King Charles: New Royal Mail stamps featuring profile of King Charles go on sale

Royal Mail stamps featuring the profile of King Charles III have officially gone on general sale in the UK for the first time.
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Royal Mail’s new King Charles III stamps mark the first time the King’s likeness has been featured on Royal Mail stamps following the death of Queen Elizabeth II, in September last year. The release of the stamps mark a key milestone in the King’s reign ahead of the coronation, which takes place next month.

In keeping with tradition, the stamp shows the King’s face to the left, however, unlike the Queen’s stamp, he is not wearing a crown. The image of King Charles used by the Royal Mail was the same one used by the Royal Mint for coins.

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Despite the stamps going on general sale today, the Royal Mail has said some retailers may not be offering the new stamps if existing stamps of the Queen are not completely sold out. This is at the request of the King in order to avoid waste.

According to the Royal Mail, they were guided by King Charles to keep the style of the stamps consistent with that of the late Queen. David Gold, Royal Mail’s director of external affairs and policy, spoke on continuity earlier this year.

King Charles stamps King Charles stamps
King Charles stamps

He said: “The guidance we got from His Majesty was more about continuity and not doing anything too different to what had gone before.I think perhaps there’s an acknowledgement that, for 70 years people have been so used to seeing the image of Her Majesty, even though actually the current image only started in 1967, they didn’t want to do anything too different to what had gone before.”