Unofficial Ilford update (products)

sergio caetano said:

What about Ilford at Photokina ? Does somebody know what they are showing ? (besides products made in Switzerland...)

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The rumor about Ilford at Photokina goes like this. They are talking to one of their main US customers about buying their technology out of bankruptcy and moving the entire coating operation to the USA.

David A. Goldfarb said:

I guess that's why Carnegie employed Pinkerton guards to suppress labor strikes and bring in replacement workers---so they wouldn't have to pay the help too much. Actually, he usually had Henry Clay Frick do his dirty work.

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Oh!! Did you take that to be an endorsement of an entire philosophy of life, or some sort of "canonization" from the personal life of anyone?

It was not meant to be ... only to draw attention to one interesting facet of a complex study of "Why Companies Are Successful." There is, apparently, a significant and undeniable correlation between the levels of compensation of the "rank-and-file" and the financial success of the enterprise. Ford, in his time, was viewed as overpaying his employees; consider IBM; I saw, first-hand, the same at Polaroid while I was there, and Polaroid was making money hand over fist - only to slide into the toilet when wages were cut.

I maintain that moving operations to Third-World or "low wage" Countries is wrong, and massively counterproductive.

In another life, I was a Quality Control Engineer for a large electrical/ electronic equipment company. I have an exercise indelibly imprinted on my mind, where the company transferred the manufacturing of a certain line of stable components to a "Banana Republic" ... "They'll work for $.30 an hour - and well take care of all the engineering from here." Right. The employees were not the most reliable ... they could literally make more than $.30 an hour cutting sugar cane and harvesting bananas.

After four months of ruining materials and components, the parent company threw in the towel. Everything remaining was shipped back for appraisal, and possible salvage. Nothing was salvageable and all($$) was deposited in the local dump.

Although this is only peripherally applicable to photography, I really wanted to explain the rationale behind my "Law".

If anyone has any information to support an alternative --- "Cutting wages results in long term financial success", I'd really like to know about it - I haven't found one instance yet.

jovo said:

How do you say the F word in French?

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Putain!

O.T. Democracy

Pure democracy!!?? Under no circumstances do we even have an adulterated democracy. We cannot elct the entire Federal Government at the same time, therefore we cannot remove them. Our "founding fathers" were wealthy men who were not going to take a chance on being ousted by the rabble..Evan Clarke

Ed Sukach said:

For the moment, I's stick to your "Laws".

1. I don't think so. Last time I looked I still have both Hassleblads. I can obtain transportation for a LOT less than I have .. I could have bought a YUGO. To say that people NEVER pay more is a gross oversimplification.

2. An Investor who lasts longer than lunch time will consider a LOT more than "rate of return". I stayed out of the stock market when everyone else was investing like crazy and receiving high returns. A friend of mine invested heavily in Polaroid stock. Care to guess who's smiling now?

3. Successful entrepreneurs, the last time I looked, did not consider their employees as "overhead" ( I can hear the gasps from here!) Employee salaries and compensation should properly be "Operating Expenses"... and employees represent MAJOR investments in time and training. They ... oh the hell with it... I don't wish to get "deep" here.
Possibly I stayed from my point ... do you realize how high some entrepreneurs' overhead is? Check out the walnut credenzas and silver tea services ... and the company Country Clubs. Of course, the workers in the dust will NEVER get the right tools to do the job...

4. Another oversimplification. Remove the funding necessary to run a political campaign, the advertising, the "spin" people clouding men's (and women's) minds ... and even then ... as the last Presidential election shows, it MAY not be necessarily so. In a direct, PURE, democracy with instant, infallible communications, and a totally dedicated citizenry ... you could very well be right. Where can I find one of those?

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This is a little more towards the subject line. My local dealer has recently received a large order of Ilford fim paper and chemicals and has been told it is business as usual from the distributor.

Jim Chinn said:

This is a little more towards the subject line. My local dealer has recently received a large order of Ilford fim paper and chemicals and has been told it is business as usual from the distributor.

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That's good news Jim.

My dealer in Holland has just received a new shipment of Ilford HP5+ in 120 and 4x5 inch too. I have immediately bought half of his stock. I think it does no harm to build up a cushion as long as I still can.

G.

My local distributor (Crete, Greece) who is the only bulk, no-retail store around here has not mentioned anything about Ilford and he likes to whine about the smallest difficulty in getting something. He is having problems with Agfa and Kodak though. I had to special order small quantities of D-76, Hypo clear and Rodinal and it took weeks for them to arrive! Guys, if there is a problem somewhere, third world countries like Greece will be the first to notice.

Jim Chinn said:

This is a little more towards the subject line. My local dealer has recently received a large order of Ilford fim paper and chemicals and has been told it is business as usual from the distributor.

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I live just down the road from Ilford's UK factory in Mobberly and there are certainly plenty of big Ilford trucks coming out of the gates heavily laden and hopefully heading in your collective directions. I have always used their film chemicals and paper, but they are also a big employer around here so for both reasons I hope they pull through and don't re-site. Basically folks, as someone else said above, this is a market economy. Use it or loose it. Buy the stuff: use it, freeze it, give it away or throw it away. Look on it as a donation. I am still having to get used to the fact that they had to discontinue all 220 film about a year ago, so that I am having to learn to love Tri-X. Loosing Pan-F would be terrible, especially after just loosing Tech Pan (well apart from the freezer full I seem to have acquired obviously).

By the way, someone above asked what the global B&W market was worth. The UK magazine Amateur Photographer recently gave a figure of approx 100 million UK Pounds (about 180 million US) for film and paper. Not a lot compared to colour, but you would think enough for someone to make a living out of it. I suppose the big blow must have been the newspapers going digital. They must have been a big B&W market, but that happened quite some time ago now.

David.

I received this message from Ilford USA tech support today:

Jin is absolutely correct. I received thius email message from Ilford USA tech support today:

"Hi John! I'm happy to confirm that ILFORD films and papers are still being
manufactured now and for the foreseeable future. We did experience some
stock outs in the US and Canada due to a short cessation of manufacturing
in our UK factory while they reorganized under effectively Chapter 11 type
conditions. The products are now back in full production and we have
again started to receive regular shipments.

Thanks for your inquiry"

Good news indeed!

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Silverprint (http://www.silverprint.co.uk/) have the following in their news section:

" Look to an announcement in December regarding Ilford's future - and by this stage we can be sure that it will be good news.
Ilford material is rolling in to us as usual, (6/11/04) and we are well stocked on film and paper - the exception is their chemistry, where manufacture is to be subcontracted out to an outside chemical manufacturer. Most Ilford chemicals are now out of stock and it will be December 04 at the earliest before supply is resumed. "


Which is interesting - but a bit of a nuisance about the chemicals....

Cheers, Bob.

Bob,

seems like Champion steps in for the chemicals. And to be honest - Ilford chemicals are just plain and simple stuff with a lot of -usually cheaper- alternatives on the market.