Hard times for Kodak continue

eclarke · Oct 30, 2009

Christopher Walrath said:
I know times are tight, and it probably won't matter a darn, but if you want these guys to stick around you gotta buy the product. I know, stating the obvious, as I prone to do from time to time. Well, OK. Most of the time.

Oh, STOP! ;p

Exactly. I posted an inexact poll to find out how much everybody on the forum was spending on B&W materials after someone voiced some customer indignation. The numbers show that a hot dog stand could not survive on the APUG member purchases. We all must quit thinking homemade, recycled and cheap..no manufacturers want customers who don't want to spend...Evan Clarke

elekm · Oct 30, 2009

Manufacturers cease to exist when customers stop buying.

I've been trying all kinds of film these past two years. Currently, I have some Ektar loaded in my SLR, and I just shot a roll of 120 Portra 100UC. I need to pick up some D-76.

Shot a bunch of Tri-X. So much, in fact, that I have none left. Time to buy some more.

In this economy, people are hard-pressed to convince themselves that the latest digital camera will be a wise use of $500.

Over on rangefinderforum.com, one guy asked what would be the best inexpensive digital P&S. And then he suggested a $400 model and a $500 model. To me, that's quite a bit of money. I said that my idea of cheap is $40. I can buy a lot of film for $400, or I can pay some bills.

DanielStone · Oct 30, 2009

tiberiustibz said:
Sorry. As I get better at photography I shoot much less film. Not my fault.

with ya on that one. Especially with LF. I'm shooting roughly 1/4 of what I'd shoot when I first started with 4x5. This was roughly 6 months ago.

its also transitioned over to my medium and 35mm work as well.

-Dan

Chazzy · Oct 30, 2009

I've been thinking a lot about whether we really do ourselves any favors in the long term by buying the inexpensive house brands from Freestyle. Buying Ilford and Kodak helps keep the companies alive. But for those of us on a limited income, it can be a tough choice.

Nicole · Oct 30, 2009

I buy their local product ALL the time, but they don't know anything about their local (film) product. Lift your game so I can buy more, please.

DLawson · Oct 30, 2009

Chazzy said:
I've been thinking a lot about whether we really do ourselves any favors in the long term by buying the inexpensive house brands from Freestyle. Buying Ilford and Kodak helps keep the companies alive. But for those of us on a limited income, it can be a tough choice.

I don't think the Kodak Corporation is going to be done in my lack of film sales. They've already decided that film is a minor part of their overall menu.

As for the rebranded stuff, I don't really know enough. I figure if Kodak thought that Arista was a bad business decision, they would kill the arrangement.

I can't help but wonder (especially given the web site organization) whether Those Who Decide at Kodak want to distance themselves from all that Old Stuff. They have a target major market, and film is what was used by those people's grandparents (at least in the marketing perspective). Rebranded film lets them pull a profit from existing industrial infrastructure while still scooting toward the All Digital end of the store shelves.

Mark Fisher · Oct 30, 2009

Chazzy said:
I've been thinking a lot about whether we really do ourselves any favors in the long term by buying the inexpensive house brands from Freestyle. Buying Ilford and Kodak helps keep the companies alive. But for those of us on a limited income, it can be a tough choice.

You might be surprised. Kodak may be getting more profit per roll from Freestyle than normal distribution. I imagine it passes through at least two levels of distribution before ending up on the shelves of your local photo store. They all take their cut. I suspect they sell direct to Freestyle by the truckload drastically minimizing distribution costs. I don't know how the balance works out, but Kodak appearantly thinks it works out in their favor. It probably hurts Ilford and Fuji more.

Photo Engineer · Oct 30, 2009

eclarke said:
Exactly. I posted an inexact poll to find out how much everybody on the forum was spending on B&W materials after someone voiced some customer indignation. The numbers show that a hot dog stand could not survive on the APUG member purchases. We all must quit thinking homemade, recycled and cheap..no manufacturers want customers who don't want to spend...Evan Clarke

I agree Evan. The same few people keep posting here, while thousands of registered members never post, they just read. We don't know what they think, but if they are like the posters, that hot dog stand may go out of business. People have pressing needs and bills to pay, and film is not a high priority item for most.

