Calumet photo vanishes in the US

[CatLABS]

They currently 209 live ebay auctions... so watch out if there is no one fulfilling orders you will be chasing that money for a few weeks until ebay pays you back.

What a bummer, i have 4 spare parts orders which need to be replaced, i was literally out the door this morning when i read this.
WOW.

 

[Fixcinater]

When I went to pick up those Fred Picker videos from the San Diego location couple weeks back, the store looked barren. Decent amount of film but no stock of anything else and the normally well lit display area of local photographs was shut down and looked like it had been for a while.

 

[Xmas]

When a business shuts down like that, it generally means they ran out of money to lose.

Reading between the lines on that glassdoor.com page, it seems like these guys have been broke for a long time, are probably way over-extended with every supplier they have, and their bank finally cut them off. Its hard on the employees to shut down like that, but (pure speculation here) my guess is there literally isn't any money to pay them with anyway.

Sad stuff.

The other group of people who often get burned in a situation like this are suppliers who did get paid any time in the last 90 days. The courts can go back and demand that those payments be returned so that the money can be distributed evenly over all suppliers. The idea is it prevents the owner from making sure his brother-in-law gets paid, at the expense of some other supplier. That happened to me a few years ago, and as a small business, it really sucks. You think everything is fine, and all of the sudden you get a notice from the court that that $3000 payment you received two months ago has to be returned, and you will probably (if you are lucky) only see 5% of it when its all said and done.

That is hard.

Lots of UK photo stores have not survived the recession. The last one that folded also closed down at least one of its specialist suppliers who lost stock supplied but not paid for don't know if they even got 5%...

When your best customer folds...

I've bought things in Calmut.

 

[Ken Nadvornick]

I'm afraid it's true http://petapixel.com/2014/03/13/calumetphoto-us-declared-bankruptcy-gave-employees-zero-notice/

It reads even uglier in this recent update. Sounds like it was less about the general photo marketplace condition worldwide, and more about internal problems?

(Keep in mind this is an interview with an anonymous store-level department manager who sadly just lost his job.)

Calumet Employee Reveals what Was Happening Behind the Scenes



Ken

 

[Tom Duffy]

Sad. I purchased my Omega 5x7 enlarger, a couple of large format lenses and two of those nifty Zone VI safelights from them. I thought they had transitioned to the professional digital market fairly well. I remember the NYC store as having some of the most helpful, accommodating staff around.

 

[lns]

Once Helix closed, they were the only convenient Chicago store. (Central is in the Loop.) However, their main store's stock of film products has been poor for at least the last two years. So I never bothered to go. If your company is going to pay rent or mortgage interest to have a brick and mortar store, you need to have stock for customers.

Terrible management.

 

[Sean]

I lost contact with them months ago, which seemed odd. Strange coincidence as I've actually been working behind the scenes this week to remove their logos etc from APUG. We're announcing two new Partner level sponsors today (more on that soon!)

 

[Dr Croubie]

The actual filing says $0-$50,000:

http://www.photobusinessforum.com/images/calumetphoto_case_14-08908.pdf

a) wow.
but b) I'm confused.
Only $50,000 in assets? Surely they have to tick that as Gross assets and not Net.
I've probably got more than that as furnishings in my house. They've listed all the big boys as creditors: Canon, hasselblad, mamiya, phase one, cambo, fuji, tamron, zeiss, manfrotto. Surely with a handful of cameras on the floor, even one or two 645 digital backs alone are worth more than $50k.
Also, they're ticked Number of creditors: 1-49, but there's 36 pages of creditors listed.

Somethin' ain't right. Was this form filled in by an accountant who actually knew the business? Or just cobbled together in 5 minutes by anyone?

 

[Oren Grad]

a) wow.
but b) I'm confused.
Only $50,000 in assets? Surely they have to tick that as Gross assets and not Net.
I've probably got more than that as furnishings in my house. They've listed all the big boys as creditors: Canon, hasselblad, mamiya, phase one, cambo, fuji, tamron, zeiss, manfrotto. Surely with a handful of cameras on the floor, even one or two 645 digital backs alone are worth more than $50k.
Also, they're ticked Number of creditors: 1-49, but there's 36 pages of creditors listed.

Somethin' ain't right. Was this form filled in by an accountant who actually knew the business? Or just cobbled together in 5 minutes by anyone?

