If the title of this posting is misleading I'm sorry, but I needed some kind of header. In a post of several weeks ago Michael Klayman of Schneider Optics was t aken to task for Schneider USA's refusal to honor Schneider's "worldwide" warran ty. As far as I know only Canon will honor that warranty in the USA for their eq uipment - so Schneider is not alone. From what I understand Schneider USA is sol ely self-supporting. They are required to buy their lenses from Schneider German y at the same prices as the European distributors must pay. But unlike the Europ ean distributors they receive no support in marketing or advertising the product s - it comes out of their pockets. I'm not defending their practices in any way, since I buy all of my lenses directly from Europe I've obviously weighed the co st/benefit and made my decision. But it should not go unsaid as to some of the c ontributing factors involved in the disparate pricing. I remember when Einrich(s p?) Optical imported Nikon gear in the 70's and we were charged prices which wer e double those that were paid in Japan - this was probably the beginning of the "parallel import" business. Today Schneider USA and Mamiya USA are just the most visible practicioners of this higher pricing - but ultimately the manufacturer is to blame. If they would establish a worldwide advertising budget, and support their products in the USA, I expect that much of this pricing differential woul d disappear. If I am in error on these points, and someone has more accurate inf ormation, please contribute to this post. Also of interest is the shrinking mark et of LF gear. Even though the volume goes down many of the fixed overhead costs do not. I've included serial numbers from Schneider's site. Note the drop from 500,000 units per year from 1957-1965 vs. the ~30,000 units per year now. Seems that LF gear is rapidly following Buggy Whips.
[pre] Serial Number Date 5,000,000 February 1957 6,000,000 May 1959 7,000,000 February 1961 8,000,000 March 1963 8,500,000 February 1964 9,000,000 February 1965 9,500,000 September 1965
14,540,000 January 1995 14,560,000 April 1995 14,590,000 January 1996 14,600,000 April 1996 14,620,000 November 1996 14,730,000 April 2000 [/pre]
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