My Life this Month

Ellie is trying to get me to update my blog each week but I'm not so good at it. So instead, I'm going to give you my life this month. I think I'll be able to keep up a monthly update!

But if I have any deep and meaningful thoughts in between, I'll post them up here!

This post covers (ho ho, no pun intended):

• My Olympic Gold Medal collection
• The future of Folkestone Stamp Shop
• Family Business
• Our new Concorde 2009 covers
• Flying Brands and Benham
  

OLYMPICS NIGHTMARE
Some days I wonder if I am a glutton for punishment. Other days, I know I am.

It seemed a good idea on Sunday 24th August when gold medals were raining down on Team GB. A cover collection of gold winners, I thought, would be a gold winner. I was right there. We wrote to our collectors on the Monday and by the time James de Galle had thumped his Cuban opponent to win gold number 17, we had just about sold out of my collection.

They were the good days. From then onwards, it was downhill all the way. Now, last time I did such a collection, I worked with the British Olympic Association (BOA) and I naively thought I’d do the same this time, raising some money for them and the athletes. WRONG. Things had changed since 1996 (was it really that long since I was at Benham?).
The British Olympic Association no longer had any rights. I had to talk to London 2012. This proved difficult because they all were out in Beijing, launching 2012. When I finally made contact I fell flat on my face again. I was using British and Chinese stamps issued under the guidance of . . . the International Olympic Commission (IOC). This meant I technically need three lots of permission.

I immediately applied for a license for 2012.

Unfortunately, I hadn’t got a year or so to negotiate for this year, so the world “Olympic” was obviously banned. We called the collection the “Best in the World” instead.
I then wrote to all 27 gold medal winners via the BOA offering them a total of over £20,000 to sign not very many covers. WRONG. Unfortunately, as it was “commercial” they couldn’t help so returned all my 27 letters in a big box.
So let the fun begin. All I had to do was find 27 people, simple for Sherlock Buckingham, after all I have tracked down people for years. WRONG. It has proved one of the most difficult and time consuming exercises I have ever done. At the time of writing, I have 21 autographs confirmed. 1 will talk next year. I am still tracking 5. I reckon 150 letters, 40 plus emails and hundreds of phone calls.

That was my problem. Alas, I gave Cath an even bigger one. None of the Olympic pictures or photos were available to us so Cath had to research elsewhere. Getting photos of some teams were almost impossible. She even had to create a single picture of a team out of three separate pictures! That’s not only difficult but expensive: three fees. Luckily neither of us could afford a divorce.

I have to say it has been a roller coaster of a ride. We sent 4 covers to be signed at a wedding. I thought it was above the call of duty at the time but it was agreed. Alas, of course with all the excitement and thought of the honeymoon, they were forgotten. We managed to get them back from Royal Mail.

I always thought film stars were difficult but try Ocean racers. It’s Bermuda, Valencia, New Zealand, New York, Hong Kong, Malaysia and that was just up to December. It all comes down to a window of opportunity.

We managed to get the first two signed ones out to collectors on the 31st October. I reckon the last ones will be summer 2009. But if you're buying the collection, Tracey and I hope to send your next 2 covers out in a couple of weeks: Ben Ainslie who is one of our greatest Olympians and Nicole Cooke, a fantastic athlete who took the pressure off (or on?) the others by getting gold on the first day.

Our multisigned editions are all over the place at the moment. They obviously involves a lot of organisation. Tracey, who is in charge of logistics as well as many, many other things, has been superb. She deals with arranging over 150 autographs a year and it does involve a lot of juggling.

END OF AN ERA – FOLKESTONE STAMP SHOP
With the sad loss of Brian Uden, we decided to de-merge the stamp division of Internetstamps Group Ltd: the Folkestone Stamp Shop (FSS). Richard Kennedy, the director in charge, is buying it and moving it to Hythe. This is of course ironic as it started in Hythe in 1973, 35 years ago when I opened it in the Malt House, later moving to 53a High Street in 1975 with the late Bill King managing it.

Brian Uden joined in 1977 and opened the Folkestone shop for me in 1978. At that time, I had three shops in Hythe, Canterbury and Folkestone. Richard joined Brian in 1982 and has been involved ever since so it’s great that he will own it outright. I am sure Richard will do well. Obviously we will help him as much as possible.

FAMILY BUSINESS
After buying Richard’s shares, Internetstamps Group Ltd is now 98% owned by the family. My son-in-law, Tom Hopkins has joined us from a senior management position from South East Trains. He is a senior engineer so we should have no more problems with the pencil sharpeners. Seriously, he has brought that valuable commodity: energy. He is moving us rapidly into the 21st century with major improvements to all of our technology and bringing a very fresh approach to looking at everything we do. The rail industry’s loss is certainly our gain.

40 YEARS SINCE CONCORDE MADE HER MAIDEN FLIGHT
I have been sleuthing as usual, trying to find new Concorde autographs. With both Brian Trubshaw and John Cochrane dead, it’s difficult. Like most of us, I believed that Brian and John flew Concorde on March 2nd 1969 alone.

Actually, it was April 9th and there were 6 aboard. 1 of those has departed on another flight but 3 are still alive and I have tracked them all down. All 3 are signing for me - both on our our 40th anniversary cover and our new Concorde sheet.

So what happened on March 2nd 1969? Andre Turcat and his crew flew from Toulouse. I have been trying to locate them but alas, Andre is, as Gilbert Defer says, preparing for his last flight and despite my best efforts has not responded. Henri Perrier has been charged with manslaughter re the Air France Concorde crash (how he did it sitting in an office in Paris I’m not sure but he was the boss so as they say “the buck stops here”). Funnily enough, he is not keen on signing.

But I have found another key player who was on the flight so am feeling very pleased. 4 new great autographs, all relevant to 1969. Concorde goes on being popular as there is just the tiniest chance she may fly again.

DOWN AMONG THE DEAD MEN
I like to keep an eye on Flying Brands, the company who bought Benham from me back in 1995. If you read my articles in the Philatelic Exporter, you'll remember I mentioned their amazing share price fall compared with Stanley Gibbons.

As I write this, Sinking Brands' (as I like to call them) shares have dropped to 33.5p. They have been down as low as 30p. At 33.5p, the company was valued at £8.5 million. That’s about an 85% drop this year and a staggering 95% drop since they peaked around £160 million. Meanwhile, Stanley Gibbons shares, which were around 10p a share at de-merger, have steadied and the company is now valued at £32 million. I find this fascinating because when Flying Brands (Flying Flowers as they were then) bought Benham for roughly £3 million, the company was worth £32 million. Why they changed to Flying Brands, I don’t know but the way it’s going, it could be Dying Brands, unless they are taken over by Sir Tom Hunter who is already nursing a big loss on his 29% stake. Whatever happens, if I was still at Benham I would be afraid. Very afraid.

WHAT DO YOU THINK?
Do let me know if you like my blog or if I'm telling you what you want to know. Ellie just told me I should have a blog but being a dinosaur about these things, it is all news to me. Comments are most welcome, although Ian, who certainly put me in my place last time, you have to bear with me. Spell check on Microsoft Word is not my friend and insisted on changed Riflemind to Rifleman and Cait to Kate ..... I'll take responsibility for other factual errors though!
I think you can comment on my blog by clicking on "0 comments" at the end and then having your say. Otherwise, give us an email at betty@buckinghamcovers.com and let me know what you think.

And if you have any questions for me, I'll happily answer them here!

Until next time, all best wishes