1,111 Colnectors became our contributors!

Today we are celebrating a very important and beautiful occasion

1,111 contributors on Colnect!

What does this number actually mean? It means that 1,111 passionate collectors from all over the world spend their free time helping Colnect happen. They are so open-hearted to share their knowledge, time and expertise to bring more value to Colnect catalog so collectors from different countries could use it and enjoy their hobby of collecting.

Day by day Colnect is getting bigger and better and every single catalog is increasing in quality and quantity. Colnect is able to deliver information about collectibles around the world in the best way thanks to the group of hardworking collectors who are putting their effort into helping out fellow collectors to get what they desire.

In just two years the number of contributors jumped up from 777 to 1,111. We are happy that so many people are ready to dedicate their time to make the experience of collecting more enjoyable for those who share same passions and interests. It’s admirable what every single one of these collectors has done.

We would like to thank everyone for being a part of this amazing community which keeps on getting better. You guys are truly amazing and we appreciate everything you do. Every catalog on Colnect is what it is because of your contribution.

Colnect has been built by collectors just like you. If you wish to contribute to our growing community of collectors and start making catalog better for other fellow collectors then you can add new items, add images and information to already existing items, help to translate catalog to your language, edit the catalog, write wiki articles, and even create your own categories.

Accelerated Growth - 131313 Members Now on Colnect

The Colnect community, ever growing, has now reached 131,313 Members!

To take a quick look back at the way we have come, as a community, we need to go back to August 2009, when we celebrated our first milestone of 5,555 members. From there the community almost doubled in 8 month's time to - 11,111. The community just kept doubling its previous milestone, getting to 20,020, than going to 33,333, 40,004, 50,505, 66,666, 70,707 until reaching the beautifully round number of 100,000 almost exactly a year ago.

"100 Złotych (Władysław I Lokietek (1320-1333))" Poland Coin, from the Colnect catalog

Important thing to note, that the rate of growth in our community in the past 2 years has tripled (!) from the rate of growth in the preceding years.

"Barbara Virgin and Martyr" Italy Holy Card, from the Colnect catalog

33,333 members have joined Colnect in the past year, to form our current community of collectors from 150 countries around the world. This means that the amount of collectors joining this year is six times larger than our entire community at the first milestone!

"Parque Generalísimo Francisco de Miranda" Venezuela Admission Ticket, from the Colnect catalog

More members, means more collectors, means more collections! In a very fitting number, over 33,333,333 inventory items have been added to Colnect since the last milestone of 110,000,000 inventory items. Inventory items are any item that a member adds to their collection, swap and wish lists.

"Icon of Holy Annunciation" Macedonia Postcard, from the Colnect catalog

As the community develops, so does Colnect as a collection management tool and a website to connect collectors. The past year we've seen Colnect dawn a sleek new outfit, added with dynamic sorting, was joined by 2 new categories, Admission Tickets and Holy Cards and much more.

"Yugoslavia Vs. Indonesia" Yugoslavia Admission Ticket, from the Colnect catalog

We would like to thank the over 900 contributors that make Colnect the effective tool it is today. The contributors help make the catalogs as complete, accurate and interesting as possible, and are doing great, dedicated work, on their own time, for the benefit of all collectors.

"10th Anniversary of the Admission of Angola in the UN" Angola Stamp, from the Colnect catalog

Want to join as a contributor on Colnect? Learn more about what you can do to help on the Contributor Guide. You are also welcome to check out and join our efforts to complete the catalog with ALL images on the Zero Missing Pictures Campaign.

"National bank in Skopje" Yugoslavia Postcard, from the Colnect catalog

We're excited about Colnect getting a larger and larger collector's community, providing more opportunities for each collector, improved tools of use, better collecting and better connecting. We wish all Colnect collectors to have a thriving and fulfilling collecting year.

""Agatha Virgin and Martyr" Italy Holy Card, from the Colnect catalog

10.000+ Kids Meal Toys Reached!

