[reh321]

Latest data known: 40,000 Pentax-branded SLRs sold in 2019. That's 3,300 per month or 150 per working day. Globally.

And less than 30,000 in 2020 (30,000 includes Sony SLTs in addition to Pentax DSLRs).

In 1980 Pentax sold 1.2 million SLRs.

I used rangefinder cameras through the 1970’s, then purchased a Pentax “ME/SE” in 1979; it got damp at Niagara Falls and the repairmen gave up, so I purchased a Pentax “Super Program” in 1983. I switched to Canon in 1995 because I fell in love with their EF/usm lenses, and stayed there until issues with their bodies caused me to switch back to Pentax in 2015.

In 1979 my brother was still using the {film} ‘compact camera’ he had begun the decade with. By sometime in the 1980’s, he was using a Canon “AE-1 Program”. When we both attended a niece’s wedding in 2005, he was using a digital camera. The last time I saw him {at our Mother’s funeral in 2018}, he was photographing with a flip phone.

I have a photograph of a young woman I knew in grad school using a ‘110 camera’ at a wedding in 1976. By sometime in the 1980’s, she was a school librarian who used a Pentax K1000. The last time I saw her was around 2002; she had the first {pocket} digital camera I had ever seen.

My Mother photographed my sister’s 1973 wedding using a ‘110 camera’. By the early 1980’s, she was using a Canon “AE-1 Program” to photograph grand-babies. My Dad purchased several pocket digital cameras for her in the 2000’s.

The 1980’s seem to have been a high point for SLR usage. You cannot compare now with then.

Different market, different brand owner, different strategy. Respectfully, I don't feel the sales of Pentax SLR film cameras in 1980 has any relevance today.

[Serkevan]

all buying cameras, and no doubt more lenses than cameras.

For Canon EF, lens:camera ratio was at ~1.2 (I'd have to find the source, it's from when they celebrated the X millionth lens and body sold) from 1987-2015 or so. Nowadays it's a bit higher, probably around 1.4-1.5 lenses per camera (they just celebrated 150 million EOS lenses in 2021, and 100 million bodies in 2019 - add another 5-10 million bodies since then). I seem to recall Pentax was traditionally a bit higher but I can't find the data now... probably at 1.7-1.8; it's important to note that the vast majority of users only ever buy one kit lens - the one that comes with the camera.

[Kunzite]

it's important to note that the vast majority of users only ever buy one kit lens - the one that comes with the camera.

Yeah, but how much of that was (and still is, to some extent) skewed by the buyers of cheap entry level cameras?
Someone getting a K-1ii or a K-3iii, possibly even a K-70 might be less inclined to only use a kit lens.

[Serkevan]

Yeah, but how much of that was (and still is, to some extent) skewed by the buyers of cheap entry level cameras?
Someone getting a K-1ii or a K-3iii, possibly even a K-70 might be less inclined to only use a kit lens.

Certainly; those numbers are just the grand totals. The fact that the ratios are getting higher is a good indicator that the average user who buys a cheap body with a kit lens (or, maybe, with the 2-zoom-kit) is going to smartphones; therefore the lens hoarders* make up more of the user base, and increase the totals. And like I said, IIRC Pentax always had a higher lens-to-body ratio, probably because even a K-70 user is likely to have a DA 50 or DA 35 on top of the kit zoom(s).


By the way, it seems that Canon went from 50 million lenses in 2009 to 100 million in 2014 to 150 million in 2021, not such a huge slowdown... The RF lenses must be selling pretty well...


*I say, while looking at my 12 lenses

---

Last edited by Serkevan; 11-09-2021 at 07:07 AM.

[rdenney]

And you said there is no way it would be that expensive or rival the Fuji X-T4 specs so it is a good job neither of us work for Ricoh.

I think 1495 USD would have satisfied the market. That is what it is worth.
They are offering a $200 trade up deal plus battery grip ATM?



Still waiting for the lecture on economics and the beer you owe me

---------- Post added 11-08-21 at 09:11 PM ----------


I understand what you are saying.
It would take a lot to get me to change too but the way I see it if you own a Canon or Nikon DSLR would you buy a Pentax DSLR?

No because there are plenty of second hand Canikon DSLRs on the market as well as new ones BTW. Plus you are already locked into an ecosystem.
Where are new adopters going to experience a Pentax OVF. Not at the local B&M store.
Experienced photographers maybe?
I just don't think there will be many new adopters punting on OVF due to the herd mentality but I hope Ricoh's never mirrorless strategy is successful.

I’m well bought into Canon, and have been since I chose an F-1 to use instead of my two KX’s. (I have a 5D, a 5DII, and a large range of lenses.) But I have considered a switch to Pentax DSLRs.

But my 645Z is so dominant in my usage pattern, it could be argued that I’ve already made the switch.

Rick “who used the Canon last week because it was easier to pack” Denney

[rdenney]

If they don't have cameras yet then they probably will never be exposed to an OVF anyhow. There aren't going to be too many salespeople to say 'here try the Pentax. It has an OVF...'
If all you have left is a few enthusiasts then don't expect anything other than incremental improvements unless they have very deep pockets.
What would be interesting is how many K-3 mkIIIs were sold to non Pentaxians.
That would give an indication as to the power of Pentax to sell an accomplished DSLR in the current environment.

I think you may be wrong here. All it will take is a few articles, some Instagram influencers, and some famous hipster photographers to talk about the “reality” and “authenticity” of an optical finder to create demand among those who don’t currently have a camera. There will always be a high-touch reaction to high-tech.

