[Aristophanes]

Ecept the basic design and tooling cost is now spread over 2 bodies and has had a year of paying itself back. canon manages discount rebels the same way, functionall the bodies are all the same plastic Pieces of Sh** and model year to model year they don't change much. lower cost per unit achieved, materially increased volume should offset the discounting. KX for example a 499 camera will bring users to the brand in a way a $625 kit can't (bh price on KR kit today). If you have been in retail you know there are certain price points that are magic. $499 is one of them. price it at $529 and you'll sell about 25% of what you would sell at $499 - Canon's Rebel XS is a horrible camera with a plastic is kit lens currently a 479. guaranteed at and brick and mortar store put the 2 side by side and the kx would take a big chunk of xs sales,
Nikon D3000 @ 449 would suffer as well (hi iso of what 1600) particularly in a couple of colours the Kx would standout
and to get good placement in B&M you will need more than 2 cameras (aside from the paying for shelf space issue)
A salesperson could easily sway first time buyers to a kx kit over an xs kit. Remember the camera is rarely the only piece these buyers will own, most will end up a some point with a longer lens and a flash at a bare minimum.
If you want to see Pentax grow in share they will have to take away from canon and nikon, that's where the share is, and this is where they are getting a good chunk of that share

Just saying

Canon and Nikon pay the retailers for promo and sales force incentive. Pentax cannot afford those costs across the Best Buy chain or similar. If Pentax did try and compete at big box $499, Canikon would drop to $469, forcing Pentax into a loss position that it cannot survive but Canikon can. Pentax cannot survive a race to the bottom.

Canikon is OK with the guy who will pay below cost for an earlier model product, whereas Pentax needs the guy who will pay a marginal premium for a new offering. There Pentax does pretty well if it is to stay profitable per unit.

B&M salespeople don't sway against their bread and butter: those Canikon promos.

That is a game Pentax avoids, and so we see Woot back channel volume sales on NOS instead.

[Rondec]

I just don't know where this full frame growth potential comes from. How many people who go out looking for a 500 to 1000 dollar camera come home with a 2000 dollar full frame camera (less lenses)? How many are still married?

[jstevewhite]

Ecept the basic design and tooling cost is now spread over 2 bodies and has had a year of paying itself back.

While true, I bet the K-7 doesn't cost any less to build than the K-5 - how does it make sense to sell one cheaper than the other?

I agree with your discussion about price point, but I think the clue is when you note how much nicer the K-x is than the Rebel at $475; it's because you can't build and sell the K-X for that money on an ongoing basis and make a profit. If you could, I think the Rebel wouldn't be such a POS - I certainly don't believe that Pentax can build cameras any more cheaply than Canon can.

Another important thing to remember about salespeople is what's called "spiffs". The Vendor comes in with their demo and says to the sale floor, "For every Canon Ti kit you sell this Christmas Season, we'll give you $30." (This happens). Most retail sales clerks won't even think twice. "Yessir, this Rebel is the Value Leader. Nothing else is better unless you wanna spend a LOT more money."

[eddie1960]

I am not advocating big box per se, but getting in the door of the bigger camera chains and having some kind of sale presence will take more than a 2 body system,
getting the sales force on board really just requires spiffing when there is an ad (i spent over 25 years at retail, and can tell you spiffs work, but they need not exist long term, they don't on canon either, and i'm [pretty certain the cheap POS entry is never spiffed, it's always a more profitable step that is spiffed.
The big 3 (i include Sony) know how this works so does Pana in the m43 and p/s business
growing your market share means you need to have the supply and presence to get the attention of the consumer and the sales force. 2 bodies don't do that a mythical FF that sells for a low price doesn't either given how small the current FF market is
Pentax currently shows 13 offerings on bh vs nikons 12, but in reality it's 2 camera bodies versus nikons 9 (6 if you exclude the FF offerings) and Canons 9 (also 6 before FF) Sony has 6 (5 aside from FF - some are pellicle)
Between the 3 they account for almost the entire market for DSLR
the big point is they offer the consumer a perceived choice (even if it really is just rehashed versions)

[Blue]

I think there's just not enough potential sales out there for Pentax to do the investment needed to come out with a FF camera. I know there are Pentax users who would like a FF camera. Heck, I wouldn't mind having one myself! But Pentax's market share is already pretty small. If you remove those Pentax DSLR owners who don't want or can't afford a FF, you're not left with much of a market. That means that Pentax would have to attract Nikon/Canon/Sony folks. The only way to do that is to offer some kind of competitive advantage. So, what would that advantage be?

