Konica announces +10% in film sales

Interestingly, after Kodak recent announcements, I read this in the

Oct 1 2003 issue of the British Journal of Photography:

 

Konica reported an increase of 10% in color film sales and a 24%

increase in 35mm cameras sales for the last 12 months period.

 

Apparently this was announced by Konica UK manager. I don't know if

these figures are worldwide or concern just the UK. It's in a short

announce, apparently not on their web site (www.bjphoto.co.uk). It

appears on the same page as a longer article entitled: Kodak boldly

goes the digital route...

I do not speak from knowledge but it probably concerns the UK market only.

 

Other manufacturers of cameras and film have noted good results in the last year in the UK.

 

With reference to the film vs digital topic, the markets being affected by digital are the high end consumer compact (P&S) and amateur medium format. Film SLRs and low price compacts are selling well in the UK, because they are so much cheaper than equivalent digital cameras.

 

I think it is obvious that the majority of news photographers converted to digital years ago.

Leaving aside the relative size and significance of the UK market in global terms, the news indicates that local differences in sales and uptake of film vs digital may be considerable, and pronouncements based on sales figures or trends in the USA may be contrary to other people's actual experience.