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  #1  
Old 28th November 2021, 05:11 PM
Mike O'Pray Mike O'Pray is offline
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Default The Price of Fotospeed Paper

I think we have a very limited number of users of this paper here on FADU and with the arrival of Ilford MGV that number may now be nearly zero but I'd thought I'd just mention its current price which shocked me

The trigger for this post is that I was looking through some YouTube videos by ShootFilmLikeABoss and noticed that relatively recently he was given some paper by Fotospeed for a trial. This prompted me to look at Fotospeed's own site first as the best place to start and in the few short years since we last mentioned it on FADU I was shocked to see how much it has risen in price compared to Kentmere and even Ilford paper

It now costs about the same as MGV which I don't think was the case even a few years ago but is now in competition with what is a new and improved Ilford paper

I note that AgPhotographic for sometime now no longer stocks it but will obtain it for you if you order it. However it believes it offers no more than Kentmere as a paper and with no price advantage. This no price advantage appears now to be a definite price disadvantage

Now for pure speculation on my part but given Fotospeed's range of non darkroom paper by comparison, it strikes me that this may possibly indicate that it sees its darkroom paper as coming to its natural end as a "seller" and has made a decision not to continue its former price competitive edge or a change forced on it by costs has resulted in its contract price increase whereby it can no longer sell it at less than Ilford/Kentmere paper prices

So I do wonder how much longer Fotospeed will contract to have this paper made for it

Mike
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  #2  
Old 28th November 2021, 05:32 PM
Molli Molli is offline
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I use/d Fotospeed primarily as my contact sheet paper. As the only glossy paper I buy and only use I have for it, I bought Fotospeed as it was the cheapest available here. My last order was a box of 100 Sheets of 8x10 in the middle of 2019.

I recently went to put in an order for more and spent two weeks thereafter debating whether I'd be able to continue darkroom printing.

It had gone from $102 AUD in 2019 to $170!

That's not including postage as the store is out on the other side of town, at the time I'd intended to order we were in lockdown with a 20km travel limit and I'd also intended to combine the paper replenishment with more chemicals which necessitates a courier.

I finally bit the bullet and bought Kentmere from America. Even with the 71¢ on the dollar exchange rate and $40 USD postage, it wound up being around $160.

I still need to order those chemicals, though, and that's another $30 postage... from an hour up the road.

At any rate, Fotospeed's off my shopping list and Ilford MGV is even more expensive here.
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Old 28th November 2021, 07:46 PM
Mike O'Pray Mike O'Pray is offline
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Mollli, my sympathies on those rises. We have seen the intended Kodak increase in prices for Jan 2022 and they are eye-watering for me. OK this is film only but I just have feeling that our whole business is in for some real shocks in the next year or so

I can only hope that I am wrong and if I am right then the shocks will largely be due to the post lockdown effects from Covid 19 and sooner rather than later things will return to pre-Covid levels

However as far as Fotospeed paper is concerned I just have a feeling that its once competitive edge may be gone forever

Mike
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Old 28th November 2021, 11:31 PM
John King John King is offline
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The prices of silver is on the up and this is the key element in film and paper to form the image. Some companies I think are taking advantage (my opinion based upon what is bleedin' obvious).

There may be an element due to the upsurge of the use of film and they are jumping on the bandwagon to fill their coffers. The prices vary from company to company lead by Kodak and Fuji. The price of TriX is outrageous and I am sure this will lead to the drop in use. The demise of a Golden Goose comes to mind. Then the prices of the 'new' slide film by Kodak absolutely way over the top.

The surface area of 36 exp of film - any film, is roughly the same as a roll of 120, so why is 120 seemingly always cheaper? Then take colour printing paper.
This must be more complex that B&W to produce with the layer of silver and the layers of the colour element, so why is colour paper less expensive than monochrome? Sheet for sheet Ilford MG for a 12x16 box of 50 sold by AG = £72.70 A box of 50 12x16 Fuji Colour paper = £47.19. Quite a significant difference nearly twice the price.

It is all very complicated and the reasons are well hidden in the board rooms of the respective companies. The differential between colour and B&W film prices is not so clearly different.

Last edited by John King; 28th November 2021 at 11:49 PM.
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Old 1st December 2021, 08:19 AM
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Miha Miha is offline
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I guess its elevated price doesn't have anything to do with the generously weighted base (their description)?
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Old 3rd December 2021, 12:22 PM
Molli Molli is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Mike O'Pray View Post
Mollli, my sympathies on those rises. We have seen the intended Kodak increase in prices for Jan 2022 and they are eye-watering for me. OK this is film only but I just have feeling that our whole business is in for some real shocks in the next year or so

...

Mike
Thank you for your sympathies! I just remind myself that I brought this on myself. I used to write. Pen and notebooks, $30 per annum! 😁

Regarding film, I added a few rolls of Ilford HP5+ to that USA paper order. I've been using Tri-X to replace the discontinued Fuji Neopan 400 and was really only just warming to it when this new price hike was announced.

If worse comes to worse, I'll finally put in the effort to learn to draw. Alternatively, there are paper negatives and cyanotypes to be made.
All this time I've been warning my sitters that I'll make them look like gargoyles (to lower expectations and let us all off the hook).
I guess I'll simply have to switch my spiel to, "You'll look like a smurf, but it's not you, it's me... and this 180 year old process I'll be using to print your photograph." 😁
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Old 7th December 2021, 12:03 AM
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paddy paddy is offline
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I still have a lot of 12x16 sheets of fotospeed legacy fb paper, it probably has lost a couple of grades as i have had it over 15 years
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