Kodak has not relegated film to a side line either. Film represents almost $1B in income each year. That is 50% of their income. How can they ignore that? They cannot and neither can the sharholders. So, film will continue as long as there is a market.

PE

Thomas Bertilsson · Oct 30, 2009

I love Kodak. But I can't afford their products. Sorry. Four dollars per roll of 120 at the cheap place in California just doesn't jive with my wallet right now. I am almost ashamed to admit that I use Arista.EDU Ultra films, but what can a guy do?
My Kodak usage has been reduced to selenium toner, sepia II toner, Xtol, and Photoflo. I wish I could do more and hand them some pocket change once in a while. I do buy Kodak TMY-2 and Portra 400NC whenever I make client portraits, but that's it for film.

They do a bang up job, and their products are silly good. Tough market for many, I'm sure.

removed account4 · Oct 30, 2009

we are just supposed to just buy film and paper and chemicals to help kodak ? i don't think so.
i think i have more pressing needs than to give a hand out to a multi national corporation ...

railwayman3 · Oct 30, 2009

jnanian said:
we are just supposed to just buy film and paper and chemicals to help kodak ? i don't think so.
i think i have more pressing needs than to give a hand out to a multi national corporation ...

I think that the point is that if I, and enough other people, don't buy sufficient of any particular Kodak product, whether it's because I don't need the item, prefer Ilford or Fuji, can't afford branded products or any other reason, I can't then reasonably complain later when Kodak stop making it.

Exactly the same applies to any other product or service provided by any commercial company.

(Don't worry about hand-outs, our governments will do that for us, using our money anyway. )

sepiareverb · Oct 30, 2009

RalphLambrecht said:
???

It is the shareholders who they are beholden to no?

mopar_guy · Oct 30, 2009

I should buy some film because I am using more fight now. I'll get some T-max in 35mm. I also will get some 8x10 sheets so I can cut them down to 3 1/4 x 4 1/4. Then I will use the film.

railwayman3 · Oct 30, 2009

sepiareverb said:
It is the shareholders who they are beholden to no?

Correct, in law a commercial company's first duty is to its shareholders. If we imagined Kodak's shareholders complaining to the management that, for example, "analog products are losing money, and nothing is being done about it", the management would have to defend their reasons for inaction.
Could they then put forward a valid reason for retaining analog products, such a major expected increase in analog sales in the future, or a massive loss of goodwill and custom if they closed the whole division completely? IDK

removed account4 · Oct 30, 2009

railwayman3 said:
I think that the point is that if I, and enough other people, don't buy sufficient of any particular Kodak product, whether it's because I don't need the item, prefer Ilford or Fuji, can't afford branded products or any other reason, I can't then reasonably complain later when Kodak stop making it.

Exactly the same applies to any other product or service provided by any commercial company.

(Don't worry about hand-outs, our governments will do that for us, using our money anyway. )

i don't really think that will make to make a bit of difference.
you would have to buy an awful lot of stuff to make any sort of impact ...

hoarding paper and film and chemicals does no one any favors.
a month or 2 or a year or 2 down the road when this same story
happens again, we are supposed to drop everything and buy even more,
when our storage shelves are already full from our last purchase ?

maybe the big wigs need to take a pay cut, and figure out a way to market
film and traditional products that were the foundations of their company. there
already is a grassroots effort of people turning back to film.
i suppose it doesn't really matter anyways, since they already declared film being "dead" several years ago ...

Photo Engineer · Oct 30, 2009

If you read the article one of its first comments is that higher management has taken pay cuts at Kodak.

PE

railwayman3 · Oct 30, 2009

jnanian said:
i don't really think that will make to make a bit of difference.
you would have to buy an awful lot of stuff to make any sort of impact ...

hoarding paper and film and chemicals does no one any favors.
a month or 2 or a year or 2 down the road when this same story
happens again, we are supposed to drop everything and buy even more,
when our storage shelves are already full from our last purchase ?

maybe the big wigs need to take a pay cut, and figure out a way to market
film and traditional products that were the foundations of their company. there
already is a grassroots effort of people turning back to film.
i suppose it doesn't really matter anyways, since they already declared film being "dead" several years ago ...

