Canon Lens Price Increases

[Flake]

This is just typical Japanese business practice!  The cost of development or getting manufacturing right has risen, so they're going to pass those costs on to the end customer, not for them a reduced profit margin, they're so blinkered & greedy, & have such little respect for their customers that it's passed on.

Well I won't be buying any of them at these prices, and if they think that this will assist them in their competetiveness with Nikon they've got another thing comming!  The new lenses are almost double the street price of the old ones, and 50% dearer than the Nikon equivalents, at this level that's a lot of money, enough to buy a body.  If I were a user of this type of lens then I'd be switcing away from a company which shows me no respect and doesn't really care whether I stay with them or not.

[Edwin Herdman]

This is just typical Japanese business practice!  The cost of development or getting manufacturing right has risen, so they're going to pass those costs on to the end customer, not for them a reduced profit margin, they're so blinkered & greedy, & have such little respect for their customers that it's passed on.

You may want to turn that mirror around...this little rant comes off, unintentionally perhaps, as being borderline racist.  Really, you wouldn't expect an American company, for example, to raise prices if there was a massive earthquake and manufacturing cost increases on top of that (personally I wouldn't know)?

And Sigma's price on one of their new lenses puts the lie to "typical Japanese" even further.

Please think before you type...or don't bother.

[Flake]

Racism is word that now means someone who dissagrees with a socialist, it lost its real meaning long ago when left whingers inserted it into every debate they thought they were in danger of losing!  As you say don't bother to type, because you cannot stand people to have an opinion different to your own.  It's the socialists who are the real haters & the enemies of freedom & freedom of speech!

Having worked for a Japanese company I know a little about the business model, and it's not always pretty.  I do not accept that this has anything to do with the earthquake, it's to do with problems on the manufacturing line being passed to the customer, many other companies would have absorbed that cost.

[Hesbehindyou]

This is just typical Japanese business practice!  The cost of development or getting manufacturing right has risen, so they're going to pass those costs on to the end customer, not for them a reduced profit margin, they're so blinkered & greedy, & have such little respect for their customers that it's passed on.

Well I won't be buying any of them at these prices ... If I were a user of this type of lens then I'd be switcing away from a company which shows me no respect and doesn't really care whether I stay with them or not.

You seem to be taking this personally, yet were never going to use nor buy these lenses anyway.  Why so outraged?  Changing prices to reflect changing costs is a pretty common business practice over much all of the world, not just Japan.

[1982chris911]

This is just typical Japanese business practice!  The cost of development or getting manufacturing right has risen, so they're going to pass those costs on to the end customer, not for them a reduced profit margin, they're so blinkered & greedy, & have such little respect for their customers that it's passed on.

Well I won't be buying any of them at these prices, and if they think that this will assist them in their competetiveness with Nikon they've got another thing comming!  The new lenses are almost double the street price of the old ones, and 50% dearer than the Nikon equivalents, at this level that's a lot of money, enough to buy a body.  If I were a user of this type of lens then I'd be switcing away from a company which shows me no respect and doesn't really care whether I stay with them or not.

Was just thinking about certain US and European defense contractors in regards to businesses with their own governments ... Lockheed Martin F 35 lightning or Airbus A400M anyone ;-) ...

[click]

I've been pretty tolerant of high prices from Canon. But, my threshold has been breached. $13,000.00 for a 600mm lens? Do they really expect to sell them for that? On general principles, I expect those who can afford it will wait until it falls to $11,000 or so. Even then, it's super high priced. I suspect this could be a ploy to empty the coffers of the old designs.

[1982chris911]

I've been pretty tolerant of high prices from Canon. But, my threshold has been breached. $13,000.00 for a 600mm lens? Do they really expect to sell them for that? On general principles, I expect those who can afford it will wait until it falls to $11,000 or so. Even then, it's super high priced. I suspect this could be a ploy to empty the coffers of the old designs.

Well I am quite sure that we will see lower street prices after the Olympic Games in London ... but good timing for Canon to let all the Press Agencies/ Pros upgrade their equipment before ... I guess that the 200-400 f/4.0 TC 1.4 will also be available quite some time before ...   

[Edwin Herdman]

Racism is word that now means someone who dissagrees with a socialist, it lost its real meaning long ago when left whingers inserted it into every debate they thought they were in danger of losing!  As you say don't bother to type, because you cannot stand people to have an opinion different to your own.  It's the socialists who are the real haters & the enemies of freedom & freedom of speech!

Having worked for a Japanese company I know a little about the business model, and it's not always pretty.  I do not accept that this has anything to do with the earthquake, it's to do with problems on the manufacturing line being passed to the customer, many other companies would have absorbed that cost.

