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07-13-2013, 04:41 PM   #46
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QuoteOriginally posted by LaurenOE Quote
Folks. Give me one example, where a company made cheap products and worked their way up to the luxury market - while retaining the same "brand".
Very few companies can pull that off.
Some have, but the products were always quality to begin with, and were honest.

On the other hand, the world is filled with companies that found it was too hard to maintain their high standards and fell to an eventual destruction of their brand.

Pentax is in the throes of the latter, in that Ricoh is racing Pentax to the basement.
The argument about "needing" a wide consumer base to expand into other areas is moot and is exactly the marketing-double-speak that destroys a brand.

Again, show me a single brand that pulled this strategy off successfully, while maintaining the same "brand".

Most companies have to create a "luxury" brand to capitalize, and it appears that Ricoh is using Pentax as the "fodder".
Colored cameras, selling to mass retailers - so that in 5-10 years the brand that will appeal to upscale will be - Ricoh.

If Pentax has limited brand recognition, Ricoh is even less when it comes to the camera world and would make more sense in 5-10 years to build into the luxury brand.

Ricoh is going to throw Pentax under the bus, and they are doing it now as we speak.
Ricoh is destroying the Pentax brand.
Nothing that Ricoh is making now will be sought after on eBay in 10 years after production - at a higher cost - than it was, when it was in production and new.

When I can't get enthusiast based products from Pentax that have been shown, it's pretty easy to realize what is going on.

Problems integrating manufacturing operations
Brand reposition
Market change

Take your pick, it's not doom and gloom per se, but Pentax as we knew it in Ricoh's hands is not working out the way I thought it would.

When Pentax was aligned with the medical optics folks and the other high-tech parts of Asahi Optical Co (AOC) and even with Hoya, they were aligned with top quality engineers and visionaries.
Sure Hoya may have been shutting things down, but at least almost all of what we are seeing now, came from the AOC and Hoya brain trust.

With Ricoh, we got a printer company with a dismal camera brand.
I'm thinking this is not going to work for Pentax enthusiasts in the long run.
Well, one brand that springs to mind in recent years in Samsung. Used to be the cheapest TVs in the shop when I was a kid. Cast your mind back further and you can say that almost every major Japanese brand came up from being a value brand to a high-value brand.

But this is beside the point since Pentax still has some very nice lenses and bodies on the market right now. They have not vacated the enthusiast market at all. The K-5 II received a gold award from the other site just a few weeks ago. That is interesting because DPR reviews cameras against their actual competition, not against some mythical camera of their dreams.

Coloured cameras started in the Hoya era. That much is pretty obvious. Ricoh's cameras are very conservative in their design and colouring. Having good cheap cameras like the K-50/K-500 is not just a play to the average Walmart customer. So many members of this forum started on a K100, K-X or K-R. The amount of control Pentax offers at that price point attracts thinking photographers to the brand.

By the way, I'm starting to think they are planning to retire the Ricoh brand from cameras. I saw some large banners in a store last week advertising the "Pentax GR". They looked quite official. The brochure for it also shows "Pentax" much more prominently than "Ricoh". Can't see that they are "throwing Pentax under the bus". If that were the case, why would they buy it.


Last edited by JPT; 07-14-2013 at 05:31 AM.
07-13-2013, 05:26 PM   #47
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QuoteOriginally posted by IchabodCrane Quote
Lauren, here's my take on the State of Ricoh/Pentax -- Innovation almost always starts at the top of the product line and then is trickled down from there. Unfortunately, there hasn't been any real innovation since the release of the K-5 which is pushing toward three years ago. Therefore there hasn't been any technology to trickle down to the mid and now entry level offerings. Why is that? We can only guess that Hoya shut down most if not all of that activity and you can't restart it overnight (or even in a year or more). The Ricoh/Pentax litmus test may very well be the level of innovation and/or advancement seen in the K-5 successor. I think it will tell us a lot about what to expect throughout their product line down the road.
What "innovation"? State what you want out of the K-mount.

This is a very mature technology. Most of the advances are predicted to come from off the photographic [art and into the network. Not new bodies or lenses.
07-13-2013, 05:27 PM   #48
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QuoteOriginally posted by JPT Quote
Well, one brand that springs to mind in recent years in Samsung.
Samsung hasn't matured into an elite brand. They simply replaced a slew of Japanese brands. Same for LG.

Sony tried to make its brand an elite brand..and it backfired.
07-13-2013, 05:29 PM   #49
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QuoteOriginally posted by LaurenOE Quote
Folks. Give me one example, where a company made cheap products and worked their way up to the luxury market - while retaining the same "brand".
Very few companies can pull that off.
Some have, but the products were always quality to begin with, and were honest.

On the other hand, the world is filled with companies that found it was too hard to maintain their high standards and fell to an eventual destruction of their brand.