I agree entirely. The fall in analog use is probably so great that a few extra purchases by we enthusiasts is unlikely to make any significant difference...especially if we're just putting supplies into our own stock which we would be buying later anyway.

I can't say that I've seen anywhere where Kodak has declared film dead, or are not looking at ways of marketing if there is a significant grassroots return to film (I'll stand corrected if I'm wrong with that). And if someone already has enough knowledge and enthusiasm to have decided to return to film, I'm not sure that a lot of expensive marketing is going to alter their decision. IDK, just my thoughts.

Ian Grant · Oct 30, 2009

jnanian said:
we are just supposed to just buy film and paper and chemicals to help kodak ? i don't think so.
i think i have more pressing needs than to give a hand out to a multi national corporation ...

You can buy Kodak film but not Kodak B&W paper

I have real difficulty getting Kodak Tmax films outside the UK (& North America) so switched back to Ilford films 2 years ago and they are very significantly cheaper (in the UK).

You are right John, I'd rather buy from companies that respect their customers and listen. There's also an issue of supporting companies who make a full range of B&W materials, I'd rather support Ilford or Adox (Foto-impex - EFKE & former Agfa products) and Foma than Kodak. But then I've only really used 2 Kodak products in the last 40 years Tmax100 when APX 100 went in sheet film sizes and KRST, and a tiny bit of Ektachrome but I always prefer Fujichrome.

Personally I've no real need to buy anything from Kodak, in addition they are now the only company not to support APUG either directly or indirectly, despite the fact we are told they monitor this website.

Ian

shutterspeed1000 · Oct 30, 2009

I am glad someone brought up the fact that Kodak is not a sponsor of APUG. I also have been trying to purchase and support manufactures and suppliers that I feel will support me in the future. I purchase from Freestyle for this reason. Maybe Kodak needs to post here to do some damage control.

Jeff Searust · Oct 30, 2009

Kodak, even before digital, had formed itself into a circular firing squad. They have been so mismanaged and poorly forecasting that I am amazed that they have lasted this long. Just remember all the foolishness of the 70's and 80's and wonderful products that they spent billions on like "instant" film.

They could still survive and they could even flourish by selling chemistry and photo papers, but they refuse to do that and would rather be 4th place, or even worse, in the ink business.

RalphLambrecht · Oct 30, 2009

railwayman3 said:
I think that the point is that if I, and enough other people, don't buy sufficient of any particular Kodak product, whether it's because I don't need the item, prefer Ilford or Fuji, can't afford branded products or any other reason, I can't then reasonably complain later when Kodak stop making it.

Exactly the same applies to any other product or service provided by any commercial company...

I couldn't agree more.

chriscrawfordphoto · Oct 30, 2009

I shoot about 200 rolls of film a year, virtually all kodak. If they died, I could use Ilford, but Ilford products are A LOT more expensive and much harder to find in the USA than Kodak, and I like Tmax 400, Tmax 3200, Tri-X, and Tmax 100 better than the ilford equivilents.

sepiareverb · Oct 30, 2009

railwayman3 said:
If we imagined Kodak's shareholders complaining to the management that, for example, "analog products are losing money, and nothing is being done about it", the management would have to defend their reasons for inaction.

And if every user of Kodak silver products was a shareholder, the users would then have some measure of control.

removed account4 · Oct 30, 2009

Ian Grant said:
You can buy Kodak film but not Kodak B&W paper

Ian

whoops!

what a wicked blunder, thanks ian ... i am living in the past!

john

removed account4 · Oct 30, 2009

railwayman3 said:
I can't say that I've seen anywhere where Kodak has declared film dead, or are not looking at ways of marketing if there is a significant grassroots return to film (I'll stand corrected if I'm wrong with that). And if someone already has enough knowledge and enthusiasm to have decided to return to film, I'm not sure that a lot of expensive marketing is going to alter their decision. IDK, just my thoughts.

it was the CEO ( mr perez ) a few years ago in a big speech who declared it ...

oh well, i guess we just better keep shooting, and keep supporting those who support us in any way we can ..

Hard times for Kodak continue

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