BCN Rankings Are Out, Canon Continues to Dominate DSLRs, Further Growth in Mirrorless

Talys

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BillB said:
The top 3 in lens sales account for just over 50% of total sales, so the difference between 3rd place and the next places is likely pretty small. Also, Sigma and Tamron sell a lot more Canon mount lenses than Nikon does. Canon's share of lens sales is a lot smaller than its share of DSLR sales. This is also be true of Nikon as well. More competition for lens sales, thanks to Sigma and Tamron. I wonder how things look in the North American market.

Yeah, for sure. Fourth place will account for less than 13.7% of the marketplace, since that is Tamron :D I suspect it must be Nikon, and Olympus and Sony, probably in that order. If you give those 3 an average of 8% each, you're at nearly at 80% of the market.

I think you meant that Sigma and Tamron sell a lot more Canon mount lenses than they do Nikon mount lenses - the way you put it.. it sounds like Nikon is in the business of selling Canon mount lenses, but not doing a very good job of it :D


Mt Spokane Photography said:
Obviously, big consumer stores like Best Buy sell lots of Sony. I don't recall ever seeing a Sony high end, or any for that matter, in Costco, thats because they do not allow discounts. Costco and Sams club sell zillions of cameras, so Sony is really missing out there. Its their sales policy rooted in the ancient past that is to blame.

In our area, Best Buy sells last generation cameras for the bargain price of current generation cameras. On the shelves are cameras like 6D and 5D Mark III for absurdly expensive prices. For current generation product, the highest end product they have for Canon is the Rebel line. In display cases, a lot of the lenses are

Of course, they tell you they can order anything in, but the reality of it is that they're not going to get many (if any) sales of high end stuff they don't keep on hand, when there are plenty of camera shops that do -- with cheaper online options if local inventory isn't important to you.

Costco around here mostly have mid-range APSC kits with a bunch of extra accessories. Like t7i with a couple of lenses, a spare battery, and bag for a thousand bucks. I don't think I've ever seen a body only, or kits that contain bodies in the $1k+ range.
 
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Mt Spokane Photography said:
Orangutan said:
Aglet said:
Mt Spokane Photography said:
Canon has a sales network that allows them to put any new camera they introduce in front of more buyers than any other brand, so instant success is almost guaranteed for a major new model. Nikon is slipping in that area, but also strong. I think that some retailers resent Sony's super strict price control policies that keep sales numbers down. They seem to be getting good exposure, but are not displayed in the most prominent locations at the pro level stores near me.

All of that is related to sales figures, its impossible to tell which came first, but as long as Canon does not introduce a lemon and keeps their reputation for customer service, they are going to be on top.

Those factors are more important than the technical differences that generally affect only 0.1% of the photographers.

That's it in a clamshell.
Make it "good enough" and keep it in their face often enough so that when they do think of buying something, that's what they remember and where they start looking.

If it were so simple, Sony, Nikon and the rest would do the same. How is Canon able to do this when those others are not? To this point, you have not provided good evidence that Canon's dominance is purely due to sales tactics.

Building up a distribution network world wide with stock, warehouses, repair facilities, customer service reps, salesmen is a gigantic investment. The smaller companies can't just drop a billion into all this and hope it works, they have to climb inch by inch. The last time I went into our small local pro camera store, they did not stock Sony, and said that Nikon was really difficult to work with and they make a profit of 5%. They do order Nikon high end products for you and have them in 3 days.

Obviously, big consumer stores like Best Buy sell lots of Sony. I don't recall ever seeing a Sony high end, or any for that matter, in Costco, thats because they do not allow discounts. Costco and Sams club sell zillions of cameras, so Sony is really missing out there. Its their sales policy rooted in the ancient past that is to blame.

Nikon and Canon offer a special package for Costco and Sams club that typically have some extras like dual lenses or a camera bag to differentiate it from the retail packages.

+1
My precious Betamax story. Wouldn't budge and shot themselves in the foot.
My first DSLR was a Canon 40D kit from Costco, followed by me feeding all the employees at B&H.
Canon gets it with their customer service and recently expanded their capabilities. A recent study states that good customer service is 87% of your return business. That's huge.
I bought an M5 for a few reasons- mostly because I wanted a good "always with me" camera to keep the wear and tear down on the FF bodies. The other reason is my 7D has a lot of miles on it and I needed an APS-C body until Canon releases the 7D mark III.
I really enjoy using the M5 and if Canon introduces a FF mirrorless in the 5D Mark IV form, I would jump on that and probably put off the APS-C upgrade. If FF is done right, it would be awesome.
 
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goldenhusky

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Dec 2, 2016
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Guess what? Canon fans got data now hence Canon do not have to innovate for next decade. To me this is a bitter sweet news. As a Canon user I am happy to see this but this also means Canon will not bother to add 4k video with H.265 compression in any camera in the near future. One hope is that IF (that is a BIG IF) canon releases a non cinema video oriented EF mount camera with 4k h.265 compression and 1080p high frame rate that will be helpful but IMO chances of that happening is very very slim. I have a feeling that the U.S market may be different from Asian markets. I am guess Sony's market share might be 3rd largest behind Canon and Nikon. But that is just my guess obviously no data to backup.
 
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Mt Spokane Photography said:
Orangutan said:
Aglet said:
Mt Spokane Photography said:
Canon has a sales network that allows them to put any new camera they introduce in front of more buyers than any other brand, so instant success is almost guaranteed for a major new model. Nikon is slipping in that area, but also strong. I think that some retailers resent Sony's super strict price control policies that keep sales numbers down. They seem to be getting good exposure, but are not displayed in the most prominent locations at the pro level stores near me.

