Sic Transit Gloria B+H

[Donmck]

Pareto efficiency does not necessarily result in a socially desirable distribution of resources,....(or counter space).... as it makes no statement about equality or the overall well-being of a society.

 

[Mahler_one]

Forgive me for asking about the arcane application of your post regarding the "socially desirable distribution of resources"... the relevance of the "Pareto principle" to the thread with reference to exactly how B&H affects the well being of society is? Please consider enlightening us as we are all anxious to know.

 

[Donmck]

"Please consider enlightening us as we are all anxious to know. "

By "us" and " we all" I assume your referring to the social group or "society" of analog photographers.By reading the comments in this thread and others you can easily see how B&H or Kodak,Ilford and many other co.'s effect the "well being "of this society.

The Pareto principle,far from being arcane,is the old 80-20 principle---which states that 20% of Band H's customers account for 80% of their revenue.
I'm pretty sure most if not all of the 20% are digital professionals-- hence the up grade in shelf/counter space to digital at the cost to analog space.

It seems from the comments that this distribution of space is not acceptable to some of the members of this society(socially unacceptable)

The Pareto principle is a statistical model and--

"makes no statement about equality or the overall well-being of a society."

hope that helps-

Don

 

[Mahler_one]

Yes...thanks.

I do agree with you Don about the counter space....hard to understand how some here think they should actually be managing B&H.

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

I can't imagine film counter space is too important to professional film users. When you see someone ordering a large amount of film for a studio, it's usually an assistant or a runner who comes with a shopping list.

 

[Rolleiflexible]

I do agree with you Don about the counter space....hard to understand how some here think they should actually be managing B&H.

You have mistaken me. I started the thread to
lament the passing of an era -- not to tell the
company how to manage itself. Did you not
read the title?

That said, I do think it unwise to remove the
darkroom section. At some point B+H becomes
indistinguishable from Best Buy in its focus on
moving boxes of electronics in volume, near
cost. There was a day when you could walk
into B+H and learn something from the sales
staff -- most had lives as photographers before
joining B+H. Andrew Daillinger in large format
and Milton Spiegel, the darkroom supervisor (see
attached), spring quickly to mind. Those days are
long past and B+H is the poorer for it.

I've been buying my film and chemicals from B+H
for over a decade and a week does not pass that
I am not in the store. I still shop there out of
loyalty to the place but it is not the store I fell
in love with in the 1990s.

 

[clayne]

B+H is becoming indistinguishable from Best Buy because they are Best Buy. They sell electronic plastic crap (yes, that includes digital computers that happen to convert light to binary) and getting rid of the darkroom section is probably "good riddance" to them. Here is what interests them: greenbacks, and lots of 'em.

Freestyle always gets my business.

 

[jovo]

... There was a day when you could walk
into B+H and learn something from the sales
staff -- most had lives as photographers before
joining B+H. Andrew Daillinger in large format
and Milton Spiegel, the darkroom supervisor (see
attached), spring quickly to mind. Those days are
long past and B+H is the poorer for it.

Not only did I learn a good bit from the staff when I asked a question, but I also learned from looking at the displays what was available in darkroom equipment, tripods, backpacks, light pads, and even enlarging papers. This news is indeed a marker of the passing of an era, and I am really disappointed about it.

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

An honest portrait of Milton, Sanders. He was great.

 

[naugastyle]

This is extraordinarily upsetting. I actually never bought equipment from B&H--and thus had limited experience asking questions of staff for myself--but years ago dragged my friend there when her parents handed down their F2 and the salesman was very nice and patient, as she'd never even held an SLR before.

For everyone who slams B&H, you forget that for New Yorkers it IS the local store. I would take it (well, really Adorama) over Freestyle for anything except paper every single time. This change is a pretty damn big deal.

I guess part of me isn't surprised. The last time I was there to stock up on chems the salesman seemed really pleased to chat about printing (once he realized I wasn't a beginner--my printed list of items made it seem I was gathering school supplies), when even a year ago I would have been waiting in line to get attention and had other customers waiting behind me. I remember the "expanded film counter" post from a few months ago and was really confused because it was sooo small compared to how it used to be--but I think it was because the film counter temporarily got even smaller or went away for a while, so that was the comeback period.

Since paper is the only thing I don't buy in New York, I can still go to Adorama for my film & chem needs, although their film counter has been super-shrunken for a few months now, with items no longer refrigerated while on the sales floor, and the darkroom section gets smaller every year, and a lot of items shown as in stock online are in the New Jersey warehouse. It's getting more and more frustrating to shop locally.

 

[Rolleiflexible]

An honest portrait of Milton, Sanders. He was great.

Milton was the best. I called him "Father" and
made a point of visiting with him whenever I
went into the store and would not leave without
a truly corny joke and a couple of reminiscences
about his life in the darkroom. Milton showed me
the virtues of LPD and TF-4 -- they remain my
paper developer and fixer. I miss him dearly.

 

[zenrhino]

Wow. These guys are the #1 stop anytime I go to NY/NJ. And always for the same thing -- to buy something from the MF shelf I can probably live without, but wouldn't ever see on the shelf here in Minneapolis. One doodad and a 5-pack of Fuji 160S 120. It's like a ritual for me.

Gah.