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I just received an order for a cover that read in part:
This particular cover is of great interest to me, as it was posted in my hometown when I still lived there.
This reminded me of one of the best sales that I ever had as a cover dealer on the bourse circuit.
Somewhere around 1985 I was at ROMPEX, in Denver. I recently had bought a large APO collection in which there were about 30 9x12" envelopes made from old US Army maps (no longer needed as the war was
over there) and sent from APOs in Germany in late 1945-47. These were kind of neat but, because of their size and an almost-total lack of interest in post-war APO covers at that time, not worth very much. I decided it would be a nice gesture (and a good way to get rid of them) to use them as bags for my customers' purchases.
On the Sunday morning things were very slow at ROMPEX that year. A couple, late 50s,
with German accents, sat down at my table and went through my German covers. The husband bought something and I gave him as a "bag" one of these big map covers. I then said, heck, things are slow, why not take one for your wife as well. He asked if it would be okay to pick one out. I said "Sure," and returned to the conversation I'd been having with the dealer in the booth next to mine.
About 2 minutes later, I heard an exclamation from the man, and when I turned to see what was going on I found him pointing at the map on the inside of one of these covers and excitedly telling his wife, "This is the town where I was born, and in this town my uncle and I went to buy an apple tree when I was a little boy."
I don't think I've ever seen, in the couple of hundred shows that I've attended, anyone at a bourse table as excited as he was.
That was one of the great moments in my career as a cover dealer-- because when it comes down to it, while it may look like we're selling covers, what we in this business are really selling is happiness.
It's nice to be able to bask in the reflected glow of that happiness. And it's nice that, even though e-commerce doesn't provide the face-to-face contact with happy buyers, you can still feel some of that warmth in an e-mail.