Pentax is in the throes of the latter, in that Ricoh is racing Pentax to the basement.
The argument about "needing" a wide consumer base to expand into other areas is moot and is exactly the marketing-double-speak that destroys a brand.

Again, show me a single brand that pulled this strategy off successfully, while maintaining the same "brand".

Most companies have to create a "luxury" brand to capitalize, and it appears that Ricoh is using Pentax as the "fodder".
Colored cameras, selling to mass retailers - so that in 5-10 years the brand that will appeal to upscale will be - Ricoh.

If Pentax has limited brand recognition, Ricoh is even less when it comes to the camera world and would make more sense in 5-10 years to build into the luxury brand.

Ricoh is going to throw Pentax under the bus, and they are doing it now as we speak.
Ricoh is destroying the Pentax brand.
Nothing that Ricoh is making now will be sought after on eBay in 10 years after production - at a higher cost - than it was, when it was in production and new.

When I can't get enthusiast based products from Pentax that have been shown, it's pretty easy to realize what is going on.

Problems integrating manufacturing operations
Brand reposition
Market change

Take your pick, it's not doom and gloom per se, but Pentax as we knew it in Ricoh's hands is not working out the way I thought it would.

When Pentax was aligned with the medical optics folks and the other high-tech parts of Asahi Optical Co (AOC) and even with Hoya, they were aligned with top quality engineers and visionaries.
Sure Hoya may have been shutting things down, but at least almost all of what we are seeing now, came from the AOC and Hoya brain trust.

With Ricoh, we got a printer company with a dismal camera brand.
I'm thinking this is not going to work for Pentax enthusiasts in the long run.
You make it sound like as if Pentax doesn't have a digital MF camera (Nikon? Canon? Sony? Don't have that) or the K5II/s (compare it to the competition...).
And you also make it sound like as if since Pentax now has released long missed entry level cameras and a few compacts, they're not going to release anything else.

And you also make it sound like as if developing high end cameras is child's play and takes no time.
Why don't you start your own camera company and show Pentax how it's done already.

I wonder what narrative you'll switch to in September. Sigh.

07-13-2013, 10:29 PM - 1 Like   #50
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In their "normal state", most people are conservative and their vision closed. They play safe, rely on old knowledge to understand everything in front of them. Thus the imagination of the future is very much very linear extension of the present, and goes along the complacent ideas of self-preservation. The future is barely anything else but going along the beaten track, only faster and faster.

For example, not a single Pentax user could ever predict development of the Q system, nor how good the new GR would be. Nor could they imagine that improvements of the K5IIs were of such incremental magnitude that will indeed give Pentax one more year of steady development at hand. Not just that — that K5II camera won't be easily beaten during that period in area that matters most — image quality. Doesn't that show some insight Pentax had about the coming sensor tech, which they buy and know more about than all of the users at PF together, even in 100 years?

Similarly, we can talk about advancing and innovating within the DSLR category — what is possible, where imagination can change state of things, it's best to say, folks please give up. I'm reading these threads for months already and not a single soul could add something imaginative to the pool of repetitively uninteresting statements.

If the photographs coming out your cameras are as imaginative as your predictions and imagination in general, you should give up that hobby and enrol knitting classes. Seriously.

Last edited by Uluru; 07-13-2013 at 10:36 PM.
07-14-2013, 01:13 AM   #51
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QuoteOriginally posted by Uluru Quote
Damn, they are just human engineers, not Hogwarts magicians.
But even Harry Potter and Mr Albus Percival Dumbledore would be impressed with things that will be showed in the next 6 months;
- 4 new cameras in K mount
- 1 new camera in 645 mount
- 1 new in Q mount
- new TC and flash(es)
- new lenses
- compact hi-end cams
If they dare to show more, they'd be charged guilty for practicing witchcraft and Japanese inquisitors, Canon and Nikon, would light up the pyre.
2013/2014 will mark the best and the most productive time in the entire history of Pentax and Ricoh.
Damn, can't you hear the sound of hooves behind the hill, that will show up on the peak with first rays of dawn?
Are you counting the K-500&K-50 as well, because I don't expect a total of 6 K-mount cameras in one year (assuming they won't launch anything in January). That would means the Q was already announced.
And... is that from a reliable source?
07-14-2013, 01:25 AM   #52
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Original Poster
QuoteOriginally posted by Uluru Quote
Damn, they are just human engineers, not Hogwarts magicians.
But even Harry Potter and Mr Albus Percival Dumbledore would be impressed with things that will be showed in the next 6 months;
- 4 new cameras in K mount
- 1 new camera in 645 mount
- 1 new in Q mount
- new TC and flash(es)
- new lenses
- compact hi-end cams
If they dare to show more, they'd be charged guilty for practicing witchcraft and Japanese inquisitors, Canon and Nikon, would light up the pyre.
2013/2014 will mark the best and the most productive time in the entire history of Pentax and Ricoh.
Damn, can't you hear the sound of hooves behind the hill, that will show up on the peak with first rays of dawn?
Yes, and they will also market a tricorder that will mount our K-mount legacy glass.

