The other day, I got a piece of mail, and on the stamp was the Little Mermaid – the Disney one, I mean. Now, to me, this is an ad – even though the movie came out a few years ago, there’s plenty of Little Mermaid merchandise still to be found in stores. So, wondering what’s up, I go to the USPS website, and sure enough, there’s a press release celebrating the issue.
I quote: “‘The Postal Service knows that Americans have much to celebrate,’ said Patrick Donahoe, Deputy Postmaster General and Chief Operating Officer of the U.S. Postal Service, who dedicated the stamps. ‘We also know that the mail remains the best way to share joyous news and invite friends and family to come together for a special event. So, who better than Mickey Mouse and his friends to help the Postal Service and all Americans celebrate those special times in their lives.’”
And on hand at the dedication – Matt Ouimet, President of Disneyland Resort, as well as Andrae Rivas, “Disneyland Resort Ambassador,” whatever that is (maybe he works for the State Department?).
Now, is everyone else as bugged by this as I am? If this is how the USPS is going to operate, why shouldn’t it just go the honest route, and sell space on the stamps the way you would a billboard?
Right, but there *you *have to pay extra for the privilege of promoting yourself or your company – which is a far cry from the *government *paying to promote you or your product.
Wow. That shit’s pretty expensive. Twenty 37c stamps (face value: $7.40) will cost you $16.99. I’m afraid i’m not that keen to have my face on a stamp.
The government doesn’t pay to put things on stamps. The USPS is a government owned business. The money you pay to buy stamps – not your tax dollars – pays for what is placed on the stamps. The only government funds the Post Office receives is compensation for certain government mail and free postage for the blind.
If putting the Mermaid on postage stamps is shilling for Disney, then Yip Harburg’s stamp is fronting for MGM & Sinatra’s stamp was a sneaky way of promoting Reprise Records. Commemorative stamps are offered to make the Postal Service a profit (‘collectors’ buy them and don’t use them). If I’m not mistaken, thousands of commemorative stamps proposals are made each year & a commitee of private citizens makes the decision on which ones to produce.
If you wanna beef about the USPS, maybe you could look into the the millions of dollars they spend on advertizing, or why they still have Saturday deliveries or better yet, why bulk mailers pay a fraction of the first-class rate to mail out shit in the form of paper and text. It sounds very much like a ‘make work’ project to me.
Actually, I suspect that you have the direction of influence going the wrong direction. The Postal Service has a long history of putting entertainment figures on their stamps to encourage collectors to buy stamps and with the Disney characters they get a double hit with stamp collectors and Disney memorabilia collectors. I’m surprised that Disney has not sued the USPS for some sort of royalties.
Perhaps the USPS has cut a deal with Disney to use the Little Mermaid at no cost because it amounts to advertising that will make them money in DVD sales, etc.?
These examples are a bit of a stretch. The connection between Yip Harburg and today’s MGM is tenuous (if it even exists at all), and comparing Reprise Records to Disney is like comparing, uh… something small to something big. And both Sinatra and Harburg had icon status – debate if you will – whereas the Little Mermaid is a derivative piece of mediocrity that within 50 years will have just about vanished from America’s cultural consciousness.
As others have said, it’s a win-win situaion for both organizations. Free advertising for Disney, and the chance to have their characters associated with other american icons, and for the USPS a way to sell more stamps.
But that’s just my point – we’ve come to define things as win-wins in purely commercial terms. It used to be that our stamps, like our national monuments, had a kind of civic function – to honor what was distinguished, or at least distinctive. But now it seems that we’re only interested in what pays. And to my initial point – if that’s the purpose, why not just sell the space off to the highest bidder?
I think you don’t understand the point of the Little Mermaid stamps (or any collector stamp). Yes, the purpose of the USPS to make these stamps is to make a profit, but they aren’t going to make a stamp for any company that pays. Would anyone collect Microsoft stamps? No! But will people collect Little Mermaid stamps? Yes! And remember that the USPS is not a for-profit organization; in fact, they are the only government agency that actually stays even so the more stamps they sell, the less tax dollars they’ll have to use to keep themselves operational. You should thank the USPS for creating these stamps otherwise they’d be spending our tax dollars!
