Model designations for USA vs Europe and elsewhere

David Lyga · Aug 30, 2020

Why are many camera models different regarding where they are sold? One such example is the Nikon N8008 vs its European counterpart, the Nikon F-801. Another (old) example is the Asahi, H2 vs S2. An understandable exception is the branding of Nikkormat in the USA and of Nikomat in Japan, solely because pronouncing the letter R is difficult for Japanese.

I have listed only two; there are many more. But what is the prime reason(s) for doing this? Is it marketing needs, identification for sales data, or some other reasons? - David Lyga

Dan Fromm · Aug 30, 2020

David, we and western Europe got Nikkormat because Zeiss Ikon threaten to sue Nikon over the camera's original name, Nikomat. I bought my Nikkormat FTN at the 4Wing RCAF spring, 1970 photo fair from Nikon AG.

Sal Santamaura · Aug 30, 2020

The primary motivation for dual naming was to ensure easy identification of grey market cameras, which were usually not qualified for warranty service in the U.S.

David Lyga · Aug 30, 2020

Dan Fromm said:
David, we and western Europe got Nikkormat because Zeiss Ikon threaten to sue Nikon over the camera's original name, Nikomat. I bought my Nikkormat FTN at the 4Wing RCAF spring, 1970 photo fair from Nikon AG.

Then, we presume that this lawsuit would not have reached the courts in Japan, because there Nikomat was the name. - David Lyga

MattKing · Aug 30, 2020

The best examples are Gossen meters and Bogen/Manfrotto tripods. Gossen model names were one form in most of the world and different in the US. And Manfrotto tripods barely referenced the manufacturer's name in the US - they were named after the US distributor, Bogen.
And of course, in a different vein, all the different house brand cameras with M42 mounts that, subject to some minor feature variations, are essentially the same camera.
More recent examples are the various cameras produced to order by Cosina for Olympus, Nikon et al.
In days gone by, before the internet, almost all photographic markets were local markets. So things like feature sets and model designations were frequently determined by the national distributor, not the international manufacturer. That makes sense, because almost all the marketing efforts were at the distributor level, not the manufacturer's level. The big, professional models were an exception, not the rule.
Even Kodak had different models in different countries - a Kodak camera manufactured in Toronto, ON Canada often differed from the similar model made in Rochester, NY, and both of them were frequently very different than the Kodak cameras made in England.

AgX · Aug 30, 2020

David Lyga said:
Then, we presume that this lawsuit would not have reached the courts in Japan, because there Nikomat was the name. - David Lyga

Either the "Zeiss Ikon" brand was not protected in Japan, or Zeiss Ikon did not believe from the start to get through with this at a japanese court.

AgX · Aug 30, 2020

To sum up the reasons:

-) to market under a locally more known brand
-) to hamper grey-market sales
-) to please a retailer (house-brand)
-) to please another manufacturer, who expanded his offer
-) to evade legal quarrel on brand name
-) to veil the manufacturer (Comecon manufacturers)

wiltw · Aug 30, 2020

AgX said:
To sum up the reasons:

-) to market under a locally more known brand
-) to hamper grey-market sales
-) to please a retailer (house-brand)
-) to please another manufacturer, who expanded his offer
-) to evade legal quarrel on brand name
-) to veil the manufacturer (Comecon manufacturers)

...and sometimes, because of feature patent conflicts, they offer a de-featured version in a specific market so as to avoid patent violations. or the need to pay royalties to the patent owner. This HAS happened in the past!

AgX · Aug 31, 2020

Typically patents (for such generic products) are placed strategically, in the country of manufacture and/or in the main markets, that manufacturing de-featured versions makes not much sense, unless easily left out. Have you got examples? Right now nothing comes to my mind.

Raphael · Aug 31, 2020

Mainly model names examples come to my mind :
- Minolta Maxxum line (US + (UK ?)) is unknown in continental Europe (I think), here, it's called Dynax line
- Canon "Rebel" in the US, only known as EOS in Europe

ic-racer · Aug 31, 2020

Different names would make gray market imports easy to spot.

