Tariffs and Film and Paper prices

[GregY]

Craig, At the same time, why would Harman choose to invest/build in a country with high wages & economic volatility?

Someone, somewhere, has probably tried to develop film in instant ramen!

Ramenol ??

 

[GregY]

Yes...yet another reason I'll be eating less of it.

Excellent fresh ramen is offered in Japan, but the cheap commercial packaged stuff is largely made by Nissan Foods...& they have plants in Lancaster Pennsylvania....

 

[GregY]

I can't imagine Adox wants to disclose their trade secrets and formulas to a competitor. Even if they did, there is additional cost to having a third party coat, package and distribute their products. I suspect that would end up being more expensive than paying a tariff, even if Adox wanted to go that way.

Exactly.....

 

[DREW WILEY]

There was a giant new Saki plant built only a block away from my old work place. It's still going strong. But you'd have to drink a lot of even saki to get inebriated enough to think that any kind of film or paper developer would warrant that scale of production investment.
The building permit itself was two million dollars; and that was before even the demolition of a former commercial interest on the same lot. (That particular expense was terribly underestimated; the former business manufactured and distributed aircraft cable; and they used their own surplus of it to reinforce the foundation, rather than conventional rebar. Well, it made helluva lot stronger foundation, but also a helluva lot harder foundation to break up and remove when the incoming Saki plant figured out they needed a different configuration). Murphy's law once again. I'm pretty sure Mr. Murphy is now synonymous with someone else; but I won't go there.

 

[Don_ih]

@koraks seems to have just beaten me with a similar thought.

That thought was put forward in plenty of already deleted comments.

 

[mshchem]

Excellent fresh ramen is offered in Japan, but the cheap commercial packaged stuff is largely made by Nissan Foods...& they have plants in Lancaster Pennsylvania....

Pennsylvania Ramen! Oh the Humanity!!!!

 

[koraks]

That thought was put forward in plenty of already deleted comments.

As well as plenty of non-deleted ones, too. By and large, the thoughts expressed in this thread or in most forum posts on the internet are not very novel, original or unique.
I'd wager to say that the comment about Fuji's paper business was fairly specific and original, however.

 

[Don_ih]

By and large, the thoughts expressed in this thread or in most forum posts on the internet are not very novel, original or unique.

If a thought needed to be unique to be expressed or deemed valuable, no one would have any right to speak whatsoever.

 

[pentaxuser]

If a thought needed to be unique to be expressed or deemed valuable, no one would have any right to speak whatsoever.

Yes there is little that meets either criterion in the world let alone in Photrio

pentaxuser

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

If people never thought out of the box, there would be no photography. Our memories of what our deceased family looked like would only be in our heads.

 

[Carnie Bob]

Luckily Palladium is 1/2 the price of a couple of years ago , this is my only purchase that right now affects me personally

 

[bfilm]

And Fuji's paper business will take a significant hit due to these tariffs, which will accelerate its inevitable demise.

I think the Fujifilm silver halide chemicals and paper are doing fairly well.

They have a dedicated website for the photographic paper and chemicals.

The remaining Fujfilm factories are paper in the Netherlands and chemicals in Belgium and Singapore.

And Fujifilm gave an informative interview in 2023:

David Honey, general manager, Sales & Marketing, Fujifilm Europe:

"What we are concerned about now is the ecosystem of silver halide. How to keep silver halide as the premium quality photographic system. Particularly for printing. So a lot of the work we are doing in Holland is around sustaining this silver halide ecosystem."

Tom De Rop, business manager, Photo Imaging Products, photo chemicals business Belgium:

"chemistry for CN16/C41 films and E6 films is very much part of the future."

"Our senior management stresses on keeping a full ecosystem of paper and chemistry in hand, in close cooperation with the equipment manufacturers."

"Our plant has enough capacity, raw materials and packaging materials to respond to any kind of demand that the market lays upon us -- [existing] customers or prospects."

Fujifilm is also evidently working on a biodegradable photographic paper.

Richard van den Bergh, business manager, Photo Imaging Products, photo paper business Netherlands:

"We take out the polyethylene layers and use a bio-plastic. We had the first test samples at end of March and those were looking good... so in June we will do the first production with our (bulk paper stock) supplier Felix Schoeller."

"I think in the industry our competitors like HP or Canon often refer to silver halide as being old and dirty, which is not the case in my humble opinion. We are developing a more closed and better process."

"We are still investing heavily in the factory. In people and machines."

"The love for photo imaging within Fujifilm is very, very big. It’s really still a very important part of our DNA as well as our product turnover. We are still very much committed to the complete ecosystem."

 

[ChrisGalway]

Exactly, what kind of lunatic would want to invest with such turmoil.

Unfortunately the core of this discussion is something that can't really be discussed.

That's OK, I'm more than happy to discuss pre-washing film

OK, so what are the pros and cons of pre-washing? (Since we are not permitted to discuss anything else ...).

 

[Pieter12]

If people never thought out of the box, there would be no photography. Our memories of what our deceased family looked like would only be in our heads.

If there would be no photography, people would still draw. It was common for folks to keep a sketchbook, for itinerant artists to draw and paint family portraits. So there would be images of friends and family for some.

 

[Don_ih]

It also wasn't "out of the box" thinking that made photography a reality. It was a lot of general and particular experimentation and observation and a lot of different people engaged in a lot of different study and practice (most of which was mundane) that brought together all the necessary elements of understanding to make it possible. Just like with everything else meaningful that comes into existence.