It hasn't even been 2 years since Kids Meal Toys category was created, and now we are honored to announce that it has increased its size to more than 10.000 items! 
The catalog dates back to as early as 1974, and has a big variety of groups, brands and types of toys. 

"Ballet Dancer", Italy, from the Colnect catalog

We would like to thank our coordinator Jorge Jara [Zonnyc], who has been making an outstanding progress in developing the category and its catalog.  Also many thanks to Frens Bosman [Digger] and Hans Meeuwisse [steamtrain] for editing and contributing to the Kids Meal Toys catalog.

 "Chef", People's Republic of China, from the Colnect catalog

The category wouldn't be so successful without our precious translators Dino Delfar [dino92], Haard Mehta [Haard-Mehta], Petyo Shopov [PShopov] and [eleonxam].Thank you for making Colnect more international and accessible all over the world!

"Nounours, Nicolas, Pimprenelle, Oscar", France, from the Colnect catalog

We are grateful to every member of our community that has done their bit in the category's improvement. Now most of the items on the catalog have images and details about the origin and the type of the toy. It is not a secret that Kids Meal Toys are really different, so that makes the collecting process even more exciting and gripping.

"Snail", Italy, from the Colnect catalog

The Kids Meal Toys catalog currently includes 2.000+ toys available worldwide, as well as other toys from 19 countries. Interestingly enough, the Netherlands holds the highest number of toys.

"Simba and Nala", the Netherlands, from the Colnect catalog

Would like to join as a contributor on the Kids Meal Toys on Colnect? Please see our Catalog Contribution Guidelines page. Interested in helping on other categories? Start at our Contributor Guide help page.

22,222 Paper Clips Reached

Growing to 22,222 unique items in less than 20 months since its inception, becoming 11 times its original size, the Paper Clips catalog has proven itself to be a plentiful, varied and interesting collectible category on Colnect.

"Beemster electrotechniek bv" Netherlands paper clip, from the Colnect catalog

We would like to thank the category coordinator, Ton Bax [tontoos], who has been making great progress on the catalog, advancing it at a high rate and improving it. Thank you to Els Van Gastel [leeuwin], helping as an editor on the category and to the contributors of the category.

"Logo 4 colours" Netherlands paper clip, from the Colnect catalog

Founded by the initiative of Bruun01, the category has been supported by Colnect collectors from the very start. As such it was well constructed, an advantage that this catalog benefits from now as well. You can see the whole process on the original discussion.

"Logica" Netherlands paper clip, from the Colnect catalog 

The catalog boasts complete coverage of images, there is no clip left without a picture to showcase its advantages.

"Philips Vips" Netherlands paper clip, from the Colnect catalog

As Paper Clips come in different Styles of structure and different Models of form, they are a fun collectible to deal with, coming in many different shapes and manufacturing methods.

"van den Broek" Netherlands paper clip, from the Colnect catalog

The catalog displays clips from 70 different countries (!), covering the world far and wide from the Netherlands to Bahrain, from Puerto Rico to Finland, from France to Azerbaijan.

"Musée de la Création" Netherlands paper clip, from the Colnect catalog

Would like to join as a contributor on the Paper Clips on Colnect? Please see our Catalog Contribution Guidelines page. Interested in helping on other categories? Start at our Contributor Guide help page.

"Amstel hotel" Netherlands paper clip, from the Colnect catalog

Over 20,000 Pocket Calendars on Colnect!

We are proud to celebrate the Pocket Calendars category on Colnect reaching a new high - over 20,000 Unique Pocket Calendars are now featured on the catalog.

"Monkey" 2016 Russian pocket calendar, from the Colnect catalog

Since the foundation of the catalog in 2012, the catalog has grown over 10 times its initial size. This is largely due to the dedicated work of the driving engine behind the category - the category coordinator, Hans Meeuwisse [steamtrain],

"Old Locomotive 1839 United Kingdom - 07/10" 1986 Lithuanian pocket calendar, from the Colnect catalog

The category was initially suggested and created by Pelacanyes and Hans Meeuwisse [steamtrain]. It started as a discussion on the forum that later developed to a fully fledged beautiful catalog.

