Film/Digital Camera Sales 2006

http://today.reuters.com/news/articleinvesting.aspx?view=CN&storyID=2006-09-13T034700Z_01_T19992_RTRIDST_0_TECH-JAPAN-CAMERA.XML&rpc=66&type=qcna

 

http://www.imaging-resource.com/NEWS/1158601458.html

 

Japan's Camera & Imaging Products Association (CIPA) has released sales figures

for the first seven months of 2006:

 

Overall digital cameras: 20.3% growth for the first seven months of 2006, and

19.3% growth of DSLRs.

 

Film camera sales: original projection was for a 38% decrease in sales, actual

decrease much higher in less than a year -- 67.1% drop from 2005 sales.

The huge drop in film cameras sales, while sad, is probably not surprising.

 

What does surprise me a little is the proportional growth of DSLR sales to the overall sales growth of digital cameras in general.

 

Just from the sheer number of new P&S digital camera models introduced each month or every other month, I would've thought that overall digital sales growth would far outpace DSLR sales growth.

 

To me, that means that quite a few of those digital P&S cameras are not hitting their revenue projections.

 

But, what do I know?

Truthfully, there's little reason to buy new film cameras now. There are plently barely-used models out there that sell for significantly less than a new version. Used film equipment is cheap enough that I don't ever see myself buying new film equipment.

 

I've bought 4 film cameras in 2006, every one of them used.

I'm still shooting some film, and making lots of jury slides for artists from digital, so I'm a little curious about this subject. But I am one of those that can't see any reason to buy new film gear when so much great gear is out there for pennies on the dollar, so it's no surprise to me that new film gear is sitting on the shelves, unloved and unwanted.

 

I have a Pakon sleever which takes a stack of slides and inserts them in sleeving that comes off a roll, three across by whatever. I was getting low so I called Pakon to order another roll. Pakon was, as I understand it, one of the two main manufacturers of slide mounting, imprinting, and packaging equipment, and sold mounts for their equipment. I knew that they had sold off their slide-mount operation last year. When I called them last week, the order clerk was out sick and I ended up placing the order with the general manager. So I asked him how much things had slowed down.

 

In 2000 Pakon shipped an average of 2.5 million slide mounts every day, in 2005 when they shuttered that operation they were selling 10,000 a day. That's a 99.6% drop.

 

I know that Byers, the other biggie in the field, didn't suddenly start selling new gear to former Pakon users, nor did Gepe, so I think that probably is a pretty fair proxy for the volume of 35mm slide film sold over that time period. Of course, this says nothing at all about medium and large format, where digital hasn't made such deep inroads, but they were never as large a business as 35mm to start with, and it's pretty likely that they are shrinking as well.

 

So not only is the volume of new equipment disappearing, the consumables are falling down pretty rapidly as well. I can probably go for many years without buying any more equipment, but I do need to have an ongoing supply of film (Astia, in my case), chemistry (Kodak), and slide mounts (Pic-Mount and Gepe). It's a bit scary to think that, someday, none of those is going to be available. If the Pakon sales experience is representative, it could be a lot sooner than I want. Slide mounts will last forever, so I can stock up on those, but film and chemistry are a problem, even with refrigeration.

 

Van

I'd agree that it makes little sense to buy new film gear anymore, as durable pro film hardware has flooded the market. This makes the sales figures for film gear a poor measure of how many people are still shooting film. Everyone's just selling their film gear to each other! Sadly, the previous poster's story about slide mounting is a very sobering indication of film's waning popularity in many circles. Also, anyone who's tried to find a local lab that does E6 or 120 can tell you that it's getting harder and harder. Hopefully it just means most people are just shooting 35mm negative film.

Andrew Hinkle:<i><br>I'd agree that it makes little sense to buy new film gear anymore, as durable pro film hardware has flooded the market. This makes the sales figures for film gear a poor measure of how many people are still shooting film.</i><p>Heartily agree. The worse thing is the skill demands of photography and being a good photographer are also waning.<p><i>Everyone's just selling their film gear to each other! Sadly, the previous poster's story about slide mounting is a very sobering indication of film's waning popularity in many circles.</i><p>First, in regard to ``film`` the generic, slide film has always been a niche market, though slide film and its terminology drove the conversation about ``film`` for the 50 years.<p><i>Also, anyone who's tried to find a local lab that does E6 or 120 can tell you that it's getting harder and harder.</i><p>Precisely my point. Slide film is getting hammered, but as long as Fuji, Kodak et al are cranking out thousands of millions of feet of film for one-use and film in cartridges, ``film`` (print) will be around a long time. Then there is the medium and large format sheet film market. Theirs may be the more endangered film genre.<p><i>Hopefully it just means most people are just shooting 35mm negative film.</i><p>But that has <i><b><u>always</u></b></i> been the case for ``film``.

Relative sales volume of film and digital cameras does not really mean anything. Most people have a film camera. They are now buying digital. That does not necessarily mean that they will stop using film. And some will move back to using film once they have tried digital.

Ilkka, you have not been paying attention to film sales, then.

 

Worldwide film sales dropped 11%-16% a year from 2001-2004, then the drop accelerated. In 2005, film sales decreased 25% over 2004.

 

Not only that, around 40% of ALL film sales are in the form of cheap plastic one-time-use cameras.

 

In other words, film sales have been dropping dramatically. I would not be surprised to discover that by the end of this year film sales are around 10% of what they were in 2000.

And your point is?

If you're replying to me, Stephen, the point is that Illka said that film body sales were not as relevant as film sales.

 

I pointed out that sales of *both* were crashing.

 

That was the point.