This is where some sort of sustainability model would come in handy. The LX would be one case study to look at in this context to evaluate how many actually sold. Smaller companies shouldn't get caught up in the General (Government) Motors manufacturing model of the 1950s and 60s where they tried to exponentially increase sales every 4 years while making the models from 4 years ago scrap. What they need to do is figure out home many units they can sell in a period of time and target that. Then they wouldn't end up on a tread mill cranking out more units than they can handle at marginal profits plus having to lay off 10,000 people down the line. This is how Niche markets can be profitable and sustainable. They don't have to be a small niche but just don't outgrow the structure too fast.

Edit: For example some people and sources consider the Spotmatic F a failure but yet Asahi sold more of them than most M42 models.

[jsherman999]

Huh?

It would take Pentax 5 years to catch up to Nikon's lens array, primes included.

They don't have to catch up - maybe 4, 5 lenses gets them strongly in the game. And that wouldn't take 5 years with a capital investment by Ricoh.

You are greatly overestimating the demand for FF fro any brand, much less Pentax. FF right now in terms of gross camera sales is an extremely limited and elite market.

As is MFD digital. The 645D is a halo product, a FF body would be a bread & butter product.

To pay for the capital investment in such a high-price, static market, you MUST have the migration away from Canikon to Pentax.

The right product at the right price would bring a little of that. Also, from Sony, and upgraders from other mounts would have Pentax to consider.

The FF market is not elastic and it grows very, very slowly due to high prices.

Just like MFD digital - pre-645D.

...And the vast majority of those purchasers are institutionali pros with locked-in brand investments (lenses, studio flash systems, etc.).

Absolutely not true. Thom Hogan (sorry to keep bringing him up, but he makes a living thinking about these things ) estimates that all the full-time pros in the US don't account for the sales of the d3 series alone, much less the d3, 1ds, D700, 5D, Sonys... It's an enthusiast-driven market.

The Panny/Oly crowd are with those companies for the small size. Probably less than .00001% of them would even conceive of owning a $2,000+ camera at FF size.

*Every* crowd has future FF upgraders in their mix. The Nikon forums are full of ex Pentax, Oly, Panasonic, etc shooters, not just Nikon upgraders.

Apparently sales for the Sony A850/900 were in the very low hundreds per month, but needed something like 6-fold increase in sales to break even. Sony saw the writing on the wall an ended development and sales of the A850 to reserve some margins on the A900. They could not compete on price and the loss leader strategy resulted in too few lens sales after-market to even keep that assembly line chugging along. They were looking at a 20 year amortization at sales #'s that low. You cannot sell that to a BoD on a retail product.

Source?

As well, I bet anything that Nikon and Sony have a "no compete" clause about allowing FF sensors into the market through their fab; Nikon gets the fab first to their design, Sony later with no sales to other companies for FF sensors. This allows them to take on Canon, and gives Sony some face-saving among its current customers.

Interesting speculation, but 'I bet anything' isn't data.

Pentax needed a much larger market share in 1985 to afford to get into the FF digital market now. Past mistakes, etc. FF is now an elite product until APS-C has run its course and fab development trends towards larger sensor commodity pricing.

It sounds like you're advocating Pentax keep making past mistakes, tied to severe risk-aversion.

Honestly - if I shared your pessimistic view about Pentax's potential k-mount future under Ricoh - and I have my doubts about that K-mount future locked in in a soon-to-be-mirrorless-dominated tier like aps-c - I'd sell all my Pentax equipment as fast as I could and get out while the getting was good.

The people on this thread ARE the demand for a Pentax FF. That's it. It's us; the reflection on your screen. A bunch o' guys around a virtual table.

Statements like that have the feel of a self-fulfilling prophecy.


.

