Price of film

Just checked Henrys Camera in Canada for 120 HP5+ and found it costs $10 per roll. With tax that's virtually $1 per frame. Sure it's cheaper in the US but then theres the dollar conversion rate.

Sheesh!

So $10.49 a roll if your order is $50+ for free shipping.

BH with a $100 order for free shipping + brokerage + conversion** is $6.67 a roll.

**your credit card likely has a worse conversion rate than the market rate.

As much as I try to support local business, BH is really the only game in town for new film. I just have to do occasional $100 orders for the free shipping.

This looks interesting:
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I've ordered from ilfordphoto.ca previously. They are listing 120 hp 5+ at 5.93 plus tax plus shipping. Not bad....

I just ordered from 20 rolls of HP5 @ $5.93 CAD each from Amplis. No shipping charge! Thanks to frank for this thread!

Thanks to to those posting good buys!

We canucks gotta stick together☺

Awesome thanks, I'll have to check those sites out next time I need film.

I like Freestyle's prices, and I like they way they run their business. While they may not always have the cheapest prices on film (but you can't beat the prices on Arista films), that's where I always buy. However, if I had to pay $1 a frame to shoot film, I might have to stop shooting, or drastically cut back.

What the shipping charges are to Canada I couldn't say. That might be an issue, might not, I just don't know.

I usually get my film from argentix. They have especially good prices on foma products usually rivaling freestyle and b and h. Rollei films are actually marginally cheaper on argentix then they are compared to freestyle.
In terms of film, ive stopped buying film from henrys ever since they started charging 10 dollars for a 35mm roll of HP5+.
http://www.argentix.ca/index01.php

Thanks, Mguy.

Please pardon my rant, but henrys sells Kentmere film at the same price of ilford film. That makes no sense. Isnt kentmere ilford's "value" brand? If they are going to sell for this price they shouldnt even bother selling it.

Last time I ordered HP5 120 from Beau Photo (within the last 12 months) it was $6/roll for ordering 20+ rolls or $6.50/roll for smaller quantities. Not sure where it is at now but I've always found them to be at least within the ballpark of US prices when you factor in the exchange.

I feel your pain Frank. If you want a cheaper hobby consider golf or old motorcycles. Ha ha ha.

Love my old BMW Brian, but golf is a good walk spoiled.

You're lucky not to be in Australia and trying to buy film and chems ( or anything else for that matter ) I have to import almost everything and I have no where within a 10 hour drive I can go to by film that is not marked up 400% Some places here try to sell film such as Delta 100 120 roll film for over $30 per roll. I found some Ektar100 35mm last week for $36 per roll.
Admittedly shipping to AU from the US with BH-Photo is rather cheap and only takes a bit over a week but there is also many things they will not send. Even with international shipping film is around half the best price than what I can find it for here in AU, shipping from within AU cost around the same as shipping from the US and is at times much slower.
The biggest problem I have is with sellers who do not read there own listings and send the wrong stuff, I just now received an order from Fotoimpex in Germany and what was supposed to be 12 rolls of 120 MF film is 12 rolls of 35mm film, I do not even have a 35mm camera

Mark,

It's pretty much the same here in Brazil. Film and chemicals are hard as heck to find and local prices are absurd.

It's cheaper to buy from Freestyle, even with the shipping and import taxes! Freestyle has the lowest shipping rates, since they offer the option of FIMS (FedEx International Mail Service), which can be insured but is not trackable. FIMS is cheap for light packages, but gets as expensive as faster options if the package gets heavier, though.

B&H won't ship HC-110 to Brazil, even though Freestyle will. But the shipping is as costly as the product itself!


Cheers,
Flavio

Here in the UK prices are about the same, we have high taxes. I tend to scour Ebay for film, you can grab the odd bargain here and there, just be prepared to do lots a trawling to find the bargains. For fresh film in the UK Foma is the cheapest for 120 roll film, about £3.20 a roll inc postage if you buy 10 rolls.

Flavio, B+H won't ship HC-110 anywhere, including the US.

Another Australian chiming in here.
I recently changed all of my film and chemistry over to FOMA purely because I can get it at a good price and with relatively low shipping costs. It saddens me that where I live I can't pop into a store and pick up some paper and paper dev when I need it even at inflated prices, I have to buy in batches online to make it economical.

It has been sad for me to let go of Kentemere 100 and wish companies like ADOX, ILFORD, FUJI and KODAK would set up some sort of direct distributor system to make their products more available however I suspect that Australia is seen as a rather small and difficult market to sell to with all our import duties and shipping restrictions. I have no problem with photography in general being expensive (though cheaper is always appreciated), lets face it most hobbies or art are, however the availability and difficulty to get what you want is a real problem.

A small example of this is I was hoping to try out some Diafine as I heard about its nice keeping properties uniform development time. Getting it in Australia without doing a bulk order however was a big problem (most places simply would not ship it I don't know why I probably should have sent emails), unfortunately I know very few people near me who do analogue photography and so even doing a yearly bulk order from America or England is generally unfiesable. However I won't let any of this stop me from doing the thing I love and that is developing my own work. Even if I have to change brands of product or make my own chemistry I see a lot of value for money for how many hours of enjoyment I get out of it.

All I would ask is that companies take a good look and ask if their shipping costs are reasonable (particularly for the Australian companies) and if perhaps incentivizing yearly bulk orders may make things a little easier for everyone.

Kirks518 said:

Flavio, B+H won't ship HC-110 anywhere, including the US.

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True. I don't know why, since the formula doesn't seem to contain any dangerous component, at least not in significant quantities.

At least they will ship film, paper and gear. Adorama doesn't ship a thing to Brazil anymore.


Cheers,
Flavio

BainDarret said:

This looks interesting:
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This really irritates me. Amplis are the Canadian distributors for Ilford products. I would much rather that they put their energies into getting more film at reasonable prices into local stores than trying to compete against the stores who have to buy from them.

Send me the money for a group buy and I'll drive it over the border. Maybe there's money in smuggling film to Canada! !

Mogsby said:

Here in the UK prices are about the same, we have high taxes. I tend to scour Ebay for film, you can grab the odd bargain here and there, just be prepared to do lots a trawling to find the bargains. For fresh film in the UK Foma is the cheapest for 120 roll film, about £3.20 a roll inc postage if you buy 10 rolls.

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Swede here, we most likely have even higher taxes than the UK. I buy my film from Germany (Macodirect), last 15 rolls of FP4+ were about 4.5 USD each. My current sheetfilm (Adox CHS 100 II) is approx. 32 USD per box of 25 sheets, approx. 1.2 USD per sheet?

It all depends on where you buy your film from...

mehguy said:

Please pardon my rant, but henrys sells Kentmere film at the same price of ilford film. That makes no sense. Isnt kentmere ilford's "value" brand? If they are going to sell for this price they shouldnt even bother selling it.

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Kentmere is HARMAN Technology's value brand. ILFORD is their premium brand. The Swiss company named ILFORD is now a separate entity, and HARMAN has a limited license to use the name for B/W photograpic products.

More detailed history: http://ilford.com/about-us/history-heritage and http://www.harmantechnology.com/DotNetNuke/Aboutus/Introduction/tabid/133/Default.aspx (not up to date on the recent sale of HARMAN).