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A postage stamp booklet is a booklet made up of one or more small panes of postage stamps in a cardboard cover. Booklets are often made from sheets especially printed for this purpose, with a narrow selvage at one side of the booklet pane for binding. From the cutting, the panes are usually imperforate on the edges of the booklet. Smaller and easier to handle than a whole sheet of stamps, in many countries booklets have become a favored way to purchase stamps.

Originally booklets were produced manually, by separating sheets into smaller panes and binding those. These are not distinguishable from the sheet stamps. Later, the popularity of booklets meant that it was worthwhile to produce booklet panes directly; printing onto large sheets, then cutting into booklet panes each with a small number of stamps, and perforating between the stamps of each pane.

First day cover (FDC) is a postage stamp on a cover, postal card or stamped envelope franked on the first day the issue is authorized for use within the country or territory of the stamp-issuing authority. Sometimes the issue is made from a temporary or permanent foreign or overseas office. There will usually be a first day of issue postmark, frequently a pictorial cancellation, indicating the city and date where the item was first issued, and "first day of issue" is often used to refer to this postmark. Depending on the policy of the nation issuing the stamp, official first day postmarks may sometimes be applied to covers weeks or months after the date indicated.

Postal authorities may hold a first day ceremony to generate publicity for the new issue, with postal officials revealing the stamp, and with connected persons in attendance, such as descendants of the person being honored by the stamp. The ceremony may also be held in a location that has a special connection with the stamp's subject, such as the birthplace of a social movement, or at a stamp show.

 

Other types of first day covers

Computer vended postage stamps issued by Neopost had first-day-of-issue ceremonies sponsored by the company, not by an official stamp-issuing entity. Personalised postage stamps of different designs are sometimes also given first-day-of-issue ceremonies and cancellations by the private designer. The stamps issued by private local posts can also have first days of issue, as can artistamps.

Event covers

Soviet Union first day cover for the event of the 1965 Bandy World Championship, that has an arrival backstamp.

Event covers, instead of marking the issuance of a stamp, commemorate events. A design on the left side of the envelope (a "cachet") explains the event or anniversary being celebrated. Ideally the stamp or stamps affixed relate to the event. Cancels are obtained either from the location (e.g., Cape Canaveral, Anytown) or, in the case of the United States, from the Postal Service's Cancellation Services unit in Kansas City.

Earliest known use

The earliest known use (EKU) of a stamp may or may not be the same as the first day of issue. This can occur if:

• Stamps are inadvertently sold or stolen, and cancelled on an envelope or package by unaware postal officials prior to the first day of issue.
• Minor changes, such as a different perforation, are noted by postal officials, and no one knows when they first went on sale. This is also true of some major stamp issues, especially during periods of civil unrest or if government records have been lost.
• Some earlier stamps, especially high values, have not found any customers using them on the day of issue, or those uses have been lost. EKUs for these may be weeks or even months after the official first day.
• Some stamps have not have had an officially designated first day of issue and instead were simply placed on sale whenever the stamps were needed.

The search for EKUs of both old and new stamps is an active area of philately, and new discoveries are regularly announced.

Philatelic covers

First day of issue postmark on a U.S. 1964 stamp.

As the collecting of first day covers became more popular they began to appear on prepared envelopes, often with an illustration (commonly referred to by collectors as a cachet) that corresponded with the theme of the stamp. Several printing companies began producing such envelopes and often hired free lance illustrators to design their cachets such as Charles R. Chickering who in his earlier years designed postage stamps for the U.S. Post Office.

Any sheet containing 4 stamps or more where there is repetition of designs, either all the stamps being the same design or a minimum of two sets of se-tenant pairs.

Two stamps separated by a gutter (selvage).

In philately a maximum card (also known as a maxi-card, or maxicard) is a postcard with a postage stamp placed on the picture side of the card where the stamp and card match or are in concordance. In most cases, the cancellation is also related to the image on the front of the card and the stamp.

A miniature sheet or Mini sheet is a small group of postage stamps still attached to the sheet on which they were printed. They may be either regular issues that just happen to be printed in small groups (typical of many early stamps), or special issues often commemorating some event, such as a national anniversary, philatelic exhibition, or government program. The number of stamps ranges from one to about 25; larger sheets of stamps are simply called "sheets" with no qualifier.

A piece of postal stationery is a stationery item, such as a stamped envelope, letter sheet, postal card, lettercard, aerogram or wrapper, with an imprinted stamp or inscription indicating that a specific rate of postage or related service has been prepaid. It does not, however, include any postcard without a pre-printed stamp.

A revenue stamp, tax stamp or fiscal stamp is a (usually) adhesive label used to collect taxes or fees on documents, tobacco, alcoholic drinks, drugs and medicines, playing cards, hunting licenses, firearm registration, and many other things. Typically businesses purchase the stamps from the government, and attach them to taxed items as part of putting the items on sale, or in the case of documents, as part of filling out the form. Revenue stamps often look very similar to postage stamps, and in some countries and time periods it has been possible to use postage stamps for revenue purposes.

Se-tenant stamps or labels are printed from the same plate and sheet and adjoin one another, unsevered in a strip or block. They differ from each other by design, color, denomination or overprint. They may have a continuous design. The word "se-tenant" translates from French as meaning "joined together" or "holding together".

• Any sheet containing stamps where all the stamp designs are different and meet one of the following criteria :

• • • 1. There are less than 5 stamps in the sheet and the stamps were not also issued separately in single-design or se-tenant full sheets at the time of issue of the sheet.
    • 2. All of the stamps in the sheet, regardless of number of stamps, were also all issued separately in single-design or se-tenant full sheets..

A postage stamp is a small piece of paper that is purchased and displayed on an item of mail as evidence of payment of postage. Typically, stamps are printed on special custom-made paper, show a national designation and a denomination (value) on the front, and have a gum adhesive on the back. Postage stamps are purchased from a postal administration or other authorized vendor, and are used to pay for the costs involved in moving mail, as well as other business necessities such as insurance and registration. They are sometimes a source of net profit to the issuing agency, especially when sold to collectors who will not actually use them for postage.

a joined se-tenant unit consisting of a one or more stamps and one or more decorative labels printed within the sheet of stamps.

a joined se-tenant unit consisting of one or more stamps with attached illustrated sheet margin (selvage) recognized by a Colnect-supported catalog as a distinct collectible variety of the stamp.

a joined pair of stamps printed intentionally or accidentally in upside-down direction to one another. A pair of tête-bêches can be a vertical or a horizontal pair. Triangular stamps can be linked only "head-to-tail". Tête-bêche is a type of the Se-tenant.