As serious Canon and Nikon DSLR owners see their platforms being phased out, they will look to alternatives when they need features used cameras don’t offer. I say that as a Canon user whose wife is a Nikon user with a D500. Some will end up at Pentax, if Pentax sticks with optical reflex designs. Those that don’t will move to some other camera architecture.

The dead zone will be cheapie plastic DSLRs with mirror finders instead of pentaprisms. This was the lesson of the Swiss watch industry. The Quartz Crisis should really be called the Cheap Quartz Crisis. Cheap pin-lever mechanical watches ceased to exist in favor of much better cheap quartz watches made where labor costs were low. But the Swiss industry survived on the basis of style, and have since then flourished by moving upmarket.

Pentax (for consumer cameras) has always been mid-market, a bit below Canon, which was a bit below Nikon. Leica was high-end, and there were a zillion lower-end brands (and Ricoh was one of them). Chasing the low end is a race to the bottom, but trying to be high-end will require a monumental paradigm shift.

Pentax would make a statement by bringing out a modern good-quality film SLR—as a halo model. I’m not saying make a fetish object like the current Leica, but something solidly usable and fully updated at an affordable price. This was exactly their positioning (in a commercial sense) with the 645D—a high-end camera concept at a much lower price than the fetishist Leica S2 or Hasselblad. These wouldn’t define Pentax, they would validate Pentax. It wouldn’t matter if the halo models lost money on their own.

Refurbishing, warranting, and selling vintage and used Pentax gear would be a major positive leap, and would give Pentax a way to monetize its past. That was Fossil’s strategy for bringing back the Zodiac watch brand—start with refurbished old watches and then add some modern vintage-style revivals, aimed at the same market segment (mid-market that don’t think of themselves as luxury) that was buying Zodiac in their heyday. SLRs are the vintage revivals of the future.

Rick “it’s about buzz” Denney

[ThorSanchez]

For Canon EF, lens:camera ratio was at ~1.2 (I'd have to find the source, it's from when they celebrated the X millionth lens and body sold) from 1987-2015 or so. Nowadays it's a bit higher, probably around 1.4-1.5 lenses per camera (they just celebrated 150 million EOS lenses in 2021, and 100 million bodies in 2019 - add another 5-10 million bodies since then). I seem to recall Pentax was traditionally a bit higher but I can't find the data now... probably at 1.7-1.8; it's important to note that the vast majority of users only ever buy one kit lens - the one that comes with the camera.

So being a skeptical engineer I started thinking through this. Could you actually have a 1.7:1 ratio of lenses to cameras and have the vast majority of users just have one lens? The answer is yes, but it doesn't have to be that way.

If you had ten people each with one camera:

a. Six with one lens, three with two and one with five
b. Three with one lens, and seven with two
c. Nine with one lens and one with eight

...each group averages 1.7 lenses per camera. So it could be a vast majority with one lens and a few people with many. Or it could be 1/3 of the people with one lens and a lot with just two.

We need your source to include the standard deviation along with the average.

[Serkevan]

We need your source to include the standard deviation along with the average.

I would have to dig, because I could swear that I saw something along those lines, but for the life of me that I can't remember where. IMO it checks out pretty well with your first scenario (although we would of course also have to consider the possibility of users with a body and only third-party glass... because those Sigrons have to be used somewhere).


I mostly wrote that as a rough estimate that points to a significant part of the user base not being addicted to buying lenses unlike some of us weirdos

[boriscleto]

Pentax could be thought of as the equivalent of turntable manufacturers in the camera world. Who would have thought turntables would still sell decades after being supposedly obsolete

Who would have thought that vinyl LPs would outsell CDs? With sales of all music on physical media being dwarfed by music streaming...

[biz-engineer]

Were will the Pentax Funerals take place?

[Kunzite]

Regarding lenses, it would be a mistake to consider an overall ratio.
I've upgraded cameras more than I liked, in the past; typically because there was something desirable in a new model and some niggling issue with the one I had. The K20D had better high ISO and no VPN, compared to the K10D. The K-5 had a sensor which made me stop worry about image quality. The K-5iis focused better on low light.
But if I am to consider my going back to FF, that is the K-1 and the D FA lenses, that would be a ratio of 3:1 (soon to be 4:1, and then maybe 2:1 after which it should grow again).

[ThorSanchez]

Who would have thought that vinyl LPs would outsell CDs? With sales of all music on physical media being dwarfed by music streaming...

Just wait, I'm now seeing the hipster music aficionados start to talk up how awesome CDs are, and buying music on CDs. The vinyl craze was 98% nostalgia, now that's shifting to the 40-somethings who fondly remember buying grunge and other bootleg CDs in obscure independent record stores in the 90s.

[slartibartfast01]

Just wait, I'm now seeing the hipster music aficionados start to talk up how awesome CDs are, and buying music on CDs. The vinyl craze was 98% nostalgia, now that's shifting to the 40-somethings who fondly remember buying grunge and other bootleg CDs in obscure independent record stores in the 90s.

There is some sense to it. The streaming services probably only have the latest remasters of older music, if you buy the CD you can search for pressings released before the loudness wars.

[ThorSanchez]

There is some sense to it. The streaming services probably only have the latest remasters of older music, if you buy the CD you can search for pressings released before the loudness wars.

The sense, if there is any, is remembering going to that weird little record store in Norfolk in 1995 and buying those copies of the Ned's Atomic Dustbin b-sides compilation and the U2 bootleg from that concert in 1982, and the little rush of Dopamine that comes with the memory. The U2 bootleg was probably recorded on some tape deck and sounds like crap, the quality has little to do with it.

[thibs]

"And it must be available today."

Yeah. Non-buyers are easy to spot.

Yesterday. But it's not so they are doomed.