[dr5chrome]

..as things evolve, folks who understand what real photography is, in the-mind, will not want to give up that notion. To these peeps 'cell-phone-photography' is a joke. But, they only have so many $$ resources.

It's not that we don't have enough clients, we do. The problem is will we have enough clients that will be able or will want to pay the cost for the services. This is what caused EFKE to close. While they had enough business, the cost of doing business in the foreseeable future was too high. EFKE didn't feel that their client base would pay what was needed to keep it all going.

As a lab service its the same - the cost of chems & supplies, some of them up 250% this year alone, [not to mention ship costs & film costs]. These are business cost increases we cannot absorb. The result is to raise rates. As EFKE did, labs have to decide to raise rates and hope their clients will pay it, or close and do something else..

Real photography has all moved to the arts. There is no commercial or hardly any being done today. When the economy is bad, artists have no money, and arts related services suffer. This is now the state of our industry. By the time who-all is left in analog, decides to pool together, it will be too late for all of us.

This im afraid is the reality of it all..

to krifatida's post - We deal with what we are given - DDX is still very much alive btw.. As mentioned, and I might take it to extreme, specialty stores even as big as freestyle may be going bye-bye sooner than we all think. The Amazons of the world are going to take over this mail-market. As 'services' get more expensive, more artists will be doing the DIY thing to save money. As far as helping each other, it rarely exists, if at all.