new.
This example has stood the test of time because of its (lucky) red colour and the charm of its design.
Good quality, mint examples are treasured and often given as gifts, and strips and groups can sell for tens of thousands of pounds.
German 1980 Olympic Games stamps
Ready to go to Moscow, until they weren't. A boycott made this stamp a super rarity.
Germany was gearing up to send a team to the 1980 Olympics in Moscow.
Part of the preparation included the usual commemorative stamp.
And then… a boycott, after the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan.
The stamps were withdrawn, but a few were posted by a German post office official and are out there somewhere.
A rare discovered example has sold for over $20,000.
2c Large Queen on laid paper, Canada 1868
Nobody knows how many of this hard-to-spot rarity were sent out in the Canadian mail.
It’s a simple paper variant. Most of this issue, they’re not high-value or particularly distinguished, were on wove paper. But a small (but unknown) number were printed on lower-quality laid paper.
The 1c and 3c laid-paper issues were known, but only in 1925 did the first 2c issue come to light.
A late discovery! The perfect recipe for the needle-in-the-haystack stamp.
Only three examples have been found, and they go for over $200,000.
Definitely worth checking Canadian covers for.
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