What Can Be Done: Luxembourg is a relatively unpopular philatelic country. Writers have ascribed this to Luxembourg’s small internal market (population only a bit over 500,000). Iceland however is far smaller, as is St Pierre and Miquelon, yet their stamps are far more popularly collected than the stamps of Luxembourg. No, it’s not population or internal markets. Luxembourg suffers from too many early high priced stamps, too many very cheap stamps in the middle period, and too many forgeries. Also, until 1950 the stamps of Luxembourg were poorly designed and executed. Still, the country has many collectors, though not nearly as many as the other countries of Western Europe. And Luxembourg philately has its interest and challenges.
The first issue of Luxembourg is very similar to the first issue of Netherlands and is actively collected on its own as one of the most interesting nineteenth century issues. After the first issue, the problems of collecting Luxembourg begin. The next few issues were printed by lithography and typography on unwatermarked paper and were easily and often forged. Our hobby has millions of stamps to collect and when a country has too many forgeries of its issues, collectors tend to take their interest elsewhere (Mexico and Iran are two other philatelic areas that suffer in popularity because of forgeries). By the time a collector gets to the 1880’s, the forgeries stop, mainly because the stamps are so common (who wastes their time forging a common stamp?) and there is a fifty year period (1880-1930) where there is barely a single scarce Luxembourg stamp.
In the modern period (after 1950), Luxembourg has been one of the most conservative stamp issuers in Europe. They issue far fewer stamps per year than most other countries at far lower postage value. And the modern stamps are well designed and the production values are high. Modern Luxembourg deserves to be more popular. The semi-postal issues (or as the Europeans call them Charity Stamps, because there is a surcharge for charitable works) are popular and attractive.
Serious problems start again with the Officials. Most are simple and easy to forge as they are overprints on crudely printed easy to forge basic stamps. As if that wasn’t enough, many catalog for thousands of dollars. This is a prescription for forgeries and that’s what we have. These stamps are unpopular and, though easy to expertise, if you collect Luxembourg, it would be easy just to avoid them altogether.
Specialty Catalogs: Years ago, specialists in most European countries had to purchase the specialty catalogs for the countries they collected. Since about 2000, Scott has issued its Classic Catalog for worldwide issues 1840-1940. The Scott Classic catalog is not only good but it gets better each year. Scott keeps expanding its listings, adding new specialty listings each year. It is not original work. Scott is doing little more than reprinting the listings for the foreign specialty catalogs, but the Scott listings are in English and the stamps have Scott catalog numbers. For countries like Luxembourg the Scott classic is good enough to eliminate the need to purchase the specialty catalog (this isn’t true for all countries though – Michel for Germany is still head and shoulders above Scott).
The Scott Classic catalog is expensive – retailing near $150 for the single large volume. Prices and new listings don’t really change that much year to year though. A several year old, lightly used Scott Classic catalog can be found on EBay for $30 or $40, and this would be a good way to start using this catalog at a good price.
Specialty Albums: The Scott specialty series is very good for Luxembourg and if you like to use Scott albums by all means stick with them. But if you have wanted to experience Lighthouse hingeless albums – the most expensive but also the nicest specialty albums – Luxembourg would be a good country to start with. This is because Luxembourg has issued far fewer stamps than most other European countries. The Lighthouse Luxembourg album is in two or three volumes and so is far less expensive than their other albums.
Availability of Material: Luxembourg stamps are widely available and actively sold. Collectors should have no trouble finding nearly all the stamps of the country.
Expense: Because of the relative unpopularity of Luxembourg, compared to its neighbors, the stamps are not very expensive. If you stay away from the Officials (as recommended above), the entire country can be collected for a few thousand dollars.
Overall grade: C