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adrian tyler
24-Aug-2004, 01:06
here are some more detailes about ilford's insolvency.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0,3604,1289418,00.html

maybe someone on this forum with a few million to spare could do a buyout?

Aaron_3437
24-Aug-2004, 02:38
Why can't they manufacture in a lower cost country like China and India?

Jacques Augustowski
24-Aug-2004, 04:14
That will be a great idea Aaron. The problem is that the euro is over evaluated related to the dollar, about 20%. The british are keeping the pound in such a high value that they don't have any companies anymore. Rolls Royce, Land Rover are owned by other countries and even the Meccano/Hornby centenary toy factory is now french. Ilford has many patents and good ones, like Ilfocrome (Cibacrome} sold to Ciba-Geigy their swiss partner. Why other companies like Efke a Berger are producing b&w products if it was so bad? I don't believe they will shut down, it will be sold. Imagine the loss of the share holders.

Jacques

>Why can't they manufacture in a lower cost country like China and India?

>Aaron,

mark blackman
24-Aug-2004, 05:22
Realising I'm running the risk of being OT, I must point out your analysis is flawed Jacques. Few companies are 'owned' by western countries these days, those that are tend to be obese monopolies that cannot compete on an open market. So whilst it is untrue to state that the British don't have any companies anymore, those that are left are loss makers such as transport providers, the postal system and British Nuclear Fuels - tasked with the horrendous costs of PowerStation decommissioning.

Ilford will sink or swim depending whether an organisation think they can make money out of their products. If one does, and continues to operate in England, it will be taxed on any profits by the UK government, regardless of ownership.

Philippe Gauthier
24-Aug-2004, 10:00
Well, Polaroid was in a similar,or perhaps worse situation a couple of years ago and their products are still being made. OK, these are really bad news, but I'm confident that Ilford will restructure and downsize; and they cannot do it around anything but the existing B&W products, right?

Michael Kadillak
24-Aug-2004, 11:28
Phillip hit the nail directly on the head. If you are an Ilford products user, please continue to do so as the absolute worse thing one can do is exaserbate the situation by getting into a tizzy and jumping ship. I am confident that their products will serve us for many years.

Keep the faith and keep shooting!

Cheers!

MIke Sherck
24-Aug-2004, 12:58
As troubling as this development seems to be for the industry as a whole, I don't think of it as a disaster (easier since I don't work there.) With sales worldwide of B&W materials falling, a shakeout of manufacturers is inevitable. They can't all survive a shrinking market. Some of the smaller, low-overhead niche manufacturers can survive and even prosper but among the leaders, it is beginning to appear that Kodak may have the best chance of enduring the longest. While I disagree with some of the Great Yellow Father's product decisions over the years, they still make a range of products widely available. With Ilford in serious trouble, Agfa dramatically cutting back, and Fuji never widely distributed in the US, at this point in time I'm rather glad that I stuck with T-max. I can imagine a future (distant, I hope,) where Tmax and Tri-X are the only B&W emulsions widely available in a range of formats, including sheets. I can live with that, even if I'm not ecstatic about it. Beats the heck out of going back to wet plates and mixing my own emulsions. :)

Neal Shields
24-Aug-2004, 14:09
The article I read said that they have 300 million in sales supporting 740 employees .

For a mature product, that should have highly automated processes, that sounds like they have some pretty bad management. I would expect to see about half that number.

They seem to have ignored reality when times were good, and not made the kind of hard decisions that are required to keep a company healthy and assure resilience to market fluctuations.

When you run a company to try to maintain jobs rather than sustaining the wealth producing resource, in the end you have neither.

Brian Ellis
24-Aug-2004, 14:36
"I'm confident that Ilford will restructure and downsize and they cannot do it around anything but the existing B&W products, right?"

No, Ilford makes digital inks and media. Acording to an Ilford dealer who posted a message on another site, they say that's where they'll be concentrating their energies and resources.

adrian tyler
25-Aug-2004, 12:11
i think neil has got it right. i was producing a publication of fineley reproduced black and white photographic prints three years ago here in spain and the cover design was a faxamil of an ilford box of multigrade paper. i thought that with a print run of 5000 copies, to be distributed through all the major spanish museums it would be good free publicity for ilford. so of course i wrote to the marketing department and asked for permission but to our suprise it was flatly refused, the publication went ahead with a variant cover and was a huge success, unlike the ilford marketing departmnt.

David A. Goldfarb
25-Aug-2004, 12:24
But Kodak must have been okay with that idea when Andre de Dienes published the collection of Marilyn Monroe photos cased in a facsimile of a Kodak sheet film box:

http://images.amazon.com/images/P/3822811998.01.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

Bob._3483
25-Aug-2004, 17:53
As Michael Kadillak said above: keep buying. If you use Ilford products, go out and buy 3 months worth now: if they are not going to survive, that gives you time to find new products, if they do survive, then congratulations, pat yourself on the back, you helped them to do so. Don't jump ship now - it's the very, very worst time to do so.

Cheers,

Kim Du Boise
15-Oct-2004, 21:43
I run a photography supplies store and custom (read=specialty, manual) photo lab. We currently do not have an Ilford "rep" of our own anymore, but we are having NO problem getting our products from Ilford (or Agfa). They have run student specials for years at lower pricing, making it good for everyone, especially those students we service. We expect that this practice will come to a halt for a while in the next semester. I personally spoke with Ilford concerning the production of the Ilfochrome, since we print for client-artists and our own work. I was informed that we are one of the few left doing this, but there are no plans to discontinue the Ilfochrome classic papers (polyester base). Don't jump ship. Your small, old-fashioned, customer-oriented photo suppliers need you to stick with them. Thanks.