Agenda

Jessops Christmas trading statement

Jessops plc, the UK specialist photo retailer, has released its trading figures for the last quarter and the seven weeks up to and over the holiday period.
The group has not been enjoying the tough market of late and began an extensive restructuring exercise last year, during which CEO Chris Langley fell on his sword; Langley had been in photo retailing man and boy, previously with Dixons.
Jessops figures for the Christmas period however compare favourably with much that has been reported from the UK’s high streets. Although total sales for the seven weeks were down around 20 percent compared with last year (the group closed around 25 percent of its stores as part of the restructure) like for like sales were level on a year ago; further, despite stiff competition the group managed to maintain profit margins during the last quarter. Stock levels have also been more tightly controlled and were almost half that of last year at the end of the period.

Getty gets another one

One nore down and counting. iStockphoto sells out: click here for a really convincing piece of PR.

Konica Minolta to quit photo business

Enough said, really. Check out the announcements at the website.

Nikon moves away from film

Nikon has announced that it is ceasing production of a high proportion of its cameras and lenses designed for film photography. Full details can be found in press releases here.

Further signs of photo boom

Despite companies such as Kodak and Ilford making announcements which sound like photography is going down the pan, quite the opposite is true. Their bad news is the result of restructuring their businesses too late to align with changing markets, changes which, ironically, companies such as Kodak have been driving hard. Although photography as a hobby has been declining since the 1980s, thanks to the ubiquity of digital imaging analysts now expect the market to grow by almost a quarter over the next four years. One UK business that has clearly been on the ball is the specialist photo retailer Jessops. Bought from the founding family in a 1996 management buyout, the company has since increased turnover by almost 270 percent and profits by almost 300 percent. Jessops is now about to float on the UK Stock Exchange and is likely to achieve a market capitalisation of around £200million. Not bad for a chain of camera shops.

Kodak caught out?

Listening to news reports, it seems the consumer is to blame for Kodak's shedding of 250 jobs at its plant in Harrow in the UK. It's all the result of too many people opting for digital photography in place of film, a possibility that Kodak seems to have overlooked. Why can't companies talk straight sometimes? There is now a boom in photography as a popular hobby - the biggest since the 1960s and '70s; and that's thanks to companies (such as Kodak) investing millions in R&D and getting it right for once. But all the bad news, that's your fault, apparently.

Ilford Imaging jobs go

News today that the administrators of Ilford Imaging have cut almost half the jobs at the company, reducing the UK workforce to around 400. The move is intended to make the Cheshire-based business more attractive to would-be purchasers.

Ilford Imaging feels the digital heat

Ilford Imaging has been placed into administration following a steep decline in global demand for black and white films and papers this year. What began as a steady shrinking of the market – down 11% between 2001-3 – has become a crisis for the company with a reported further fall in demand of more than 25% already this year.
Ilford is probably the UK’s oldest photo brand still in production. The company was founded in 1879, just 40 years after the announcement of the negative/positive process. The picture above is of Ilford’s factory, the Britannia Works Company (as it was then known) in Ilford, Essex, in 1888. It is taken from an article by Martin Reed charting the history of b&w printing papers that appeared in Ag10.
The company led the way in developing resin-coated b&w papers that greatly speeded up print processing and then introduced high quality variable contrast papers, Multigrade. A long history in monochrome film technology was capped with XP1 (now XP2), a chromogenic emulsion capable of development in standard C-41 colour chemistry and with a variable speed rating of up to ISO1600. Based on colour negative film technology, it was practically grainless, with the image being formed from minute dye clouds instead of particles of silver.
It is to be hoped that the administrators will succeed in finding a home for the business. Ilford is a significant part of photography’s history and although inevitably its traditional products are far from a growth business, they remain far too good to go the way of all things.