Finland: Tom of Finland stamps biggest sellers in history of Finnish postal service

News Flash: Images by renowned artist Tom of Finland are popular!

So popular, that stamps honoring the artist, real name Touko Laaksonen who published his drawings under the name Tom of Finland, have been the biggest sellers in the history of Finland’s Posti postal service, with people pre-ordering the stamps in 178 countries.

The stamps went on sale on Monday, with the biggest overseas orders coming from Sweden, Britain, the United States and France.

An exhibition of Tom of Finland’s drawings and letters is being held in Tampere’s new postal museum to coincide with the release of the stamps and there were long queues outside the museum when the stamps began being sold there yesterday.

The demand for the stamps has taken the postal service by surprise.

‘We haven't seen this kind of interest before in Posti's history and we probably won't again soon,’ Posti development chief Markku Penttinen told Finnish news service Yle Uutiset.

Over the course of his career, Laaksonen produced more than 3,500 erotic sketches which originally had to be sold in secret due to the nature of the drawings.

(source)