Ian Grant · Aug 31, 2020

Sal Santamaura said:
The primary motivation for dual naming was to ensure easy identification of grey market cameras, which were usually not qualified for warranty service in the U.S.

Actually it was because cameras were very significantly cheaper in the US compared to Europe in the 1970's and 80's. At the time i bought my Spotmatic F the US price in Dollars was $120 about the same figure as UK pounds - £120, and the exchange rate close to $2 to £1, so there was a big incentive for grey imports as even imported legally with duties paid there were still big savings.

Japanese camera companies were selling higher volumes of cameras into the US at lower prices and then making their profits with much higher pricing in Europe and outside the US. So to counter grey imports models had different names or in the case of Pentax marked Honeywell Pentax for the US market.

Ian

wiltw · Aug 31, 2020

AgX said:
Typically patents (for such generic products) are placed strategically, in the country of manufacture and/or in the main markets, that manufacturing de-featured versions makes not much sense, unless easily left out. Have you got examples? Right now nothing comes to my mind.

I distinctly recalled that a manufacturer left out a feature in the USA specifically to avoid patent issues and payment of royalties, as a legal principal but not with memory of the specific product and feature at issue....quite a while ago, which is why memory fails here.

AgX · Aug 31, 2020

We better not speak of my memory...

wiltw · Aug 31, 2020

Ian Grant said:
Actually it was because cameras were very significantly cheaper in the US compared to Europe in the 1970's and 80's. At the time i bought my Spotmatic F the US price in Dollars was $120 about the same figure as UK pounds - £120, and the exchange rate close to $2 to £1, so there was a big incentive for grey imports as even imported legally with duties paid there were still big savings.

Japanese camera companies were selling higher volumes of cameras into the US at lower prices and then making their profits with much higher pricing in Europe and outside the US. So to counter grey imports models had different names or in the case of Pentax marked Honeywell Pentax for the US market.

Ian

Do you know the above with certainty? Have you taken into consideration the signficant taxation with VAT, and the effects on end user price in countries with VAT?
I purchased an Olympus OM-1n in 1981, and with the weakness of the British Pound vs. the USD at the time, and with VAT refund, the end price was very substantially cheaper then the best NYC price at the time.

Martin Rickards · Aug 31, 2020

Raphael said:
Mainly model names examples come to my mind :
- Minolta Maxxum line (US + (UK ?)) is unknown in continental Europe (I think), here, it's called Dynax line
- Canon "Rebel" in the US, only known as EOS in Europe

And my Minolta X-500 bears more than a passing similarity to the American Minolta X-570

AgX · Aug 31, 2020

wiltw said:
Do you know the above with certainty? Have you taken into consideration the signficant taxation with VAT, and the effects on end user price in countries with VAT?

Do not overestimate the VAT. In West-Germany in the 70's it was 11%. More of interest would be import duties, in those years before free-trading was really established. But I could not find historic figures.

John Koehrer · Aug 31, 2020

Differences were mainly importer requirements. IE:Honeywell Pentax*, Bell & Howell Canon* and Nikon* were a couple. Nikon a third. EPOI was the company that owned the name for Nikon

Nikon refused to service anything that wasn't imported by them. Warrantee or cash money it was just refused.
The "Nikomat was introduced in Japan in '65 and the US version in '67

*All of the ese names were owned by US Companies. The Tower (Sears brand) MAY have been made concurrently
with the B&H Canon as a house brand.

wiltw · Aug 31, 2020

AgX said:
Do not overestimate the VAT. In West-Germany in the 70's it was 11%. More of interest would be import duties, in those years before free-trading was really established. But I could not find historic figures.

Thanks for clarification about VAT vs. import duties, in the relative contribution to increase in prices in Europe vs. elsewhere.

