I want good ones, and only Gepe seems to be available.
Hi chip j,
so long as you are in business with 35mm slides you can feel comfortable. There a lots of manufacturers who serve different kind of 35mm mounts wich are still afordable.
And I guess with 35mm slides you will have luck for many further years.
With 120 films it is much more expensive indeed. And from pricing you noticed with GePe you're right - they come more and more expensive. During the last decade most manufacturers doubled pricing.
I remember "Kaiser" CS mounts at obout 6,95 bucks (200 pcs.) in 2005 ! Today you have to pay
nearly 12 bucks for the same 200pack.
I have still a couple of GePe 35mm mounts out of the 80th. The type is glassless without metal mask
(no CS buy the way) this are the cheapest Gepe mounts. I payed around 5bucks for 3x50 pcs (a so called 150er package).
You should know that Gepe has the best of today's mounts (from my point) also in the past Gepe had the most expensive ones. For example Gepe antinewton glass mounts in 35mm were offered in 20pcs.
boxes in the past (you also got them in 100th) But they were realy expensive 20years ago : ~ 11 bucks (to 20mounts) if I remember correct.
So the problem from pricing have been allways in regard of :
1) antinewton ? 2) normal glass. 3) glassless ?
Normal glass mounts are not the best ones (from my point) due to different reasons.
If you decide today on glassless it isn't highliest expensive (belive me) !
But the manufacturer wich cheapest mounts (no name brands) ,we experient ones, remember from the past are still not avaible any longer. And that is ok - so far because of not the best quality.
I remember brands of normal glass mounts at 4,50 bucks from the 80th (100pcs). I can imagine that glassless was indeed cheeper (30years ago....

) but I bought first Gepe at this time!
So today you should decide what you realy want and what you realy need.
To Gepe your first decision (you need glassless right?) is on CS mounts or on normal ~ 2mm/~3mm system mounts.
If you decide on CS you don't need Gepe because there is no difference to other manufacturers of
CS system (the color of that mounts is different but who cares

).....
Coming to ~2 mm (the "thin" ones) you may have luck to get that one without metal mask (they were allways cheaper) - but they might be not avaible any longer.
Metal mask mounts are pretty good buy the way and had normal pricing at around 10 bucks the last years.(100pcs.).
But what you stated is correct - price increasement - so you have to pay 12 bucks sometimes 14 bucks and that is not the end my friend. We might see pricing of around 20 bucks for 100 Gepe metal masked in the near future because increasement is in advance.
But that isn't the case with CS mounts because this type isn't exclusive from GePe.
So the last decision you should take this day is on CS or against CS.
But if you want Gepe metal mask (real better but indeed expensive) you should buy a bigger stash of it next. Because today's pricing will be real "cheap" if you compare in the future (next year so far...)
that means THEY WILL NEVER BE SUCH CHEAP AS TODAY - think about !
with regards