"Bird" 1983 Lithuanian pocket calendar, from the Colnect catalog

The Pocket Calendars catalog is remarkably complete with all data of its items. Each and every calendar is also accompanied by a high quality image, which is an achievement in itself.

"Orchid" 2010 Laotian pocket calendar, from the Colnect catalog

With around 500 new calendars added to the catalog every month, it is no surprise that the catalog is very diverse. The catalog features calendars from around the world, from Russia, in which pocket calendars are highly popular, to special items from Angola and Laos, from Lithuania to Hong Kong and Colombia.

"TAAG Angola Airlines" 2006 Angola pocket calendar, from the Colnect catalog

We would like to thank all the great contributors and editors that help makes this catalog so rich and detailed. If you are interested in joining as a contributor on the Pocket Calendars category, please see our Catalog Contribution Guidelines page.

"People" 2010 Laotian pocket calendar, from the Colnect catalog

Want to start a new catalog on Colnect? Want to join another existing category? Want to help with translations? You can find all needed information about that and more on the Contributor Guide help page.

"Friendship" 2012 Colombian pocket calendar, from the Colnect catalog

100,000 Collectors 110,000,000 Inventory Items Now on Colnect

We have reached a perfect score! The Colnect members community has expanded to a perfect 100,000 Collectors.

100,000

We have been counting up to this milestone in a rising pace, starting way back in August 2009, just a few thousands, then going up - 11,111, then it took us a year to reach the next step 20,020, climbing to 33,333, 40,004, 50,505, passed the wicked 66,666 to 70,707 and now we are doing a great leap, skipping a few steps ahead into the nice and round 100,000.

"20 Dollars (Black-eyed Susan)" 2010 Canadian coin, new on the Colnect catalog

These 100,000 collectors all manage their collections on Colnect, which has brought the total amount of items in the Colnect inventories lists to a whopping 110,000,000 items! Each item on this list is a collectible piece someone has, wants to swap or is interested in. That is a satisfyingly great collecting power.

"Football Party" 1953 USA commuter card, new on the Colnect catalog

A significant part of the community are the contributors, Currently there are over 800 active contributors on Colnect, each helping in their own way into building and perfecting the Colnect catalogs. Would like to join in and contribute to Colnect? Learn more on the Colnect Contributor Guide.

"Algarve. Rocha beach" 1988 Portuguese postcard, new on the Colnect catalog

The contributors are doing great work and the catalogs have been flourishing, each catalog reaching new and impressive milestone of size and quality. The Stamps catalog has surpassed 500.500 Stamps just in the last month. All numismatic catalogs have been perfecting their art. All catalogs have expanded and are looking beautiful.

"Order of the Württemberg Crown Commander with Star" 1818 German medal, new on the Colnect catalog

We're proud of this community and glad to see how far Colnect has come since it's inception. Colnect only develops as it's community does. Every new collector affects the catalog and community and makes it better.

"Rodenbach" Belgium beer coaster, new on the Colnect catalog

We're excited to see this vivid and bustling activity on Colnect and appreciate all who participate and all those who help make it happen. We wish fun collecting to everyone, see you on the next milestone!

"You're Great!" 2015 USA gift card, new on the Colnect catalog

777 Colnect Contributors - Creating Colnect Magic

A new year, a new milestone reached, a new satisfying number to celebrate. Colnect has passed 777 contributors.

The number 7 has always represented some sense of wonder, of far reaching ventures, of worldwide phenomena, the seven seas, the seventh heaven, the seven wonders of the world, the seven colors of the rainbow. Associated widely in cultures throughout history with special occurrences, miracles and power, we on Colnect certainly hope this number bodes well for this budding year and its potential to unite and innovate.

A year after our previous milestone of 666 contributors on Colnect, more than 111 new contributors have joined to empower, improve and enhance Colnect.