[jsherman999]

Canon and Nikon pay the retailers for promo and sales force incentive. Pentax cannot afford those costs across the Best Buy chain or similar. If Pentax did try and compete at big box $499, Canikon would drop to $469, forcing Pentax into a loss position that it cannot survive but Canikon can. Pentax cannot survive a race to the bottom.

When I walked into a camera store intending to buy a D40 or Xt in 2007, a Pentax K100DS was on the shelf - and it was the least expensive DSLR in there. Nikon and Canon didn't try to adjust price at the retail level to undercut it. I wouldn't assume anything there.

---

Last edited by jsherman999; 07-12-2011 at 02:40 PM.

[Aristophanes]

When I walked into a camera store intending to buy a D40 or Xt in 2007, a Pentax K100DS was on the shelf - and it was the least expensive DSLR in there. Nikon and Canon didn't try to adjust price at the retail level to undercut it. I wouldn't assume anything there.

Ironically I had a D40 in 2007 and it was an extended warranty issue with Nikon over a zoom lens that caused be to switch brands towards Pentax based on the K200D in early 2008. Nikon and Pentax are very, very similar companies in their approach towards camera design.

Nikon only stopped making the D40 last year. It was a sales unit for the Asian and developing markets. I think the D60 only just recently ended production. Nikon has 5x the volume Pentax does, and probably more on lenses, so the company can siphon off 5% of its productivity to keep a bargain bin legacy line going even if they only return $10/unit to the mothership. If a new model starts to cannibalize sales forcing pricing below costs, Nikon simply withdraws NOS as warranty surplus. Because they have such a high volume of sales, they can do this.

Pentax does not have that elasticity, not with its volumes. Pentax can compete on price precisely because it does not have the extra assembly line and does not funnel resources towards bracketing price points. I do agree that Pentax really needs a 3-model DSLR system to compete, but mirrorless is making a mess of planning along traditional lines. Ideally an ILC manufacturer should hit the $499 price point one lens kit, the sub-$1,000 kit, and the a high-end where the K-5 sits now.

[eddie1960]

Ironically I had a D40 in 2007 and it was an extended warranty issue with Nikon over a zoom lens that caused be to switch brands towards Pentax based on the K200D in early 2008. Nikon and Pentax are very, very similar companies in their approach towards camera design.

Nikon only stopped making the D40 last year. It was a sales unit for the Asian and developing markets. I think the D60 only just recently ended production. Nikon has 5x the volume Pentax does, and probably more on lenses, so the company can siphon off 5% of its productivity to keep a bargain bin legacy line going even if they only return $10/unit to the mothership. If a new model starts to cannibalize sales forcing pricing below costs, Nikon simply withdraws NOS as warranty surplus. Because they have such a high volume of sales, they can do this.

Pentax does not have that elasticity, not with its volumes. Pentax can compete on price precisely because it does not have the extra assembly line and does not funnel resources towards bracketing price points. I do agree that Pentax really needs a 3-model DSLR system to compete, but mirrorless is making a mess of planning along traditional lines. Ideally an ILC manufacturer should hit the $499 price point one lens kit, the sub-$1,000 kit, and the a high-end where the K-5 sits now.

Which is why i think a 499 kx would have been wise even dumping the k7
It may have helped maintain the kr pricing longer in the market
A k milc will likely not be an entry piece imo so maybe the kr hits 499 by xmas with a fancy k milc in the middle (a pentax version of the gxr perhaps with a k module hmmmm)
Pentax has had numerous models that coild have run an extra year

[Winder]

Asking your preferred vendor for an enhanced upgrade path is allowed. Right now it's K-5 @ $1300 -----> 645D @ $10,000, and that 645D might as well be a Canon, because it's a different mount.

Something everyone should keep in mind here - a FF offering by Pentax/Ricoh strengthens K-mount in almost every possible way, including the aps-c tier, because it's all part of the same product silo.


.

What price would Pentax have to sell their FF at to make money? You get up into $2,500 for a body and the service and QC expectations really increase. Does Pentax have the structure to handle that?

I'm not disagreeing with the people who "WANT" to see a Pentax FF. The more competition in the market the better we all are. I just don't see Pentax making that move anytime in the immediate future. I have think speculation is fine. Speculate about the K-5's replacement. We know there will be one. FF on the other hand is probably not going to be a reality unless it is a mirror-less body.

