Upcoming Film Price Wars - Kodak vs. Fuji...

Ron Todd wrote:


Cost - Volume - Gross Profit functions are not that simple.
Sometimes, you can make a higher gross profit by lowering the price.

The problem is the fixed costs don't change any if they make 1 roll or
they make 1,000,000. Worse the equipment isn't likely able to handle small
production runs. They need volume not just for profit but to keep the
machines running.



(liquidators) come in. You get to the point where the money to be
recovered from liquidating the company (and firing all the employees)
becomes a very reasonable possibility.


If nobody is buying film then the equipment is worthless. The cleanup
costs likely are higher then the other assets. The only way somebody can
make money by breaking up the company is if the assets have some value.

Nick

Given the profits to be made from -any- film sales, why would film
disappear from the market as long as people are still using it?

It isn't a question of "disappear" if you mean that literally. Sure, as long
as there are enough film cameras in the world to make some form of film
production profitable some company somewhere will presumably make it. But so
what? Why do I care if film doesn't "disappear" because somebody continues
making 35mm color film? That isn't any consolation to me, I use film in 120,
4x5 and 8x10 formats. Even if color photographs in a tiny format like 35mm
did interest me, I get much better images from my digital camera than I ever
did from 35mm film. So while your statement is literally true, it doesn't
give me a lot of comfort, nor should it give any great comfort to you or any
other user of medium and large format film.

"Stacey" wrote in message
...
Nick Zentena wrote:

OTOH it shows just how much profit there is in the film
market.



Exactly. Given the profits to be made from -any- film sales, why would
film
disappear from the market as long as people are still using it? Someone is
still bothering to respool 620 film for resale and others sell 127 film.
When was the last time anyone made a camera that uses either of those
types??

--

Stacey

Given the profits to be made from -any- film sales, why would film
disappear from the market as long as people are still using it?

It isn't a question of "disappear" if you mean that literally. Sure, as long
as there are enough film cameras in the world to make some form of film
production profitable some company somewhere will presumably make it. But so
what? Why do I care if film doesn't "disappear" because somebody continues
making 35mm color film? That isn't any consolation to me, I use film in 120,
4x5 and 8x10 formats. Even if color photographs in a tiny format like 35mm
did interest me, I get much better images from my digital camera than I ever
did from 35mm film. So while your statement is literally true, it doesn't
give me a lot of comfort, nor should it give any great comfort to you or any
other user of medium and large format film.

"Stacey" wrote in message
...
Nick Zentena wrote:

OTOH it shows just how much profit there is in the film
market.



Exactly. Given the profits to be made from -any- film sales, why would
film
disappear from the market as long as people are still using it? Someone is
still bothering to respool 620 film for resale and others sell 127 film.
When was the last time anyone made a camera that uses either of those
types??

--

Stacey

"jjs" wrote in message
...
"Stacey" wrote in message
...
Exactly. Given the profits to be made from -any- film sales, why would
film
disappear from the market as long as people are still using it?

Because it doesn't make _enough_ of a profit.


I do believe you have hit the nail! It seems, now-a-days that investors are
not satisfied unless they get 20-30% clear profit. What ever happened to
"long-term"? If after I pay all my creditors, myself my $250,000 yearly
salary, and taxes, why wouldn't I be satisfied with a 5% net? I dough no.

"jjs" wrote in message
...
"Stacey" wrote in message
...
Exactly. Given the profits to be made from -any- film sales, why would
film
disappear from the market as long as people are still using it?

Because it doesn't make _enough_ of a profit.


I do believe you have hit the nail! It seems, now-a-days that investors are
not satisfied unless they get 20-30% clear profit. What ever happened to
"long-term"? If after I pay all my creditors, myself my $250,000 yearly
salary, and taxes, why wouldn't I be satisfied with a 5% net? I dough no.

"dr bob" wrote

"jjs" wrote

Because it doesn't make _enough_ of a profit.


I do believe you have hit the nail! It seems, now-a-days that investors
are
not satisfied unless they get 20-30% clear profit. What ever happened to
"long-term"? [...]

Long term strategies were killed by required quarterly reports.

"dr bob" wrote

"jjs" wrote

Because it doesn't make _enough_ of a profit.


I do believe you have hit the nail! It seems, now-a-days that investors
are
not satisfied unless they get 20-30% clear profit. What ever happened to
"long-term"? [...]

Long term strategies were killed by required quarterly reports.

Shelley wrote:

Given the profits to be made from -any- film sales, why would film
disappear from the market as long as people are still using it?

It isn't a question of "disappear" if you mean that literally. Sure, as
long as there are enough film cameras in the world to make some form of
film production profitable some company somewhere will presumably make it.
But so what? Why do I care if film doesn't "disappear" because somebody
continues making 35mm color film? That isn't any consolation to me, I use
film in 120, 4x5 and 8x10 formats.

Given someone is bothing to make 127 film, why would they ignore the much
larger base of 120 and 4X5 users?

Personally I think all this "The sky is falling" is great. It's allowed me
to buy Medium format SLR's I could never afford in the past so please, keep
this up! :-)

--

Stacey

Shelley wrote:

Given the profits to be made from -any- film sales, why would film
disappear from the market as long as people are still using it?

It isn't a question of "disappear" if you mean that literally. Sure, as
long as there are enough film cameras in the world to make some form of
film production profitable some company somewhere will presumably make it.
But so what? Why do I care if film doesn't "disappear" because somebody
continues making 35mm color film? That isn't any consolation to me, I use
film in 120, 4x5 and 8x10 formats.

Given someone is bothing to make 127 film, why would they ignore the much
larger base of 120 and 4X5 users?

Personally I think all this "The sky is falling" is great. It's allowed me
to buy Medium format SLR's I could never afford in the past so please, keep
this up! :-)

--

Stacey

On Sun, 26 Sep 2004 06:44:06 -0500, Nick Zentena
wrote:

Ron Todd wrote:


Cost - Volume - Gross Profit functions are not that simple.
Sometimes, you can make a higher gross profit by lowering the price.

The problem is the fixed costs don't change any if they make 1 roll or
they make 1,000,000. Worse the equipment isn't likely able to handle small
production runs. They need volume not just for profit but to keep the
machines running.

Actually, fixed costs do change over large ranges in production
volume, as you can dump some of the costs as the enterprise contracts.
Many fixed costs are actually semi fixed costs over the wide range of
production volumes. I understand Kodak has liquidated some of its
fixed costs on continuing lines already, as film volume has declined.
I am pretty sure the fixed cost to produce one square foot of film is
much lower than the cost to produce 1 million square feet. You could
do 1 square foot in the basement, the 1 million would take some
administrative costs to run the operation.

I agree that Kodak's equipment is designed for higher production runs.
As I understand it: The TP and Kodachrome 25 production both ended
when they got down to one emulsion run a year, or less in the case of
TP. With the TP it seems the last production run was enough for three
years with the current demand.




(liquidators) come in. You get to the point where the money to be
recovered from liquidating the company (and firing all the employees)
becomes a very reasonable possibility.


If nobody is buying film then the equipment is worthless. The cleanup
costs likely are higher then the other assets. The only way somebody can
make money by breaking up the company is if the assets have some value.

Not necessarily. You never know what the assets are worth until you
sell them in the open market. People are notoriously bad at coming up
with pre-liquidation valuations. AIR, Rolls Royce was valued at
something like $0.10 per share before the liquidation. I believe it
returned something like $1.00 to $1.25 per share to equity holders.