Jim Phillips, head of Canada’s stamp program, to retire next month

Jim Phillips, Canada Post’s long-time director of stamp services, will retire this November after more than 30 years with the Crown corporation.

Phillips took the helm of the national stamp program about a decade and a half ago, leading Canada Post in its philatelic storytelling endeavours.

“The post office has a real responsibility to ensure that Canadian postage stamps reflect the country—its people, history, traditions and cultures,” Phillips is quoted as saying in a Graphic Designers of Canada blog post. “These tiny pieces of paper offer so much opportunity to share the best of Canada with all Canadians and the world.”

Phillips joined Canada Post as a researcher in the summer of 1987 and quickly went to work – wielding his Canadian history degree from Ottawa’s Carleton University – to uncover the history of the post office across the country. For the years-long project, he developed a historical timeline of the post office to check facts, “such as when we introduced couriers,” he added in 2014. He then moved into communications, working on media relations and as the spokesperson for the stamp program. He moved to the stamp services team in the early 2000s, working in marketing and product development before taking on the director’s role about five years later.

“It’s very powerful and very rewarding because if you do something they don’t like, you hear about it, but at least you know they are interested in what you are doing,” Phillips told CSN in 2014. “You certainly need to develop an attitude that you can’t please everyone.”

His final day on the job is Nov. 12.

CSN Vol. 46 #18 will feature a full retirement profile of Jim Phillips.

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