There are five main stamp album makers, each of whom makes a complete set of worldwide specialty albums. In order of cost and quality, the publishers are Minkus, Scott, Davo, Lindner, and Lighthouse, each album having their own advantages.
Minkus is the residual publisher from the great Minkus stamp business. At one time, Minkus had stores in forty large department stores and was the largest philatelic retailer in the United States. They established a line of worldwide albums to facilitate sales of stamps as collectors bought more stamps when they had spaces to fill. Minkus albums are the lowest cost option for a full range series of specialty albums. The albums are well designed though the paper of the pages is a bit thin for a good quality album, so with constant use the album tends to show lots of wear.
Scott Publishing albums have long been the gold standard for specialty albums in this country. The albums are on good quality paper and wear well. Additionally, the albums have the advantage of being set up the same way that the Scott catalog is set up so that Semi-postal issues are after Regular issues and followed by Airmails. Scott albums are more expensive than Minkus, but most collectors who make the upgrade are glad they did.
Davo is a Dutch line of worldwide albums. The album paper is good, and the albums come both regular and hingeless (hingeless albums are where each stamp spot has a prefitted clear stamp mount already affixed so that collecting is about as easy as it gets). The albums are very good quality, though the binders tend to be smaller than other albums, often requiring a four volume set where other album publishers use three.
Lindner is a good quality German album produced at a mid-market price (think Volkswagen). The way they manufacture their hingeless albums is by putting an acetate stocksheet over the specialty page so that the stamp goes over the illustration but on a different sheet. It is an ingenious and less expensive way of mounting the stamps, and Lindner has a large worldwide following for their specialty albums. Their design also allows easy viewing of the backs of stamps on an entire page, allowing one to tell whether or not the stamps are NH.
The Mercedes of stamp albums (also from Germany) is Lighthouse whose line of hingeless specialty albums are the world’s finest (and at about $250 per volume, the priciest too). In the days of stamp shops, a collector could go and examine these various types of albums for themselves and make the cost quality equation that we all make when we buy things. Now, you have to order a volume or two of each to see what makes the most sense for you. Used albums are also an attractive option. Most of the collections that we sell are in various, often high quality, albums. Smart collectors scan our listings to fill out their specialty album series with good quality, preowned albums, usually for only the cost of the stamps in the collection. It’s worth a look.