Each of these sevens, seven hundred, seventy and seven, is comprised of individual collectors on Colnect that decided to give some of themselves, some of their time and drive, to the Colnect catalogs. The catalogs you see today on Colnect are purely the result of the combined contribution and dedication of these collectors.

On the website design front, Colnect is doing its best to provide new tools and improved features for contributors, editors and coordinators on Colnect. Those help make activity on Colnect easier, smoother and more effective.

Of the new features provided, there were many to enable and aid Colnect editors. A New Comments Counter allows for quicker and easier dealing with the collector comments. The Item Edit History has become available to all editors, the Editing Menu has been optimized and there were many other changes and fixes introduced.

The look of Colnect has been going through some improvements recently as well. As part of that the badges on the collector profile page, those that indicate the role of the collector as a contributor and the amount of the stars awarded to that collector, has been renewed and polished.

As always, we'd like to thank all the wonderful contributors, editors, translators and coordinators on Colnect. This ever-growing group of collectors joined by a common goal and passion has achieved much in the past year. It brought the Colnect catalogs another long stretch forward in making collectible information available to all collectors worldwide in the best way.

Google Indexed More Than 245 MILLION Colnect Pages

The world's most popular search engine has now indexed over 245 Million Colnect pages! That is a phenomenal amount. That is almost 10x times more pages presented than in Colnect's previous milestone. Colnect is ever rising and the results are definitely showing worldwide :)

What does it mean? It means that our catalogs are growing and so there's much more information that is made available to everyone around the world. It means Colnect is flourishing and that Google accepts its original content as something valid and useful.

Globe "Now Your World is One" United States Phonecard, newly added on Colnect

Chinese Puzzle Phonecard, newly added on Colnect

To give you readers a better idea of how far the Colnect catalogs have come since then, here are a few more numbers. In comparison, Colnect's Tea Bag catalog, then only in its beginning, has added more than 50,000 items, making it 20 times larger than its original starting point. The Stamps catalog, one of the most well-entrenched collectible fields on Colnect, has gone from 90,000 stamps to almost 450,000, adding close to 400,000 Stamps at that time period. The Colnect Phonecards catalog, then already celebrating a respectable size of 222,222 Phonecards has now almost tripled its size into over half a million phonecards and the largest Phonecards catalog in the world. This is not to mention (just for the lack of space in the article, since they do deserve a mention) all the new categories that have been added since then.

Emblem, Mother and Child Vietnam Stamp, newly added on Colnect

Growing catalogs mean a growing community. Colnect's collectors, then a lucky group of 8.888 members, has ballooned tenfold and will soon complete the even luckier 80,000 collectors. Colnect has then been experiencing 111,111 visits a month which are now more than 666,666 visits made by almost 400,000 users a month. The site rating given by the most reliable source available on website ranking, Alexa, has gone up from 83,000 to 36,485, climbing almost 50,000 steps up the competitive online ladder, which is more logarithmic than linear.

Grøn Te med Citrus, dif flap Denmark Tea Bag, newly added on Colnect

Earl Grey, dif flap Denmark Tea Bag, newly added on Colnect

All this data may seem cold, but what must be seen is that they are the mirror that reflects the work, dedication and heart of contributors, translators, editors, coordinators, too numerous to count. Each number contains years of searches, cooperation, attention to detail, challenges overcome and achievements made. It shows how much could be created when a group of people, no matter from which country, sex or age, gathers together over something they are truly passionate about.

Chinese Art China Phonecard, newly added on Colnect

Chinese Art China Phonecard, newly added on Colnect

Colnect's catalogs are meant to serve collectors wherever they may be and they do. On behalf of collectors everywhere we thank you, Colnect volunteers, for your efforts to create and perfect this invaluable source of information. This benefits all those who have or will chance upon collecting along their path.