For Pete's sake, without sources or decent explanation, this is is just science fiction.

07-14-2013, 04:54 AM   #53
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Sky...
Falling...
07-14-2013, 05:11 AM   #54
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No full frame today,
Good cameras in colors;
The sky is falling.
07-14-2013, 05:55 AM   #55
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Well Pentax doesn't have many new camera's and many models. Some other camerabrands do have that and they all struggle from having enourmous amounts off left over stock from older models. There is an economic crisis going on and camera's aren't the first thing to buy in your dayley life when you don't know how your job is going in the near future.

Being conservative with modelreleases and low stocking does make your margin's bigger since the costs go down.
07-14-2013, 09:08 AM   #56
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I think you may be right...

QuoteOriginally posted by Uluru Quote
Damn, they are just human engineers, not Hogwarts magicians.
But even Harry Potter and Mr Albus Percival Dumbledore would be impressed with things that will be showed in the next 6 months;
- 4 new cameras in K mount
- 1 new camera in 645 mount
- 1 new in Q mount
- new TC and flash(es)
- new lenses
- compact hi-end cams
If they dare to show more, they'd be charged guilty for practicing witchcraft and Japanese inquisitors, Canon and Nikon, would light up the pyre.
2013/2014 will mark the best and the most productive time in the entire history of Pentax and Ricoh.
Damn, can't you hear the sound of hooves behind the hill, that will show up on the peak with first rays of dawn?
QuoteOriginally posted by Pål Jensen Quote
This is going to ruin me
Since the K7 or so, Pentax is definitely on a roll. They need a high end APS-C camera, and to park it at the sidelines of some basketball, football, and baseball games (and some car races) with some good photographers and they'll be back in the game. Their new cameras (K5/II/IIs) are stunning, and their lenses always have been. New camera, waterproof flash. That's what I'm hoping for.

And work on your movie mode, Pentax, for God's sake. THAT ONE THING has prevented you from getting the HIGHEST MARKS OF ALL TIME on at least TWO camera tests.

Cheers,
Cameron
07-14-2013, 05:34 PM   #57
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QuoteOriginally posted by RonHendriks1966 Quote

Being conservative with modelreleases and low stocking does make your margin's bigger since the costs go down.
/
/
Which is the case with the new GR. You simply cannot get one, it's already preordered.
Some sources say the demand is such that Ricoh's factory cannot make enough of them.
I believe this is every manufacturer's dream.
07-14-2013, 05:36 PM   #58
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QuoteOriginally posted by Clavius Quote
Yes, and they will also market a tricorder that will mount our K-mount legacy glass.

For Pete's sake, without sources or decent explanation, this is is just science fiction.
|
|
Check my post about K50 and K500, several weeks before the first leak on the French website.


The game goes like this: several camera variants are developing at the same time. There is a common structure, and then nuances. Which one will be released will depend on what Nikon and Canon release. By this I mean that we already know all about D7100 and 70D, but nothing about 7D's and D300's successors. (For example, we may now speculate 7DII will have same sensor as the 70D). Once they come out, Pentax picks up the variants that stack well against them and price them competitively. Same scenario was employed for the new GR, once Ricoh knew what Nikon will launch.

In above K50 models, we'll see lots of new tech. All new AF, all new video, new flash capabilities, etc. But Ricoh won't show all of that before they are sure what other two will show.
Prepare to be proud.

Last edited by Uluru; 07-14-2013 at 05:54 PM.
07-14-2013, 05:59 PM   #59
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QuoteOriginally posted by Uluru Quote
/
/
Which is the case with the new GR. You simply cannot get one, it's already preordered.
Some sources say the demand is such that Ricoh's factory cannot make enough of them.
I believe this is every manufacturer's dream.
It might be a dream for some but it's a nightmare for many more. Every unit short on supply is a potential lost sale to the competition.
07-14-2013, 06:03 PM   #60
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QuoteOriginally posted by Uluru Quote
/
/
Which is the case with the new GR. You simply cannot get one, it's already preordered.
Some sources say the demand is such that Ricoh's factory cannot make enough of them.
I believe this is every manufacturer's dream.
QuoteOriginally posted by IchabodCrane Quote
It might be a dream for some but it's a nightmare for many more. Every unit short on supply is a potential lost sale to the competition.
Correct answer.

Actually, that is every manufacturer's nightmare. Time is the only truly non-renewable resource. Each day you don't meet demand is a forever-lost opportunity to post earnings.
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