[Aristophanes]

Nikon and Pentax are very, very similar companies in their approach towards camera design.

Case in point:

Nikon launches AF-S DX Micro Nikkor 40mm F2.8 macro lens: Digital Photography Review

This is essentially the DA 35 Macro with 5mm more FL making it closer to the DA 40 (or the old school 60m macro). It's not a Limited, but closer to the DA 35/2.4 in price and construction.

It's also $400 cheaper than the DA 35 Macro, but pricier than the DA 35/2.4. Splits the difference.

[Blue]

Case in point:

Nikon launches AF-S DX Micro Nikkor 40mm F2.8 macro lens: Digital Photography Review

This is essentially the DA 35 Macro with 5mm more FL making it closer to the DA 40 (or the old school 60m macro). It's not a Limited, but closer to the DA 35/2.4 in price and construction.

It's also $400 cheaper than the DA 35 Macro, but pricier than the DA 35/2.4. Splits the difference.

The only thing is, its not a DA 35mm Ltd. May as well get the Tokina 35mm macro if one is running a DX Nikon at $299.

[Blue]

What price would Pentax have to sell their FF at to make money? You get up into $2,500 for a body and the service and QC expectations really increase. Does Pentax have the structure to handle that?

I'm not disagreeing with the people who "WANT" to see a Pentax FF. The more competition in the market the better we all are. I just don't see Pentax making that move anytime in the immediate future. I have think speculation is fine. Speculate about the K-5's replacement. We know there will be one. FF on the other hand is probably not going to be a reality unless it is a mirror-less body.

They don't have to get into a treadmill trying to crank out 500,000 bodies a qtr. They could set up a small specialty line and set up a sustainable production number and target that. Some day companies will figure out they can't keep growing exponentially with some very rare exceptions. dSLR bodies aren't one of them.

[Aristophanes]

They don't have to catch up - maybe 4, 5 lenses gets them strongly in the game. And that wouldn't take 5 years with a capital investment by Ricoh.

They'd need 3-4 more primes in addition to the current FF fare.

They'd need an economy line of f/3.5-4 zoom glass, likely 3-4 lenses. They'd need right off the bat 3 pro level zooms at f/2.8 from 14-200mm.

Even though the optical formulas are probably dialed-in, everything needs to re-worked for the unforgiving aspects of digital, including micro-lenses, etc. For that they need some idea of their sensor path.

Looking at historical trends for lens development this is a 3-4 year effort at best. Neither Nikon nor Canon, with 5x the sales volumes each, have had that much output in the last decade. You are basically demanding Canikon-level capital investments on 80% less sales.

That pig don't fly. Ricoh got big probably because they are not stupid.

As is MFD digital. The 645D is a halo product, a FF body would be a bread & butter product.

Not without volume. That's Son'y problem. They took the A850 out of sales, and now have the relatively ancient A900 as the only FF option.

Troll the Sony forums where there is some very credible information. Also, read Hogan again as he has information about Sony and Nikon collaborating closely on all sorts of aspects of sensor design.

The term "halo product" is total puffery and does not apply here. It's like saying more people will fly on Boeing aircraft because Boeing also makes comm satellites.

The right product at the right price would bring a little of that. Also, from Sony, and upgraders from other mounts would have Pentax to consider.

And just what price would that be?

The market for cameras over $2,000 is extremely small, measured in the very low tens of thousands of units per year worldwide.

Just like MFD digital - pre-645D.

The 645D is priced NOT to trend into FF territory, and there is no sign that prices will drop.

It has had no effect overall on the pricing schemes of the other MF suppliers. I don't think they even blinked.

Absolutely not true. Thom Hogan (sorry to keep bringing him up, but he makes a living thinking about these things ) estimates that all the full-time pros in the US don't account for the sales of the d3 series alone, much less the d3, 1ds, D700, 5D, Sonys... It's an enthusiast-driven market.

I've communicated with Thom Hogan. He admits he's often wrong but he does have inside information.

A "prosumer" product relies on aggregate sales from prosumers, but it still needs pros to exist at all and to be priced affordable. For every pro who logs onto B&H and pays the MSRP at launch there are 5 prosumers who benefit from the pros early adopter outlay. That cost-shifting is how the high-end market works.

