A (very) brief and personal view of the Camera Retail Industry: metamorphosis.

[AndyS]

I also burned out. In the late '80s early '90s I became disillusioned, sold all my gear, moved to another industry and took a 10 year sabbatical from photography. Then in about 2000 I made another career change and got a cheap point n shoot Nikon digital to do real estate photography for my listings. My interest was reawakened and I made contact with some old friends still in the industry. Then Olympus introduced the EM-5 and I was all in again. Nostalgia wins over past experience.

I have not been 'in' the industry except vicariously since the late '80s but I found something very curious and different about the marketplace. Cameras all cost the same no matter where I shopped. Local retailer, catalog store, big box, Amazon or direct from the maker. All the same. I visited a camera store to buy a product and found that the sales people weren't on commission! Nobody tried to sell me extraneous stuff and were genuinely interested in me and my photography, what I planned to do and pictures I planned to take. O brave new world, that has such people in it!

Having been out of the industry for such a long time I can only speculate about this evolution or perhaps revolution in the marketplace. Anything I postulate about this remarkable change is without any real foundation but based on distant memory and business practices. Stay with me as I ruminate on the topic.

The mass marketers virtually destroyed the photo marketplace. Not to say that the products went away or there was no demand but electronics diluted that demand while the enthusiast lost a supportive community. To make things worse for camera makers the cell phone took away the cash cow of simple point n shoot volume sales. For the industry to survive they had to make profit from less product sales of a higher price point item. Price stability became as important as market share. How this stability across manufacturers took place without running afoul of price fixing I cannot fathom but it has been a boon to the enthusiast and the consumer. Perhaps it's like the auto industry with the published MSRP that somehow is a baseline for dealers although the car dealers are still in the “add on sales” profit mode. When some car dealers were adding $3-5k dealer markup both Ford and GM quietly let their dealers know that while pricing was at their discretion, delivery of product as at theirs wink wink ya' know what I mean?

Anecdotally one camera model suddenly went on sale for twice the established discount on one platform. That price lasted about 48 hours before it disappeared and the price suddenly matched every other outlet. Wonder how that happened?

Frankly I don't care. The end result is a much more user friendly marketplace where sellers can once again put experience on par with profit. A place where you become a customer not just a sale. It's a good thing however it happened.

Perhaps we have learned the difference between price and value? I don't know with online shopping for so many things but at least for photo equipment I think it may be time to form a relationship with a local retailer again.

[multigraincracker]

1. Had a lot of fun when I was 15.

Had a SLR, some bellow, and enlarger and a closet dark room. Made a ton of fake IDs for the local college kids to get in the bar.

[no_hypocrisy]

2. I still have my Olympus 35mm. Wouldn't trade it for computer cameras.

[peacebuzzard]

3. the camera is one item that has not inflated at all; kind of like airline tickets.

I revived a passion for cameras recently as well and was relieved the investment was not extraordinary, in fact affordable, and maybe more so since the end product no longer relies on film, darkroom or processing. The wait time for the final image has virtually disappeared. That makes the artistic end of the image easier since you can place finishing touches within minutes rather than hours or days. The cost for the end product is now just a time and skills investment rather than the hard tools. So much easier to transport!
Airline tickets have also remained stable and even less than what it was decades ago. Plus bargain shopping online makes the industry highly competitive.

Thanks for sharing Andy, enjoyed your post.

[yonder]

4. Thanks for your perspective in these posts about the business.

Sadly, our local indie shop, Idaho Camera closed their doors a few years back after many decades of being the go to place for anything camera related, including repair. I suppose they fell victim to what you described.

I've always been a snapshot guy (especially now with smart phones) but could always walk into their old-school, suit and tie stores for knowledgeable and gladly provided answers to any questions I might have.

Sad to see them go.

And no, perspective up there in the header 👆, was absolutely not meant to be a pun.

[Gato Moteado]

5. great trilogy, andy!

i wrote a similar post as a reply in one of your threads last week; of course it was completely from the consumer's perspective as i did not have any of the retail experience from the seller's side.

i would have loved to have heard your take on gray market sellers and how that affected you as a retailer.

[AndyS]

6. I remember your post. I didn't comment because I was contemplating

this series.

The 'gray market' wasn't that big a factor. Pricing was already in the dirt and without the add on junk to build profit back in the cost difference was small enough to be addressed with most customers. It did exist though and was a real pain both as a manufacturer and as a retailer because it had to be dealt with, usually in a crowd during a promotion. I cut the discussion short by looking at the irritation and saying, "Hey, if you feel that I bring absolutely no value to the transaction and you want to take food off my table, go for it but don't take up my time here doing it. Oh, and if that MFer has an issue don't even think of coming here." Something about making it personal shut them up pretty quickly.

It's still out there BTW. It usually takes weeks or months for delivery directly from China or Korea and there is no international warranty so if service is required it's up to you to find some way to get it back to the factory and then it gets the lowest priority. It might take a year to get it back . . . if ever.

[Gato Moteado]

7. yeah, i was educated about it early on and never touched the stuff...

...but the prices were so attractive and the business practices so sneaky, that i am sure plenty of people got sucked into it.