What's happening to Forte

[bwfans]

As I suspected a gossip mongerer.

This kind of post is not really constructive and only shows your ignorance.

 

[bmac]

Lets not turn this into a pissing contest... ok?

 

[jd callow]

Hi,

Thanks. And based on continuation I rest my case.

Sandy

I believe the corpse may have some blood in it. I say we pummel it a while longer.

 

[Tom Duffy]

The sky may be falling, but we'll see it coming from a long way off.

I was, unintentionally, fairly leading edge on this. In the spring of 2000, after saving for a while, I bought the enlarger of my dreams. A 5x7 Omega for B&W and color. This was after buying the view camera of my dreams, a 5x7 Sinar P2. In the summer of 2000, Kodak anounced it was halting production of 5x7 film. Fortunately, Kodak reconsidered, but it didn't have to be that way.

Most of the really bad news I've seen concerns medium format cameras. The bulk of the equipment used by bread and butter photographers has been replaced by digital 35mm, because it makes economic sense, not because it's aesthetically superior. (quite the opposite, I would maintain). So be it. 120 film will probably be available for a long time to come.

One thing I've seen in all this is that Kodak will give ample warning when it discontinues a film line. Plenty of time later to buy the freezer and 10yrs worth of film. For now just enjoy taking pictures.
Take care,
Tom

 

[jandc]

Aggie,

After the Photokina I see a fair future for us.

Sure, film was definitely a side topic at the large brand halls - Kodak had a tiny shelf with films and developers, papers etc, Fuji showed new Portrait films (declaring war to Kodak) and I didn´t see a single box of film at Agfa.

But I had many talks with many people who knew their business.

It isn´t like there is no way to produce small batches of photographic films - there are small coating assemblies available which are usually used for testing procedures... 30cm wide instead of 1m or more.

In a worst case scenario these could be used for standard production (some are already in for special jobs), the only problem would be the KnowHow and the staff.

But once they are laid off at the companies... who cares who they work for?

Re Forte - they are in financial trouble again, two german sellers talked about it in public - one is Herr Loeffler of phototec.de, the other is Mirko Boedecker of fotoimpex.de. The two don´t agree with each other in terms of future prospects for Forte..

To coat a batch of paper you need the order and the money to finance the coating - that´s some ten thousand Euros per run, depending on the size of the batch and the size of the machine.

Someone recently said that Forte depended on payments in advance, before the material was actually produced. Forte seems to have one big problem - they buy the raw material in the West, paper base (there isn´t much left but Schoeller in Osnabrueck and Muellersohn), sensitizing materials, whatever. They pay big money for it, the same or probably more Ilford or Agfa pay for that stuff. But their prices are lower.

When I walked by the Forte booth I saw nothing, I didn´t actually noticed anything there until I was some dozen meters away - there wasn´t much on display, so I didn´t turn around.

The nonexistant Forte booth wasn´t with Fotoimpex, it was with B.I.G., the Brenner Import-Gesellschaft, another large warehouse and importer. Different hall, different place. BIG sells Forte by the Forte brand, not with a private label as ´impex does.

Foma was directly next to Fotoimpex, I had a good talk with the Czechs and learned a bit more about the new old Adox stuff at the other one. Too bad those T-Shirts weren´t for the people (Grey, with the "adding the grey to black&white" slogan on it). The looked fine.

Well.... I put my cards on Foma and Agfa. I believe they will make it - I am not sure how much of this is believe or wishful thinking... both need a 180° turn in terms of customer relations, of information, they need to start caring of who is selling their products and how, they need to approach the pro to get a few "high standing examples" for the ordinary customer. And they don´t need to send interested sellers away, thats a very bad habit.

Both have products that are excellent, some are the best available - Agfas chemistry for bw, for E6, RA4 is excellent, consistent, easy to handle and quite environment friendly (in comparison). They have a good name in that sector.... the Multicontrast papers are a dream for many who work with them... same with Foma - cheap and decent stuff, some quite innovatice (R100 reversal film, T200).

The topic of Forte was hashed and rehashed by people interested in film at Photokina.

Forte as recent as our last shipment has always required cash on delivery, not cash up front to order. They have made some business decisions in the recent past to sell film to large retailers at near cost. This has cost them both in profits and in sending the price of their film on the open market into decline. If you look at the price we were selling our 200 and 400 Classic (Forte) films now and a few months ago you can see this. When the new price point came out we went to Forte and got essentially the same deal. So now they are in the position of selling much larger quantities at little profit.

Forte is now trying to re-think their sales policy and figure out how to get back into a production mode that makes sense. There are no banks after them as previously posted. Their investors are all private owing shares in the company. As I said earlier they are trying to secure lines of credit with banks.

The problems with the costs of raw materials affects all of these smaller firms. Buying gelatin, base and silver in small quantities leaves you at the mercy of the market. The price of Tri-Acetate for film base changes daily with demand from the computer industry being the prime factor. This affects Foma and others too. I woukd suspect that these problems will affect the new smaller Agfa and possibly a restructured Ilford too. The days of bargin basement films is probably drawing to a close. By the way, Forte isn't the only one who went down this sell really cheap just to create volume approach. Ilford has the same problem. Selling film to rebranders at near cost just to keep production up.

The latest word from Forte is that they will get the production going again. I believe them until I hear otherwise from them. As I also said before if they go under we have other sources for the materials they produce.

As I said in a different post, a year from now we will have more choices of film than we do today. Maybe different, but more.

We were with Fotompex in the booth next to Foma. You should have asked for a shirt.

 

[titrisol]

Maybe JandC could offer t-shirts along with the purchase of film/paper

I agre with john, film will hang in there for a long while, and I don;t like to cry ove spilled beans, I'll use whatever is available when I need it.

The topic of Forte was hashed and rehashed by people interested in film at Photokina.

Forte as recent as our last shipment has always required cash on delivery, not cash up front to order. They have made some business decisions in the recent past to sell film to large retailers at near cost. This has cost them both in profits and in sending the price of their film on the open market into decline. If you look at the price we were selling our 200 and 400 Classic (Forte) films now and a few months ago you can see this. When the new price point came out we went to Forte and got essentially the same deal. So now they are in the position of selling much larger quantities at little profit.

Forte is now trying to re-think their sales policy and figure out how to get back into a production mode that makes sense. There are no banks after them as previously posted. Their investors are all private owing shares in the company. As I said earlier they are trying to secure lines of credit with banks.

The problems with the costs of raw materials affects all of these smaller firms. Buying gelatin, base and silver in small quantities leaves you at the mercy of the market. The price of Tri-Acetate for film base changes daily with demand from the computer industry being the prime factor. This affects Foma and others too. I woukd suspect that these problems will affect the new smaller Agfa and possibly a restructured Ilford too. The days of bargin basement films is probably drawing to a close. By the way, Forte isn't the only one who went down this sell really cheap just to create volume approach. Ilford has the same problem. Selling film to rebranders at near cost just to keep production up.

The latest word from Forte is that they will get the production going again. I believe them until I hear otherwise from them. As I also said before if they go under we have other sources for the materials they produce.

As I said in a different post, a year from now we will have more choices of film than we do today. Maybe different, but more.

We were with Fotompex in the booth next to Foma. You should have asked for a shirt.

 

[jandc]

Maybe JandC could offer t-shirts along with the purchase of film/paper

I agre with john, film will hang in there for a long while, and I don;t like to cry ove spilled beans, I'll use whatever is available when I need it.

We have ADOX shirts coming in our next shipment. We plan on throwing them in with orders over $50 until they are out.