Monday 15 October 2012

London - Rio Olympic Handover cover delayed; and Memories of London 2012 miniature sheet?

Royal Mail report that production of the Olympic Handover cover has been delayed, and delivery will probably not be until November.

If I understand the position correctly, this has also delayed delivery of the Memories of London 2012 sheet where customers ordered them together, as they are 'bundled' for despatch by Tallents House.  By the time people get them London 2012 will indeed be a distant memory.

I wrote in the original announcement:

Update: For those interested in special printings, consider the likelihood of Royal Mail staff tearing maybe 100,000 stamps of these stamps from the miniature sheets?  I think the £1.28 stamp for these covers will come from a special printing of just this stamp.

I wonder if this is the reason for the delay?

7 comments:

  1. Note that the MS was printed in litho by Cartor and if there is a roll created for these covers, as would be totally logical for the reasons that you state, then Cartor cannot produce stamps in rolls as they only print sheet-fed. So, they may well be printed gravure at Walsall creating a whole new stamp.

    Speculation for sure at this stage, but the issued cover is worthy of examination for its printing process and for cut, instead of torn, top and bottom edges.

    Of course, another alternative is that Cartor prints the stamp in counter sheets, which are then broken down into singles for affixing, in which case there will probably be no difference between the MS and special printing.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. My covers arrived today (!) and the evidence points to the stamps being from MS. See 20 November post - http://norphil.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/no-special-printng-for-stamps-on-rio.html

      Delete
  2. According to the 'First' publication from RM, this MS was printed by Walsall, and the literature on the back of the Pres Pack states the same.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Contracts are often given to Walsall but the stamps printed by their subsidiary Cartor.

      Walsall's lithography printing is always done by Cartor. OTOH as Glenn writes, if a roll is produced, then it will probably be gravure printed in England, unless a third printer is involved. Needless to say, Royal Mail rarely acknowledge anything special about the stamps on such covers.

      Delete
  3. I got my Handover to Rio covers this morning but im still waiting for the Memories First Day cover to arrive

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  4. My cover also arrived today.

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  5. I have a London Rio cover serviced with the complete minisheet . The sheet covers the whole top half of the cover completely . You can not see London or any of the North Atlantic . It seems to point to the fact that the cover was originally designed only to carry the £1.28 Handover Stamp

    ReplyDelete

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