What began as a robust philatelic program in a New York City
department store continues to have remnants on the modern internet, but only a
slice of what was. In what was a major commercial success beginning in 1931 in
the Gimbel’s Department Store in New York City, the Minkus Stamp Company opened
a small stamp counter that eventually expanded to stamp counters in department
stores around the country.
The popularity of the stamp hobby in the first 30 years of
the 20th Century was evident in the hundreds of stamp stores open on
Nassau Street in lower Manhattan. The United States Post Office actively
promoted the hobby, but the hobby was still not a major factor in American
culture until all was changed by Jacques Minkus, known as ‘The Merchant Prince
of Stamp Collecting’.
After immigrating to the Unites States from Germany in 1929,
Jacque and his brother, Morris, were printing miniature dictionaries for sale
in chain stores. They were approached by a stamp dealer regarding a stamp album
that was being imported from England at a cost of 65-cents a copy. The stamp
dealer asked the Minkus brothers if they could produce the album for less.
They did, selling their albums for a dime and talking the
chain stores that carried their dictionary into stocking the albums and
accompanying bags of stamps. Soon they were producing thousands of albums for
an eager public.
Next stop was a small counter in the rear of the famous
Gimbels Department Store. Gimbels was one of the big three that dominated
American retailing in the 1930; Sears, Macy’s and Gimbels. Although not a stamp
collector himself, Minkus and the company that bore his name had a significant
impact on the stamp collecting hobby. His success in large part was founded on
his understanding that the hobby must be fun and the entry level need be
inexpensive.
At its high-point the Gimbels Stamp Counter grew to a
dominant position on the store’s main floor, covering 2,300 square feet of
floorspace, with 40 professional philatelists to serve the thousands of stamp
collector customers. At their peak, the
stamp department was re-designed by the prominent Raymond Lowey Associates, a
project which took over two years of planning to accomplish, and at a cost of
over a million dollars.
With this success, the retail model was replicated by Minkus
in 38 other major department stores nationwide. Icons of this success were the publication of
the Minkus Master Global and Supreme Global Stamp Albums. Many of these albums
continue in use today, having been handed down from father to sons and mothers
to daughters. Minkus also published the New American Stamp Catalogue, in
competition with the dominant Scott Catalog.
The catalog never overtook Scott, even though it featured more
description of the stamp subjects than the more spartan Scott Catalog. Finally in
2004 what was by then Krause-Minkus Publishing was acquired by Scott and the
catalog was discontinued. But the Minkus legacy continues on.
While today the Minkus Album is out of print, there are a
sufficient number of Minkus Albums still in use that we (iHobb.com) maintain a
robust business in annual supplement updates for the Minkus Still popular are the
All-American, U.S. Commemorative, U.S. Regular Issue and the U.S. Plate Block
Album plus new binders to replace the worn and the expanding collections in albums
begun during this heyday of stamp retailing.
The department store is being replaced by Amazon and the
internet and local stamp stores are being replaced by part-time dealers at
stamp shows and those of us on the internet. Time marches on. But we stand on
the shoulders of companies like the Minkus Stamp Company and its founder,
Jacque Minkus.
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