How many years' stock did a company like Kodak keep in reserve?
IDK and it doesn't matter much since excess stock was not the primary explanatory factor for the low prices. The primary mechanism was a production capacity that ended up being one or two orders of magnitude bigger than market demand.
Was the cut throat price you mention less than the cost of producing the product
Cost calculations are difficult/complex. I call them 'cut throat' prices because they were unsustainable. They were insufficient to meet
total cost of maintaining the production capacity, and using the small percentage of that capacity.
Did Fuji not have to do the same as Kodak and if so but with lots of other non film products to sustain them why did Fuji not simply stop film production for good in 2004/5?
They did for the most part. Fuji was producing 35mm film by the truckloads in The Netherlands up to 2004, serving a large part of the globe from that plant. At that point, they shut down that line and dismantled the building. It's a vacant lot now. I've walked past it many times. The confectioning building is still there, but it's now used for totally different products (biotech/healthcare related; growth markets).
Fuji attempted to diversify in the early 2000s in anticipation of the silver halide crash and eventually (after some hiccups) became successful in a few markets. Up to 2004-2006 they were largely dependent on silver halide products. One of the reasons they survived is that they make products that are used in e.g. LCD screens, and that business exploded about as rapidly as photographic film plummeted, and around the same time, too. They lucked out with that one.
In Japan, they also shut down production lines and in all likelihood dismantled some of them.
As to why they didn't exit entirely - it's likely a combination of factors. Pride and commitment play a role; they were/are pretty adamant about wanting to be the 'last man standing' in silver halide technology; their previous CEO said this literally. Moreover, photographic film production involves a technology base and manufacturing competencies to which "use or or lose it" applies (as with all knowledge & competencies!) - it's likely that they've kept producing film for strategic purposes. Instax shows furthermore that there was business sense to it, too; they're making good money on that. And then there's an effect that could probably be best expressed as "social inertia": if you have a group of a couple of thousand people who have been doing something for a couple of decades, you'll find that they simply keep doing it for as long as humanly possible. Patterns perpetuate themselves; it's a bit like a rock that won't suddenly stop falling midway in the air. As long as it doesn't hit anything, it'll keep falling. If it hits the water, it'll receive a lot more resistance, which will slow it down, but it'll still sink. Social structures show similar characteristics; they also perpetuate.
There may be a complete explanation of exactly what led to the price drop, how big the price drop was and why Kodak eventually went into bankruptcy but then arose from the ashes as a suitably downsized organisation
Of course there's an explanation. It happened, after all, and no magic was involved.
I'm not sure what dots you're trying to connect and for what purpose. Like I said, the mechanism in terms of the price drop boiled down to the simple fact that digital took over. Film business dropped precipitously and since it was (still is!!) an industry optimized for large volumes and high efficiency, things didn't pan out, resulting in a race to the bottom. You have to understand that you don't just dial down production capacity by 10% or 20% on a film manufacturing enterprise. A single coating line will coat such vast amounts of product that even a big plant doesn't have all that many of them. The Fuji plant in The Netherlands was literally a single line, and that one line coated millions upon millions of rolls annually. You physically can't cut that capacity in half. You either have it, or you don't.
Anyway, Fuji got away with it and basically said "f... the whole analog film stuff, we're going to make money off of something else", Agfa tried to get into medical as well as they could (quasi-successfully) and Kodak - well, Kodak tried, but they didn't make it as we all know. The Kodak miracle is that they somehow limped out of the grave after writing off tens of billions through their bankruptcy.
Nobody was in a position to fundamentally change their business structure to cater to the new reality of tiny volumes because this required a destruction of capital combined with an unprecedented act of corporate harakiri. It's literally the same as handing a person a machete and asking them very kindly to chop off both legs and the other arm. If you ask a company to restructure so it can basically shrink by 80-90% in the course of 2 years, you'll find that it just doesn't happen, even if 100% of the organization agrees it's the only way. The reasons for this encompass the full gamut of dimensions of a business, ranging from ownership, financial structure, human resources, assets, social embeddedness/stakeholders, etc. etc.
I don't think we any of us have seen all the information of this or even enough of it to be able to join all the dots completely
This is a bit like remarking to a pilot "but you see, since you don't really understand quantum physics, you're not really capable of entirely figuring out why this plane flies..." and yet, the pilot manages to land the damn thing safely. Apparently he knows enough to get by. So much has been published on this. If you find it interesting, why don't you do some reading?
It was inventories of people.
And financial structure. You can't simply call your shareholders and ask them kindly if it's OK that you're going to allow 90% of their investment to evaporate in the next 6 months or so. People tend to get a little angry if you do that with their savings, so instead, you try to do the best job you can in holding the sinking ship afloat even if you're perfectly aware you're riding the Titanic.
(And but also it need cheap C-41 process price to supply it.The Lucky's own lab C-41 Dev and Scan only needs about 2-3usds)
