Originally posted by Adam Not only did we get a written response from the president of Pentax Europe, but he assured us that management in Japan (as well as the R&D department in Europe) will be forwarded our feedback,
Who are these people and what have they done with the real Pentax managers?
/joke
Consider Pentax's reply to Adam and this quote from Ricoh's announcement of the Pentax deal - "... That is why we want to build the new PENTAX RICOH IMAGING around a dynamic dialog with customers..." (
PENTAX RICOH IMAGING COMPANY, LTD. / What makes a great photograph? | RICOH).
"Dynamic dialog" is the polar opposite of how Pentax has chosen to interact with customers these past few years, in my view. And in the USA, "minimum dialog humanly possible" would be a stretch, as for the vast majority of us, the only possible way to buy Pentax is "dialog" with a credit card and delivery truck. And if something goes wrong, Pentax USA Support's default response to every problem seems to be " that issue has never been reported before." When the customer presses the point and gives evidence of 100's of like reports already submitted, they say, "we mean Pentax headquarters in Japan hasn't told us how to respond to that problem." Yuck.
Pentax has a huge advantage over other DSLR makers that they have squandered, in my view: Their small size should allow them to be much more responsive to the market and build much stronger customer loyalty, if they would only engage with their customers. Here's hoping that Ricoh's statement and Pentax Europe's response signal a real change in corporate culture.
I will be watching with interest these next few months.