What the hell does this have to do with socialism?  If anybody's anti-business in this thread, it's you.  You seem to have an irrational hatred for companies selling products at a price they can actually make money at.  It's like crazy people protesting against Target because their mispriced $70 iPad purchases were refunded.

It also seems that I should not have bothered putting in the words "unintentionally" and "borderline" because you're getting more and more racist by the second.  "I worked with lots of black people and came to know their inferior ways..." is essentially what you're saying.

I don't really care what you think, Flake, about Canon revising their lens prices upwards, and neither does anybody else.

This may have just been the result of the fluctuating exchange rate.  Near the end of March, the dollar to yen ratio spiked at around 85 yen to the dollar, and now it's back down around 79.  But my guess is as good as anybody's; we don't have any insider information at the moment.  I haven't found an official press release about the lens price increases, and the only source I know of is on the Canon Rumors page.

The January price spike was announced by Canon USA as being put into place by them.  All those terrible Japanese people working at Canon USA!

What matters here is that the lenses are going to become more expensive, and how that impacts buyers matters.  It may make people shy away from these lenses, and I wouldn't blame them since they were expensive to begin with.  But on the other hand it's not clear to me how big these increases are, since I don't have the old figures to compare these with.  The 8-15mm fisheye zoom price, for example, looks pretty much like I remember it having looked.

[ronderick]

Reading the news about lens price increase is not a good thing for Monday morning.... 

Well, before we go any further, it would be nice to see actual results from these lenses at the hands of pros to see whether if it's worth the increase (for anyone who's considering of buying it).

However, I'd be more worried about the impact on prices for current used MK-1 version of these superteles...

[distant.star]

Please, Edwin, do not speak for me.

I do care what Flake thinks.

I don't really care what you think, Flake, about Canon revising their lens prices upwards, and neither does anybody else.

[UncleFester]

This is just typical Japanese business practice!  The cost of development or getting manufacturing right has risen, so they're going to pass those costs on to the end customer, not for them a reduced profit margin, they're so blinkered & greedy, & have such little respect for their customers that it's passed on.

Well I won't be buying any of them at these prices, and if they think that this will assist them in their competetiveness with Nikon they've got another thing comming!  The new lenses are almost double the street price of the old ones, and 50% dearer than the Nikon equivalents, at this level that's a lot of money, enough to buy a body.  If I were a user of this type of lens then I'd be switcing away from a company which shows me no respect and doesn't really care whether I stay with them or not.

I don't know a lot about Japanese business practice, but I wonder what effect the increase will have on current line-up. They should hold their value better and probably won't see them go for cheap on CL  - the ol' "used-IS I-telephotos-not-a -bargain,-may-as-well-by-new-from-Canon".

[celliottuk]

Pricing is an art. Part of that art is to push prices up to the point that the consumer won't buy in sufficient quantities to hit internal sales goals, so, if these prices are too high, Canon will reduce them.

[fman]

Those who make business using these lens need to recalculate now if it still worth the price. There is no point of going emotional here. Who were planning to by these lens for fun can be easily scared away, especially considering the possible price drop after the Olympic games.

Price is mostly indicating some kind of supply-demand balance.
As demand of these lenses is unlikely to see an unpredictable huge increase, this is an admission from Canon that they expect (at least an initial) supply shortage of these lens.

This is bad news when thinking about long rumored lenses. If Canon is expecting a supply shortage in flagship products, will they risk announcing/introducing something that they may not be able to supply just as it's happening now? Non-flagship products are quicker to see a competition...

[Mt Spokane Photography]

Those who make business using these lens need to recalculate now if it still worth the price. There is no point of going emotional here. Who were planning to by these lens for fun can be easily scared away, especially considering the possible price drop after the Olympic games.

Price is mostly indicating some kind of supply-demand balance.
As demand of these lenses is unlikely to see an unpredictable huge increase, this is an admission from Canon that they expect (at least an initial) supply shortage of these lens.

This is bad news when thinking about long rumored lenses. If Canon is expecting a supply shortage in flagship products, will they risk announcing/introducing something that they may not be able to supply just as it's happening now? Non-flagship products are quicker to see a competition...

Certainly Canon wants them on the market before the olympics, but they will be handing out loaners at the Olympics as well.  The PJ organizations who buy large lots of lenses every year do not pay the same price as a individual does.

[TexPhoto]

Oh dear god people.  It's a business, they can set prices where they want.  Buy or don't.  Ferraris are expensive, that does not make Italians racist, or require tolerance on anyone's part.