AgX · Aug 31, 2020

Moreover in a capitalisc world prices are not only made based on production cost and fiscal costs (taxes and duties) and reserves, but rather on what a certain markert wouldd spend. Thus for a country with a rather effluent population the prices are heightened and lowered at a non-effluent society.
This for instance was one reason that even wihin the European Community there was a grey market.

Ian Grant · Aug 31, 2020

wiltw said:
Do you know the above with certainty? Have you taken into consideration the signficant taxation with VAT, and the effects on end user price in countries with VAT?
I purchased an Olympus OM-1n in 1981, and with the weakness of the British Pound vs. the USD at the time, and with VAT refund, the end price was very substantially cheaper then the best NYC price at the time.

Yes but remember that exchange rates varied it's not as simple as the £ relative to the US $ but also their relative values to the Japanese Yen, also despite inflation here camera prices in the UK stayed quite stable for some time so you could easily have a reversal in the situation. There'd also been a levelling of the prices importers and then retailers were paying often because the companies were setting up their own distribution subsidiaries. The EEC precursor to the EU was also involved in helping level the playing field with regards to prices paid by US importers relative to Europe.

Olympus were aggressively marketing the OM system word wide, they wanted to become one of the leading companies alongside Canon, Minolta, Nikon and Pentax in terms of volume sales something that they didn't achieve with their older SLRs. The Olympus UK OM advertising and marketing was excellent and they were priced to break into the market.

Here the introduction of UK VAT in 1973 dropped camera prices very significantly the old Purchase Tax was much higher. VAT rates have changed a few times cameras may have been in the higher category in 1981.

Ian

runswithsizzers · Aug 31, 2020

"effluent population" indeed! I love that Freudian slip! I'm not trying to give you a hard time AgX. Many native speakers do no better with the Anguish Languish.

reddesert · Aug 31, 2020

wiltw said:
I distinctly recalled that a manufacturer left out a feature in the USA specifically to avoid patent issues and payment of royalties, as a legal principal but not with memory of the specific product and feature at issue....quite a while ago, which is why memory fails here.

This isn't exactly what you asked for: Some Nikons like the N90 and F100 would automatically rewind the film all the way into the cartridge. People who wanted to leave the leader out had to send the camera to Nikon USA to get it reprogrammed. Myth and lore said this was because Canon had a patent on the leader-out feature. In this case, myth and lore appears to have been correct; this 1979 US patent https://patents.google.com/patent/US4306794 by Canon clearly includes a mechanism for determining when the leader passes to allow leaving the leader out.

However, it isn't exactly what was asked for: it's a descoped feature that the camera was capable of, but I have no evidence it was different for US and non-US markets.

wiltw · Aug 31, 2020

runswithsizzers said:
"effluent population" indeed! I love that Freudian slip! I'm not trying to give you a hard time AgX. Many native speakers do no better with the Anguish Languish.

For Agx benefit, 'effluent' can refer to raw sewage, the runoff from many toilets. 'Affluent' means financially well off.

AgX's English is nevertheless far, far superior to my usage of German. "Haben Sie Eisbein/Grillhaxe?"...""Eine Maß, bitte"...
Wo ist das Toiletten?"

David Lyga · Aug 31, 2020

Please at least attempt to understand the dilemma Japan was in concerning currency exchange rates. In 1970, one USD = 360 yen. NOW one USD = 106 yen. The Japanese HAD 'to cheapen' the build quality in order to afford to export. They had NO OTHER CHOICE. This was done not only through build quality, but also through using other countries to do the manufacturing. Likewise the Germans: Up to 1971 (15 AUG) the exchange between USD: one USD = four Deutsche Marks. NOW, the Euro (which was intended to be a par equivalent to the DM) is this: one USD = 0.8 Euro!!!! The Germans simply could not compete. This is why a Leica M3 is built better than a Leica M6.

The dollar has fallen tremendously through the years. It has become a second-class currency. - David Lyga

Model designations for USA vs Europe and elsewhere

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