At the end of the month, the price of first and second class stamps will rise to 65p and 56p respectively. But how often do you even use stamps these days?
Christmas seems to be the only time of year you’ll find me buying stamps, mainly because they’re festive themed and I’m quite fond of them.
When you only buy stamps once a year you really notice the price hikes.
I recall buying a couple of books of stamps in early December last year and being slightly staggered by the cost of them.
Chances are it won’t be until this December that I buy my next book of stamps.
By then, they’ll be even more expensive, as the price of both first and second class stamps is set to go up on 27 March.
Buying stamps
Now let’s not blow this out of proportion – they’re only going up by a penny each.
And when you compare that to how much stamps cost in the rest of Europe (on average, 87p for a first class stamp and around 67p for a second class stamp, according to the Royal Mail), they’re actually fairly good value.
But it has got be thinking about how little I actually use stamps and wondering how often other people buy books of stamps or send letters/cards these days.
Personally, my stamp needs are really for Christmas cards. I’ll then have a little collection of festive-themed stamps to use for the remainder of the year, usually for the odd thing like my driving licence renewal.
But even with that most people wouldn’t need to use a stamp.
Had I not looked so ridiculously childlike on my old one, I could’ve done what everyone else does and renewed it online.
As it was, I had to root around my purse for a stamp so I could send off the new picture with the form to DVLA.
No snail mail
When it comes down to it, if I don’t see someone in person, I’ll mostly wish them happy birthday or congratulate them for life events on Facebook or via text.
For birthdays, it usually includes sending good wishes along with my favourite funny photo:
I’ll rarely post a card to them.
And I don’t think I’m alone here either.
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In fact, the only non-billing or statement post I really get these days is an invite to a wedding or baby-related gathering.
That said, the latest invite I’ve had for such an event came via a lovely artworked image invitation sent by text message. It must have saved the bride-and-groom-to-be a fortune in postage.
So how often do you buy stamps? Do you have any quirky stamp collections like my little hoard of festive stamps?