All of that is related to sales figures, its impossible to tell which came first, but as long as Canon does not introduce a lemon and keeps their reputation for customer service, they are going to be on top.

Those factors are more important than the technical differences that generally affect only 0.1% of the photographers.

That's it in a clamshell.
Make it "good enough" and keep it in their face often enough so that when they do think of buying something, that's what they remember and where they start looking.

If it were so simple, Sony, Nikon and the rest would do the same. How is Canon able to do this when those others are not? To this point, you have not provided good evidence that Canon's dominance is purely due to sales tactics.

Building up a distribution network world wide with stock, warehouses, repair facilities, customer service reps, salesmen is a gigantic investment. The smaller companies can't just drop a billion into all this and hope it works, they have to climb inch by inch. The last time I went into our small local pro camera store, they did not stock Sony, and said that Nikon was really difficult to work with and they make a profit of 5%. They do order Nikon high end products for you and have them in 3 days.

Obviously, big consumer stores like Best Buy sell lots of Sony. I don't recall ever seeing a Sony high end, or any for that matter, in Costco, thats because they do not allow discounts. Costco and Sams club sell zillions of cameras, so Sony is really missing out there. Its their sales policy rooted in the ancient past that is to blame.

Nikon and Canon offer a special package for Costco and Sams club that typically have some extras like dual lenses or a camera bag to differentiate it from the retail packages.

Aglet seemed to be saying that Canon uses its position to bamboozle the consumer with marketing, and would otherwise fail. I believe I wrote something similar to the following several months ago on this same topic: I can't imagine a team of Sony (or Nikon) execs sitting around a conference table saying "let's not spend more on marketing to increase our market share and profits." If cranking up the marketing was cost-effective, they would find a way to do it. Marketing has diminishing returns, and it's the combination of product choice and support that seems to work for them.

I can't say I'll always shoot Canon, I don't really have brand loyalty. So far, though, my gear does better photography than I do.
 
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stevelee

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I think for consumers, the preference for VHS over Beta had to do with recording time. VHS had more tape in their bigger cases, and allowed for slower speed and lower quality options. Sony eventually added slower speed options, but VHS already had too much of a foothold. So many folks recorded soap operas, and it was nice to be able to record the whole week on a tape and watch it over the weekend; that sort of thing in terms of playing time. Higher video quality was not nearly so important.
 
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stevelee

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I live about the same distance between two Best Buy stores. One has a more elaborate camera department, or at least did, since I haven't been to the other one in well over a year, so that is the store I go to now.

A year ago last fall I was thinking of buying an 80D and went to BB to look one over. I found knowledgeable and helpful sales persons. A couple of visits helped me decide to wait and go full frame. There was one guy in particular who was especially up on Canons. I went and talked with him shortly after the 6D2 came out, but they didn't have any yet. We did discuss pros and cons of what lens to get with it.

I went back when I was ready to buy. I had decided on the STM kit, which they didn't stock. So I tried out the camera with the L lens and put in a order for the camera in the STM kit. The salesman asked me to show him the camera and lens when I picked mine up. He put the battery from his own 6D in my new camera to try it out, and I took a few test shots in the store.

That store also appeared to have decent Nikon and Sony sections, but I didn't pay any attention to them since I was there for a Canon. I hope their having about the equivalent of a camera store continues to work out for them and for the photographers who work there. I gather that this is not the norm for BB stores unless that has been a wider trend over the last year or so.

When I was ready to buy a G7X II before a trip, neither store had them in stock, so I ordered it from B&H, and that went well. I didn't need any local help, and I didn't have much time to wait for BB to start stocking them. As someone suggested earlier, they seemed more intent on getting rid of the G7X I before stocking the newer model.
 
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stevelee

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Orangutan said:
stevelee said:
I think for consumers, the preference for VHS over Beta

And ridiculously high prices for the Beta recorders, compared to VHS. Sony refused to license, so there was no price competition.

When I bought my Beta, I think the price differential was less than $30, so it seemed to make sense to get the higher quality machine. I'm not even sure that it was made by Sony (Hitachi maybe), so that they must have eventually started licensing. This was in the early 1980s, so the format war was probably already lost. When I moved to a more rural area in 1984, I was surprised to find that the video rental places didn't even have Beta tapes.
 
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Talys

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Orangutan said:
Aglet seemed to be saying that Canon uses its position to bamboozle the consumer with marketing, and would otherwise fail.

Canon has indeed bamboozled me, though not with marketing. Out of about 8 bodies that I've bought, 6-7 L lenses, 10+ non-L lenses, a few of P&S and non-interchangeable lens cameras, printers, and a whole bunch of accessories, not a single piece has had even the tiniest problem.

The only Canon-related gear problem I've ever had an issue with are canon extenders + Sigma 150-600, which worked at for a long time and stopped working properly after Sigma did a firmware upgrade (spoiler: it works with Sigma extenders now, lol -- but I'm too cheap to buy an extender for ONE lens that's also f/6.3, especially since that extender doesn't work for most other Sigma lenses). But being the sucker that I am, I haven't blamed Canon :)

So yeah, they've got me pretty much accepting as a fact that my next bodies and lenses and accessories from them will be trouble-free, and just let me enjoy taking pictures of stuff. Neat trick they pulled on me.

I guess, also, over the years, they've also pretty much bamboozled me into thinking that I just have to shoot more, experiment, and learn, to get a just a little better each year, when really, it's not that at all. If I were more open minded, I'd accept that lighting and composition are myths. I'd run out and buy something that would let me toss out my flashes and strobes and softboxes and filters and gels and reflectors and grids and tripods -- Because all I should really need to do is just hold down the shutter button and turn everything into perfect photos in Lightroom.
 
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