New Issue: Pets (GB)

The next issue from Royal Mail is "Pets" - and yes, it is as uninspired as I expected it to be.

I like stamps depicting animals. I don't think it's necessarily a bad subject choice, but I just knew Royal Mail would stick to the predictable formula of photographic images on a plain white background.

The images are just nice photographs of pets - nothing more. They don't show the animals doing anything, they don't give us any glimpse into their characters and they're just... well, sorry to say it, but quite boring.

Contrast these with the Cats and Dogs set from 2001. They were so much more creative.

Just to underline the lack of creativity in these stamps, Linn's Stamp News reports that "the goldfish on one of the second-class stamps is identical to the goldfish on a U.S. Goldfish stamp (Scott 5110) issued Aug. 2, 2016." Linn's in, as usual, correct and the US 2016 Pets stamps have a very similar design. It seems the images have been obtained via Shutterstock. Which is fair enough, but shows how much Royal Mail's approach to stamp design has changed.

What do I think of these?

Design Quality — I find the design of these stamps pretty uninspiring. They remind me a lot of the US Pets stamps from 2016, and the basic idea seems to be just taking some stock photos of animals, putting them on a plain white background and calling it a finished stamp design. It feels like such a wasted opportunity because there are so many interesting and fun things Royal Mail could have done with a pets theme. Simple stamp designs can definitely work, which is why I have given them a few marks here, and the photographs themselves aren't bad. The problem is that this seems to be Royal Mail's go-to style far too often: photograph, white background, done. There's nothing particularly original about it and nothing that makes me look at these stamps and think that someone had a really good idea for them. 3/10

Theme / Subject Choice — Pets aren't actually a bad choice for a stamp issue at all. Loads of people have pets and animals have appeared on plenty of good stamps before, so I can understand why Royal Mail chose the subject. My problem is more with what they've actually done with it. Instead of showing something interesting about our relationship with pets, different breeds, the history of keeping pets, people with pets or even just using some really good illustrations, we've basically been given a collection of generic animal photographs. The theme had a lot more potential than these stamps suggest, so I'm giving the subject itself a decent score even though I don't think Royal Mail has made the most of it. 6/10

Historical and Cultural Relevance — There isn't really much historical or cultural relevance here. Obviously, people keep pets and they are an important part of everyday life for millions of people, so I suppose there is a tiny bit of cultural relevance in that sense. But these stamps don't actually tell us anything about the history of pets in Britain or show anything particularly British about pet ownership. You could probably issue exactly the same set in almost any country and nobody would notice the difference. So there isn't much I can give points for in this category. 1/10

Innovation and Creativity — There is basically no creativity here at all. Royal Mail had an enormous subject to work with and somehow came up with one of the most boring ways possible of showing it. It's just ten photographs of animals on white backgrounds. That's it. No clever idea connecting the stamps, no interesting artwork, no unusual layouts and nothing that makes the set feel special. It honestly feels less like somebody designed these stamps and more like somebody searched a stock-photo website for "rabbit", "goldfish", "hamster" and "dog" and then dragged the pictures into ten empty boxes. For a set of stamps that people are actually expected to collect and pay money for, I think that's incredibly lazy. I can't see anything innovative or genuinely creative to award even a point for. 0/10

Collectability — Animal stamps are always going to have some collectability because there are lots of thematic collectors who collect particular animals, birds or pets. Someone who collects rabbit stamps, for example, is probably going to want the rabbit regardless of what I think about the design. The problem is whether this set will really stand out amongst all the other animal stamps that have been issued around the world, and I don't think it will. There are thousands of colourful and interesting animal stamps out there and these just don't have anything particularly memorable about them. They'll certainly find their way into thematic collections, but I can't imagine many collectors getting especially excited about them. 4/10

Personal Appeal — Despite everything I've said about the designs, I don't actually dislike these stamps altogether. The animals are cute, the photographs are nice enough and I can imagine using them on letters and cards. In fact, I'll probably buy some specifically to use when I'm sending mail to people who like animals, because choosing a pet they like will make the envelope a bit more personal. So as stamps to actually use, I quite like them. That's also what makes the issue frustrating because I think I could have liked it much more if more thought had gone into it. It's a good subject and the stamps are pleasant enough, but Royal Mail had the chance to do something really imaginative with pets and instead chose probably the safest and least interesting design possible. 6/10 Overall Score: 20/60