The MF market is priced so this is not a relevant effect. In fact, MF suppliers avoid that game scrupulously tying their products to pro support systems.

*Every* crowd has future FF upgraders in their mix. The Nikon forums are full of ex Pentax, Oly, Panasonic, etc shooters, not just Nikon upgraders.

Again, tiny, tiny, tiny market. You are measuring sales volumes in the low thousands at most.

You seem to think that another $2,500 FF camera will increase the total market. That the launch of a Pentax FF means people will put their money there rather than a new snowblower.

Look at Flickr stats. Just one Nikon D700 group has over 10,000 members...in English. More in other languages. The English language D3 group polls over 4,000 members.

The total Sony A850 group is 275 people. The A900 less than 100 people. And the total Sony FF group about 370.

Where do think a Pentax $2,500 FF fits in there?

The 645D has 161 members. Leica M9 2,319 (cost equivalent to a 645D in some respects). Pentax K-5 1,200 and so on.

Source?

I'm simply analyzing. Sony pulling models is a strong signal about ROI. That they did so very swiftly with no announcement of a substitute, leaving a lot of their installed base very angry, speaks volumes.

Companies generally only do that if they are taking very large losses on a product. In other words, not amortizing. the A-mount Sony FF's did not even poll on Amazon sales.

And Sony's ability to tap the Minolta base is similar to Pentax tapping their base, except that the old Minolta base was always 2-3x larger than Pentax' based on historic sales. Minolta was a solid #3, challenged Nikon for #2, and was well ahead of Pentax in sales, so they come at FF from a better starting point. And it hasn't helped, even though they are the industry's major sensor manufacturer.

Interesting speculation, but 'I bet anything' isn't data.

Hogan has made it as have many industry analysts.

It's completely normal and occurs also in automobiles, tires, etc.

The reality of the Sony FF fab is that Nikon appears to have first dibs and Sony is going so far as to stop production and sales of its benchmark model to accommodate this. Obviously Nikon is willing to pay a premium for Sony's fab and we see that in D3 prices.

I highly doubt the relatively limited production runs and stitching costs of the FF sensor are going to find themselves on the market to other vendors, not when it appears that the development is proprietary to Nikon design. I suspect this is a lock-in agreement and the Sony FF sensor could never be made available to Ricoh/Pentax or anyone else for that matter.

It sounds like you're advocating Pentax keep making past mistakes, tied to severe risk-aversion.

There's far more potential to bleed money (see your first point about Ricoh "investing") in FF than there is to expand the user base and gross revenues through objectives like the Q.

Honestly - if I shared your pessimistic view about Pentax's potential k-mount future under Ricoh - and I have my doubts about that K-mount future locked in in a soon-to-be-mirrorless-dominated tier like aps-c - I'd sell all my Pentax equipment as fast as I could and get out while the getting was good.

The k-mount in APS-C will survive for quite some time. The EVF/OVF SLT debate is where the DSLR market is headed. The APS-C vs. FF debate is essentially over because of sensor prices and gross sales volumes. The FF market simply cannot grow fast enough at current price points to cover new entrants.

The question for Pentax is how to keep k-mount DSLR going while moving towards a mirrorless line, likely at APS-C. They have to wait for FF sensors prices to drop substantially to be a player there, so I suspect any APS-C Pentax mount for mirrorless will do what the A-mount did and not change.

Statements like that have the feel of a self-fulfilling prophecy.

It's all about the price. This is completely beyond the control of Ricoh, big as they are, or Pentax. These sensor fabs cost hundreds of millions of $$, and to amortize their costs you need consumer/prosumer price points and high volumes. Canikon can offer 3-6 bodies and good volumes for that market and that leaves precious little room for Sony and virtually none for Pentax. Flickr isn't exactly scientific but the there's a lot of data points there, but it demonstrates decisively that the gap between Canikon and other players in FF is vast. From a market perspective, it's insurmountable.

[dylansalt]

So essentially, slowly but surely Pentax aps-c will cease to exist similar to Minolta if they can't compete with the likes of Canikon and Sony??