A second chance
What’s to be done with leftover stamps? In keeping with the principle of “turning old into new”, Swiss Post overprinted two designs still left over in stock, giving them a new lease of life.
Déjà vu? That’s right: the two designs, of Lucerne and Brig rail- way stations, were originally issued in 2016 as part of the
“Swiss railway stations” definitive stamp set. Because not all of them were sold and the face values have changed, the remaining stamps were simply lying around in stock. But the train for the stamps hasn’t yet left the station: Swiss Post gave the “old” stamps a second chance by overprinting them with the current face values. “With these overprints, Swiss Post is not only cre- ating a philatelic rarity, it is also conserving natural resources and taking a further step in the implementation of its sustaina- bility strategy,” says Kurt Strässle, Head of Culture and Partner Management at Swiss Post Philately.
The first overprints
The overprinting of face values is not a new method: when postage rates for domestic postal services were increased for the first time on 1 February 1915, Swiss Post overprinted old stamps as a temporary solution until the new stamps were
issued. For example, on the so-called “used issue with overprint” of the Helvetia stamps, the 12 became a 13. The two-centime stamp as a supplementary stamp, on the other hand, was re- duced to one centime. The adjustments were made using let- terpress printing by the official mint of the Swiss Confederation in Bern (now Swissmint). The print run totalled an impressive
11.5 million.
For airmail, the first used issues appeared in 1935. The original
15-centime “Aeroplane over the Alps” stamp, designed by Karl Bickel, the most important stamp designer at the time, was subsequently overprinted with the number 10. As was the
“Stylized 3-engine commercial aircraft” stamp. The overprints remained valid as supplementary stamps until the end of 1942.
