I've read all these messages about the relative weight of the camera markets and most of the off topic matters which came attached to them. In case somebody is interested, I would like to add some information about the state of the camera market here in Spain. Don't be afraid, as I am not going to say anything about GNP per capita, or income distribution, or the welfare state matters. I only want to mention that Spain citizens obviously don't have the same purchasing power than German, British, Dutch or Norwegian ones, then perhaps it is interesting to compare what happens here to the consumer market in those countries. On the other hand, Spain's economy is one of the fastest growing in the E.U., and now it is considered as the tenth economy in the world (or so they say). Brand name has always been a major issue in camera choice in this country, both for beginners and camera snobs, then it is not surprising to know that Nikon has been the best seller in the SLR market for many years. Lately they have been losing ground to Canon, the second biggest player here, and perhaps now Canon sells more cameras than Nikon. Pentax is well considered, the quality of their lenses is respected by all the knowlegeable photographers, but as I have written before, brand awareness is the most important issue, besides of price, and this is one of the reasons which has kept Pentax as a second league player here. The second most important reason is that the Pentax dealer's policy here has been to stock and sell only the lowest priced items, such as MZ-50 plus 35-80 or 28-80 zooms, MZ-7, and so on. I am not saying that you can't buy an MZ-5n, in fact they are easy to find, or a Z-1P, in this last case it is a bit more difficult, but, for example, when I was given an FA 35 mm. 2.0 as a birthday present in November, my wife went to one of the photo shops we usually go to, they called the Pentax distributor, and they didn't have it in stock. I ought to have waited for 15 or 20 days to have the lens, and, by the way 15% more expensive than in the German online shop Technikdirekt. Then she ordered the lens in Technikdirekt, and we got it 2 days later. The prices in the most common items, such as camera bodies, and the usual zoom lenses, are more or less the same than in Germany, but whenever you want something different, they hardly ever have that item in stock, and then the price is generally higher than in Germany. When my wife gave me the FA* 80-200, strangely they had one, but that is not the usual thing. Pentax point and shoots, by the way, seem to sell very well. Digital cameras, both still and camcorders, are the fastest growing market here. It seems that digital cameras are shrinking the sales of P&S cameras and APS, but they don't have the same influence on the SLR market. Of course there are the expensive digital SLRs like the D1 and the like, but those are almost exclusively used by newspaper photographers. And I should add that in sports and news photography these kind of cameras have almost take over, for what I have witnessed. The second hand camera market is still developing. I think that buying a second hand camera or lens in Spain until few years ago was something that many people here shied away from, as most Spaniards have a Japanese-like taste for new gadgets, and that's the main cause of the grow of the digital camera sales. But things are changing somewhat in the appreciation of the consumer, and the used camera market is starting to take off, in part owing to the Internet and the online auctions. Anyway, it is difficult to find, for example, second hand Pentax primes in second hand shops, and usually prices for the bestmused items are a bit steep . But when the shops happen to have a good Pentax camera or lens, for example used K-1000s or P30N/Ts, they are quickly sold. I was fool enough when a few months ago I lost the chance to buy an almost mint LX, plus grip, motordrive, battery pack and charger for about 600 $ (everything). But that's a different story. Well, I think I've written too much, at least if I compare it with my usual telegram style. Hasta luego. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Carlos Royo [EMAIL PROTECTED] Zaragoza (Aragon) - Spain -------------------------------------------------------------------- - This message is from the Pentax-Discuss Mail List. To unsubscribe, go to http://www.pdml.net and follow the directions. Don't forget to visit the Pentax Users' Gallery at http://pug.komkon.org.