Sal’s point still stands. It wouldn’t matter (at least in terms of money) if people didn’t collect Microsoft stamps, as long as Microsoft paid enough to offset the loss in sales to collectors.
Also, all I know about stamp collectors is what I’ve seen in TV and movies, but wouldn’t people collect Microsoft stamps just like they collect the rest? Gotta catch 'em all, you know - it’s not a collection if you’re not trying to complete it, and lots of people have no problem collecting corporate memorabilia. (I, for one, would find a “History of Windows” stamp series more interesting than a bunch of stamps with old paintings on them anyway. ;))
Like it or not, Disney is famous worldwide; it is part of American culture; and as others have stated, collecting Disney memoribilia is extremely popular.
The current set out is in fact the second in a set of 3; one last year, this one, and one more next summer.
These stamps have a very high retention rate (meaning they are bought and not used as postage); something the USPS loves. It was the same for the Elvis Presley stamps 10 years ago.
As for Microsoft, you can bet that 10 years after Mr. Gates passes on, there will be a Gates/Microsoft stamp honoring him. He is a world-renowned figure, and his accomplishments in the business world have rarely been matched.
USPS policy forbids honoring living people - you must be dead 10 years, or a recently deceased US president. There have been 3 exceptions to the 10 year rule as far as I know-
Winston Churchill, Dag Hammerskjold, and … Walt Disney himself.
If you collected stamps you’d know of the various “industrial” bigwigs who have been honored on stamps throughout the years.
This is nothing new - it’s just that Disney is more obvious.
The point is that no one has much of a commercial interest in any of these industrial bigwigs. An Andrew Carnegie stamp isn’t an ad for much of anything, but a Little Mermaid stamp is. That’s the distinction I’m trying to make here.
I mean, if the purpose is maximum retention and maximum dollars for the USPS, why not a series of centerfold stamps? My only point here is that standards, such as the one alluded to above (must be dead ten years, etc.) seem to be going out the window, or *have *gone out the window. The governing idea behind putting out stamps is no longer to honor what is best and most distinctive about America, but instead to offer maximum appeal to “collectors.” Call it the Franklin Mint-ization of the USPS. It bugs me, though I’m beginning to feel a little lonely in this opinion.
Sal - I agree with you there - it has gone a little bit overboard. I blame Canada Post because they have been extremely successful at stuff like this and the USPS seems to mimic them whenever they can.
They had a Winnie-the-Pooh sheet about 10 years ago. There’s a link to Winnie and Canada (I think the inspiration bear was from a Canadian zoo), and Winnie
existed before Disney obviously, but since it is now a Disney property, that stamp was extremely popular and I believe it has a high catalogue value now. (Lucky me has one )
There’s an annual program where we honor a Hollywood Legend each year. You’d think the family/estate of the “honoree” would be thrilled and extremely co-operative but in this crass commercial era, they get all uppity and put restrictions and demands upon the USPS. I believe the Marilyn Monroe estate was a pain to work with; there were others.
Because they know the USPS may make a “profit” on such a stamp, they no longer
see it as an honor.
Personally, I wish the USPS would drop an honoree at the first sign of conflict from the estate.
Just curious, I am basically anti-modern disney corp.
But Little Mermaid will disappear within 50 years, the same way Snow White, Bambi and others have. This movie won some Oscars and is fairly timeless. I have Snow White at home and the music is badly dated and some aspects of the story are sexist but the movie is still well known and popular. I see no reason why the Little Mermaid won’t be. (admittedly, I have not bought this DVD but my 8 year old daughter has a large framed movie poster).
Post office does Rock & Roll stars, movie actors, singers, Cars & Planes and etc. They make money off selling stamps, so why not Little Mermaid also. Minor issue it seems like.
I like the issues raised earlier, why do we keep subsidizer bulk mail with 4th class mail. Just because we have always done it, does mean we should keep doing it.
I was just down to the local Post Office. They had all sorts of “commemortative” items on display for sale, including stuffed animals and framed pictures of famous atheletes with a printed envelope and cancelled stamp from the city of the athelete.
A little girl in the line next to me was offered a “Disney sticker”, so I’m kind of guessing this is a joint Disney-USPS promotion. Disney gets the publicity and USPS generates some additional revenue.
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Damn I was looking forward to making some custom stamps for my business.
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