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Shocked at how much bulk TMY-2 costs

pentaxuser said:
If you process your own cassettes then after a few months you build up a stock of used-once factory cassettes which can then be used for several times each as reusable cassettes for bulk film, can't they?

pentaxuser
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Processing myself with reused cassettes resulted in exactly the problem that Don described. Plus I did not have a situation that made self processing practical. Note that I processed Ektachrome in my basement when I with 14 years old, so I was not afraid to develop Ektachrome myself.
 
mshchem said:
I checked an old Shutterbug, TMY 100' rolls in February of 2002 were $23.95 each.
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Film was being dumped at below cost in 2002. All across the board there were absolute bargains that I wish I'd taken advantage of. Mind you, I bet that wasn't the typical price even in 2002.

No doubt the cost of Kodak bulk rolls has increased, and there's a mod here who keeps explaining why.
 
Agulliver said:
All across the board there were absolute bargains that I wish I'd taken advantage of.
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On a related note, the FUJIFILM production plant near my home ceased producing C41 film (notably Superia 200 and C200) around this time, as film sales plummeted. A venturing photo store in town bought up the entire contents of the finished stock cooled warehouse. Until today, they are still selling film from that stock. I just checked and a roll of 24 exp Superia 200 expired in early 2004 currently retails for around €10. Only a few years ago (2019-ish?) I paid a fraction of that; I'm afraid I've lost the receipt, but it was probably around €3 per roll or a little less. If I were to hazard a guess what they paid when they bought that truckload of film, it must have been far below €1/roll - most likely something like €0.25 to €0.50 (if that!) This film is definitely getting rather long in the tooth by now. Be that as it may, it ages fairly well for a color negative film, and in any case, somebody has been making crazy margins on this film for the past decade.
 
koraks said:
and in any case, somebody has been making crazy margins on this film for the past decade.
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And it's just about time to end this trend, don't you agree?
Greed is something I always fought about to end.
 
Alessandro Serrao said:
And it's just about time to end this trend, don't you agree?
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No I don't. I don't think it's greed, either. They took a financial risk back in the early 2000's to the amount of many thousands of Euro's. They then had to carry the cost of 2 decades of cold storage of the material. It's normal they now try to recoup those costs as much as possible and make some profit on top of it. They're not the United Nations; they're a local business. They need to pay salaries etc.
 
koraks said:
They took a financial risk back in the early 2000's to the amount of many thousands of Euro's.
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It's called "business risk" and it cannot be passed on the customers, plus every business out there has to pay bills and etc... it's not a valid argument to sell things at 20x of their initial value... Considering the fact that they don't sell those films only, I think...
It's still called greed to me.
 
Alessandro Serrao said:
It's called "business risk" and it cannot be passed on the customers
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That's nonsense. Risk and its associated drivers are a normal part of the cost buildup.

Alessandro Serrao said:
plus every business out there has to pay bills and etc.
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So they adjust the retail price of their products based on this combined with the willingness of customers to pay, which aligns with market conditions including supply and demand.

It seems that a solution that would fit your requirements would ask for a pretty dramatic change in socioeconomic and political attitudes across the planet. Especially the latter we will not discuss here.
 
koraks said:
That's nonsense. Risk and its associated drivers are a normal part of the cost buildup.
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No, this type of business risk should never be passed on to customers.

koraks said:
So they adjust the retail price of their products based on this combined with the willingness of customers to pay, which aligns with market conditions including supply and demand.
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Until you shrink* deliberately the supply to mantain high retail costs. This in turn lowers the sales figure because people is smart enough to discern the limit.
*hypotetically (better specified).
 
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Alessandro Serrao said:
No, this business risk cannot be passed on to customers.
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Hey, I don't make up the facts, you know It happens.

Alessandro Serrao said:
Until you shrink deliberately the supply to mantain high retail costs.
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The shop we're talking about is not in a position to do this. They don't manufacture film, and they never have controlled a big enough part of any market to even approach the point where they affect supply.

It's a typical take it or leave it situation, where a store chooses to charge whatever it fancies.

If you have a problem with this, I can supply you with their name & website so you can write a letter or something. I think that's all there is to do; I don't think trying to argue with me on a forum that this practice somehow shouldn't exist makes any sense.
 
koraks said:
The shop we're talking about is not in a position to do this. They don't manufacture film, and they never have controlled a big enough part of any market to even approach the point where they affect supply.
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Of course it's not the shop that shrink (in hypothesis) the color film production. But nevertheless the final outcome it's the same: to mantain the film cost high and make a huge profit out of them.

koraks said:
It's a typical take it or leave it situation, where a store chooses to charge whatever it fancies.
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And this is valid also for the customers, who chose to pass the purchase on. I hope they will buy less and less so to shrink the demand --> lower the cost.

I've enforced an ethical rule: I never support sellers (I never buy from them) or producers who charge more than what I think is ethical for a given product. As simple as that and I hope for other people to follow this rule.
 
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Your opinion is clearly stated and I'm sure many feel the same or similar ways. I do think that everyone draws the line differently between what's 'ethical' in terms of a price point and what's not. Heck, I bet that line tends to drift from time to time for most people, too.

Btw, I also don't buy this film anymore from this shop, but not so much due to ethics. I've head my fill of expired color film; it's as simple as that. If someone else enjoys the 2-decades expired € 10 rolls, they have my blessing. Again, I'd happily provide the address of the shop so they can purchase... (no, I don't have any affiliation with them).
 
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Alessandro Serrao said:
I've enforced an ethical rule: I never support sellers (I never buy from them) or producers who charge more than what I think is ethical for a given product. As simple as that and I hope for other people to follow this rule.
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What price for a roll of black and white and color film do you think is "ethical"? How do you determine that?
 
Alessandro Serrao said:
It's still called greed to me.
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A business has to sell at a competitive price or it doesn't sell. If that involves a great deal of profit, that's great. It allows the business to continue and provide customers with other things at competitive prices. Making "a great deal of profit" on any film at present is a very, very unlikely thing. Photography stores sell new film for just a little more than they pay for it - that has been said directly on this forum by people who own stores and sell film.

You can't condemn people for making as much money as they can from a supply of a product no one actually needs. They can't make more than people are willing to spend. If they're not being deceptive in their description of the film, they are not being greedy at all. They are being sensible.
 
Don Heisz said:
Photography stores sell new film for just a little more than they pay for it - that has been said directly on this forum by people who own stores and sell film.
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That's not the specific case.
 
faberryman said:
What price for a roll of black and white and color film do you think is "ethical"? How do you determine that?
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For b&w that's max 6-7€ per roll.
For color that's max 10€ per roll.
 
koraks said:
So at €9.99 they're in the clear
Just messing with you. You draw the line wherever you want; it's a personal choice.
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Of course it's a personal choice, never said differently.
I just hope people realize that buying films above a certain cost will push manufacturers to raise that cost even more. People seem not to understand that or, worse yet, not to care about.
 
I guess it's balancing two desires: shoot film, and cheap film. As to the latter - I'm afraid that ship has sailed some time ago. I personally don't think that today's film prices are superficially inflated above what market conditions dictate. It's difficult to let go of the 2-decade long and unsustainable habit of irresponsibly low film prices.
 
It is not a "personal choice" issue when what is essentially being done is calling a seller immoral for trying to make a profit while selling a product within its expected price range. Attempting to sell film for 100000x the normal price is not even immoral (although it would be stupid) because film is not a necessity. You are not depriving anyone of anything by trying to maximize the profit on a discretionary item.
 
Ethics is not applicable to the pricing of film. It would be applicable to whether or not the film is honestly represented.
 
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