In its latest issue of Details, Canada Post announced six self-serve stamp kiosks would be added to major cities across the country.
The first kiosks were installed in 2012 as part of a one-year pilot program. Dispensed in singles from rolls installed in Wincor Nixdorf vending machines at a Vancouver post office, another office in London, Ont., and three sites in Toronto, the first (and short-lived) denominations were 61 cents, $1.05, $1.22, $1.29, $1.80, $2.10, $2.95, $3.40 and $3.65.
REVIVED KIOSK PROGRAM
Late last year, Canada Post began selling new postage labels from an experimental kiosk machine at a Canada Post centre in Vancouver. Designed by Canada Post regular Stéphane Huot, of Montreal, the stamps feature paintings from the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, including Emily Carr’s 1912 Indian War Canoe on Alert Bay; James Edward Hervey MacDonald’s 1928 The Front of Winter; Tom Thomson’s 1915 In the Northland; Albert Henry Robinson’s 1923 Winter, Baie-Saint-Paul; and Arthur Lismer’s 1930 Little Haven, a scene from Nova Scotia. They were printed in large rolls with four lithographic transfer colours plus metallic ink on Avery Dennison paper by the Lowe-Martin firm in Ottawa.
“They are British-style,” Jim Phillips, director of Stamp Services for Canada Post, told CSN Consulting Editor Ian Robertson last December. “They look like Post & Go stamps.”
Calling them “better-designed” and “more sophisticated” than the 2012-13 labels, Phillips added the labels’ perforations make them “look more like stamps.” Unlike the imperforate 2012-2013 kiosk stamps, the current versions have simulated perforations on all sides.
NEW KIOSK MACHINES IN VANCOUVER, GTA & MONTREAL
Six additional self-serve stamp kiosks are coming to Vancouver, Toronto, Barrie and Montréal.
The six new locations include:
- Vancouver Bentall Centre at 595 Burrard St. in Vancouver;
- West Georgia Post Office at 710 Granville St. in Vancouver;
- Toronto Dominion Post Office at 77 King St. W. in Toronto;
- Shopper’s Drug Mart at 465 Yonge St. in Toronto;
- An additional location at 279 Yonge St. in Barrie; and
- Pharmaprix at 901 Sainte-Catherine St. E. in Montréal.