Bulk rolling 120/220 film

Well, they're put up for sale. Whether someone buys them is a different matter.

Either way, I don't think for EK the potential and very soft/weak value of selling this as a sustainability gain would offset the loss in value due to channel conflicts, reputation damage, transaction cost due to small-scale sales etc. As to the latter - if an EK employee spends 10 minutes on your order, they'll likely not make any money on that small volume of film. What's the rationale for them? All they can do on such small-scale sales is lose money and incur all manner of risks (=additional costs). It might be different if they were organized for high-mix/low-volume e-commerce sales, but fact of the matter is that they're no Amazon and they likely don't aspire to become one.

Keep in mind that this is a manufacturing company and they're in business to make money. Ultimately someone in the chain of command will look at it through that lens and if it doesn't make sense, it ain't gonna happen.

Theodor Bader said:

The question is, what does Kodak do with the leftover film that's essentially unsellable?

Kodak could boast about its environmental credentials if they sold this leftover film to hobby photographers instead of gradually disposing of it.

I believe that only a very tiny percentage of people actually put in the work involved.

Cutting it lengthwise and then widthwise. Then adding the paper backing...
all done blindly in the darkroom...

This can't become a big competitive business, especially since there's no guaranteed continuous supply.

And whoever then sells the roll film can't offer any quality guarantee.

Feel free to pass this on to your Kodak contacts.

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Kodak buys back unused cans. Studios deal with the leftover shirt ends and recans. Sometimes they sell it, sometimes they keep it for future projects if they have them in the immediate future. However the studios and film brokers have been told not to sell to photographers now.

As far as your last points, there are 120 making machines that you can buy now, they are still only semi-automated and cost $9k, but they have a very consistent quality compared to hand rolled film. And if you are large enough to justify that, you will have a contact with a movie studio that gets you a constant supply of film. This is why 120 Cine film in China is extremely common now, even more than before.

If EK can't sell enough still film cheaply, the production will be shifted away from photographic products to their other products that make use of their coating technology and expertise. The machines and people are already being used for more and more of that.
It is all about return on investment. And EK is absolutely ruthless about factoring in every possible cost relating to the product sold when determining that ROI.
With Kodak Alaris, EK basically had no need to factor in downstream costs, and with a single customer with (I expect) minimum order requirements, it was relatively easy to convince management to continue to devote capital to the still film business.
Without Kodak Alaris being in that role, I'm really concerned about continued availability of product - particularly given current political and economic realities.

MattKing said:

If EK can't sell enough still film cheaply, the production will be shifted away from photographic products to their other products that make use of their coating technology and expertise. The machines and people are already being used for more and more of that.
It is all about return on investment. And EK is absolutely ruthless about factoring in every possible cost relating to the product sold when determining that ROI.
With Kodak Alaris, EK basically had no need to factor in downstream costs, and with a single customer with (I expect) minimum order requirements, it was relatively easy to convince management to continue to devote capital to the still film business.
Without Kodak Alaris being in that role, I'm really concerned about continued availability of product - particularly given current political and economic realities.

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That's an interesting perspective. So why is EK selling anything directly? Why not continue to funnel everything through Alaris?

I'm a total non expert and am not questioning that this is factually correct. Just observing that basically everything I read on the web is anti Alaris, but you're highlighting the benefit for EK.

Theodor Bader said:

Maybe. Looking around the world, all sorts of trivial things are being sold as environmentally friendly. That's all I can think of right now.

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The incentives that once existed in the United States to tout environmental “wins”, even trivial ones, are largely gone.

lt_col_gordon_tall said:

That's an interesting perspective. So why is EK selling anything directly? Why not continue to funnel everything through Alaris?

I'm a total non expert and am not questioning that this is factually correct. Just observing that basically everything I read on the web is anti Alaris, but you're highlighting the benefit for EK.

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That doesn’t have a simple answer.

This is my understanding of some information that may or may not be accurate. Do take it with a grain of salt.

KA was originally tasked with being the sole seller and distributor of stills film as a means to create an income stream for the UK Pension Fund. However, allegedly that agreement only lasted until 2018, at which point Kodak was free to sell films on their own, and it seems they may have been doing B2B for some time now. But they stayed with Alaris as they had taken over the old selling/distributing network and Kodak didn’t want to have to rebuild that since the market was pretty much nonexistent.

However, at some point, they decided to rebuild a distribution network on their own and begin selling film again, apparently something in the works for the last couple years. Why they did this is probably a combination of seeing a resurgence in the market, and Kodak wanting to distance themselves from KA (possibly due to the buyout).

Friend who knows people seems to think they’re rolling out the film as they coat new batches of each emulsion, which does actually make a bit of sense. It should allow Kodak to get more money per roll without putting that price on the end customer, so I’m optimistic.