Olivia sayana Ravenel Netherlands Antilles Stamps, newly added on Colnect

The New Colnect Core Coordinator - Hernan Bofill [hbofill12]

In the great Colnect team there are many different roles. Some start out initiating something new, some Colnect finds for a new role, for some a role simply grows on them. But this is not one of these cases, this case is unique. Here a role is just so perfect for a collector, that it's almost as if it was created for him.

The collector, as most of you know him, is Hernán Bofill [hbofill12] and the new role is Colnect Core Coordinator (CCC). This role will allow him to be in contact with coordinators of all categories, offering his support and advice. He will be with a finger on the pulse of all catalogs, so he'll know when something is needed to be done and what. At the same time he'll have the bird's eye view of Colnect, with the freedom to introduce and push forward ideas. Hernán Bofill [hbofill12] is now your top guy on everything related to the catalogs.

Hernán and his son, Nino

Since joining 3 years ago, Hernán has been relentless in pushing the catalogs and the community forward. Most importantly, he has been relentless in his enjoyment of what he does, refusing to let anything stifle his enthusiasm and momentum. He has very quickly made himself an invaluable resource. By offering his expertise, time, mentoring and always his care he won the respect and gratitude of many of Colnect's team and members.

You see him all the time, editing and coordinating on so many catalogs, answering on the forum and in private, swapping and listing, but let's hear a little more from him about himself.

hbofill12 as you all know him

- What do you collect?

My primary collecting items are coins. Then I have a lot of tokens and medals, that I am putting in order. Due to a "space issue” I only collect labels of the beverages that I drink. I am also a Beatles fan, so I collect Beatles CDs and memorabilia. I have a huge quantity of events tickets (Sports, Concerts, Admission) and Pins, and also some rocks, fossils and shells.

- How did you start collecting?

Since I was a child, I always had the collecting virus in me. Toys, magazines, stickers, glass balls. I always wanted to complete a series…

- Why do you think collecting is valuable?

Collecting, no matter what you collect, means two principal things to me. First, a lot of learning and knowledge. Second, creating relationships with other collecting partners.

- Which roles have you taken on Colnect before?

I've started in Colnect as a Coins editor for Argentina, Paraguay and Fantasy Issues. I would really like to thank Jim [Rubycored] for his mentoring. He was the one that motivated and pushed me to become what I am in this community. Then I became a Global Coins editor and Drink Labels coordinator. One year later, I was helping Jim and Angelo with the coordination of Coins, and handling the coordination of Tokens and Medals. In the middle of that Jim offered his Security Manager position to me and I accepted. With this, Amir also wanted me to become one of the site admins and I started working with some of the other category coordinators, helping them, for example, assign stars and grant editing permissions.

- What do you think are the main challenges Colnect faces?

We have a great catalog and we cover most of the “Swapping” collectibles, which is great. The main challenge that I see now is to improve the data in our catalogs. Doing this, I am sure that we are on the way to become the world's main collecting reference.

- Which are the first issues you'll be focusing on?

I would like to make the coordinator's day by day in Colnect more easy. I am working in a couple of ideas and I hope to share them soon.

- How can members help out?

There are many ways to help out in this community. I think that one of the best ways to start is asking your primary collection coordinator how you can help him. Be sure that he/she will find a task for you to do. This could be a good starting point.

- What would you like collectors to know about you, that they don't know yet?

Well, most of them know me but perhaps they don’t know much about me. About my personal life, I can tell you that I am from Argentina and I am 38 years old. I am married and have two kids. Nino who is 10 years old and Helena who is 6. I am a Systems Engineer and work for a pharmacy industry company, leading the Latin America software factory projects. As I said above, apart from collecting, I am a Beatles fan and enjoy going to music concerts. I also like to watch Football and Rugby.

Hernán Bofill and his family

To wrap this post up, we will finish resolving a mystery with another mystery. Many have asked and wondered, what is the meaning or reason of Hernán's OM avatar? The answer lies before you. As he wrote: "This is my necklace. It was created especially for me and it has been with me since 1997."

Thank you, hbofill12, for all that you have done and with all that you will do. Good luck and congratulations on this new role, we are all excited for you :)