I agree. Something doesn't add up.

 

[TheFlyingCamera]

What really baffles me about the whole debacle is that what, at most 2 years ago, they bought out Penn Camera here in DC and took over their stores. They winnowed the chain down from seven locations to three, but the three they kept seemed to be doing pretty good business. At least until they started shorting stock on a regular basis.

 

[Ken Nadvornick]

What really baffles me about the whole debacle is that what, at most 2 years ago, they bought out Penn Camera here in DC and took over their stores. They winnowed the chain down from seven locations to three, but the three they kept seemed to be doing pretty good business. At least until they started shorting stock on a regular basis.

From the previously linked article:

PetaPixel: What do you think the company was doing wrong?

Calumet Employee: In March 2013 the company bought a few Penn and Ritz Camera stores in the DC/Baltimore area. This spread out the company in a positive way. Having more locations is a great thing. That being said, customers expect these locations to have stock. The upper management never seemed to understand this. Corporate expected sales to be made by special order. Customers will tell you the real benefit of a brick and mortar is that you can get you hands on products before spending significant amounts of money on them.

Ken

 

[benjiboy]

I don't understand why Calumet's European operations haven't been effected .

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

I lost contact with them months ago, which seemed odd. Strange coincidence as I've actually been working behind the scenes this week to remove their logos etc from APUG. We're announcing two new Partner level sponsors today (more on that soon!)

Sad news about Calumet, but I'm glad to hear you're keeping APUG ahead of the curve!

 

[mgb74]

The actual filing says $0-$50,000:

http://www.photobusinessforum.com/images/calumetphoto_case_14-08908.pdf

I suspect that "$0-$50,000" is just because they have to estimate something. Better to claim too little at this point than too much. For example, they also checked "1-49" creditors. Yet in the same document they have about 35 pages listing creditors with about 10 to a page.

Ironically, I hadn't bought anything from them in a few years - until 2 months ago.

 

[Sirius Glass]

via the Phoblographer: All their US stores are closed and, judging from the Facebook posts, employees had no idea they were out of a job today. Their website has also gone down.

Ouch! That hurts us, but it hurts the employees more.

 

[TheFlyingCamera]

I don't understand why Calumet's European operations haven't been effected .

They're probably a wholly-owned subsidiary with discreet accounting systems and financing. So they can share the name and the overall brand appeal without being financially interdependent.

 

[Colin DeWolfe]

This explains why, today whilst visiting Boston from Canada, I decided to go to their store here and couldn't get onto the website to get the address.

 

[RalphLambrecht]

via the Phoblographer: All their US stores are closed and, judging from the Facebook posts, employees had no idea they were out of a job today. Their website has also gone down.

too bad.it was my favorite mail order business;bought my last three DSLRs there!

 

[AgX]

I looked 'em up on Facebook and their site says after 75 years their stores in the US are closed but the ones in Europe will continue.

Calumet is one that carries a lot of film stuff.

Their belgian shop has stopped selling film many years ago.

I experienced utmost bad behavior by the shop assistants in one german store, so I never came back.

 

[benjiboy]

They're probably a wholly-owned subsidiary with discreet accounting systems and financing. So they can share the name and the overall brand appeal without being financially interdependent.

There is a big Calumet branch about forty miles from my house in Manchester Scott but I've never been there it's out of town on an industrial estate and I can't be bothered to go because I can order from their website.

 

[RattyMouse]

Wow...I was planning on going there on my days off, as they are (or I guess were) based in Chicago.

Central Camera is still in Chicago on Wabash street and can take care of your film needs.

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

Central Camera in Chicago is an excellent place.

 

[Kevin Caulfield]

Central Camera is my favourite shop in the world.

 

[peteyj10]

Central Camera is still in Chicago on Wabash street and can take care of your film needs.

That's where I normally go actually, and it's usually my favorite place in the world (I say usually because sometimes there's a guy who works there who eyeballs me like I'm trying to steal something). I like to try different places every so often though.

That reminds me...I should have some processed Ektar to pick up from Central any day now.

 

[chip j]

I learned Still Photography at the US Army Signal school in Ft. Monmouth,NJ. The 4x5 Calumet view camera we had to use was the worst piece of sh**t I've ever used.
{1966}