Does Ricoh sell consumer products other than cameras?

[Mark Ransom]

Mark,

https://www.ricoh.com/sustainability/report/download/pdf2018/all_E.pdf

Above, is this what you were looking at? Ricoh's annual March 2018 report to shareholders.

DSLRs are lumped in with many items in a general description of what's in "Other" for this report; on page 81. On page 37 there is about a 5 line write-up in one column about their consumer camera business.

Also on page 81 is the name of Ricoh's President, Yamashita ( I hope I spelled his name correctly) if anyone wants to write him, but I doubt there would be any reply. In 2016 I had a legitimate complaint with Ricoh/Pentax N.A. when their office was in Denver. An employee gave me the personal e-mail addresses of the N.A. President and chief marketing mgr. after she listened to my complaint. I sent a couple courteous, descriptive e-mails but the President he never replied. Marketing mgr. did answer her's with a short phone call message to advise her direct phone number. I phoned her back L.D. from Nova Scotia to listened to her explain that Ricoh is a B2B (business to business) company and to complain about her staff. I couldn't get support at the retail level because the dealer had gone out of business. A waste of my time and my complaint was never settled.

Cheers,

Thanks. I was really hoping to hear about individual products rather than a financial statement, and I wasn't expecting a comprehensive list - just anecdotes.

Your statement does reinforce my suspicion that Ricoh really isn't geared to consumer sales, and Pentax suffers for it.

 

[moji]

We have to consider that we, consumers should not talk about Ricoh but Ricoh imaging. Ricoh imaging is not a B to B but a consumer company. We have to remember that the Ricoh company before involving in Pentax had it\s cameras ad was involved in consumer level business.
I think, in fact Pentax is in good hands. Ricoh management are not some guys who accidentally bought Pentax, they are professionals and most possibly had plans for getting Pentax, exactly like Hoya which wanted to get hands on Pentax' medical device business. I am confident.

 

[Mark Ransom]

We have to consider that we, consumers should not talk about Ricoh but Ricoh imaging. Ricoh imaging is not a B to B but a consumer company. We have to remember that the Ricoh company before involving in Pentax had it\s cameras ad was involved in consumer level business.
I think, in fact Pentax is in good hands. Ricoh management are not some guys who accidentally bought Pentax, they are professionals and most possibly had plans for getting Pentax, exactly like Hoya which wanted to get hands on Pentax' medical device business. I am confident.

I think you underestimate the power of corporate culture. If a company is used to doing things in a certain way, it will be very difficult for a single division to do things differently.

 

[Holger Bargen]

In the UK many people (millions) own Pentax lenses.... Supplied as standard with Specsavers glasses. I suspect this is a much larger contributor to their bottom line than their camera business.

... Is one of the most annoying TV adverts of mankind.

Ricoh makes interactive whiteboards? These are one of the worst inventions, students and pupils hate them and I never used them in the classroom.

Pentax should never have been bought over, Canikon didn't sell themselves out.

What should they do if there is no "white knight" at the horizon?

I think they need a change of strategy. I think they should get into selling a series of Limited quality (mostly prime) mirrorless FF lenses for other mounts (perhaps branded Super Takumar?) and build up a portfolio of more modern glass over time that could make a convincing case to then consider developing a Pentax FF mirrorless body. They have a much larger market if they can sell glass to owners of the big existing (and emerging) mirrorless systems.

Or consider a twin track approach and sell Ricoh branded mirrorless cameras with Pentax as a niche rugged SLR system. The mirrorless needs a new mount, but with an adapter to enable use of K mount lenses.

I still don't know why everybody is so keen on mirrorless.It should be possible to put the advantages of mirrorless cameras (EVF, AY on sensor) into a DSLR with hybrid viewfinder and mirror flipped up.

The advantage in size seems to be negnectable to me. Many mirrorless cameras are hard to hold - especially if you have a long lens on it. You must put it into a rig that is even bigger than any DSLR of the world. And regarding lens desing we have advantages of a shorter flange only for extreme wide angle lenses.

I would like to see a camera with hybrid viewfinder from Pentax - but I don't see a need for going mirrorless

Each time I change lenses in not so simple environment I am glad that my sensor is protected by the mirror in between. I know that a regular first postprocessing step of mirrorless users is to remove all the dust marks on their photos from dust which is in great numbers on their sensors.

Sometimes a fashion becomes a hype - and each hype will go. I see the advantages of an EVF - but I see the advantages of an OVF even more. Best would be to have both of them. But the shortaer flange would just have the advantage of having space to put in between an adapter for other mount systems. As Pentax has a lot of very nice lenses now and from their history there would be only very tiny gaps that would be nice to fill this way. For everything else k-mount is almost perfect.

Best regardx

Holger

 

[Oiche]

In the UK many people (millions) own Pentax lenses.... Supplied as standard with Specsavers glasses. I suspect this is a much larger contributor to their bottom line than their camera business.

... Is one of the most annoying TV adverts of mankind.

Ricoh makes interactive whiteboards? These are one of the worst inventions, students and pupils hate them and I never used them in the classroom.

Pentax should never have been bought over, Canikon didn't sell themselves out.

What should they do if there is no "white knight" at the horizon?

I think they need a change of strategy. I think they should get into selling a series of Limited quality (mostly prime) mirrorless FF lenses for other mounts (perhaps branded Super Takumar?) and build up a portfolio of more modern glass over time that could make a convincing case to then consider developing a Pentax FF mirrorless body. They have a much larger market if they can sell glass to owners of the big existing (and emerging) mirrorless systems.

Or consider a twin track approach and sell Ricoh branded mirrorless cameras with Pentax as a niche rugged SLR system. The mirrorless needs a new mount, but with an adapter to enable use of K mount lenses.

I still don't know why everybody is so keen on mirrorless.It should be possible to put the advantages of mirrorless cameras (EVF, AY on sensor) into a DSLR with hybrid viewfinder and mirror flipped up.

The advantage in size seems to be negnectable to me. Many mirrorless cameras are hard to hold - especially if you have a long lens on it. You must put it into a rig that is even bigger than any DSLR of the world. And regarding lens desing we have advantages of a shorter flange only for extreme wide angle lenses.

I would like to see a camera with hybrid viewfinder from Pentax - but I don't see a need for going mirrorless

Each time I change lenses in not so simple environment I am glad that my sensor is protected by the mirror in between. I know that a regular first postprocessing step of mirrorless users is to remove all the dust marks on their photos from dust which is in great numbers on their sensors.

Sometimes a fashion becomes a hype - and each hype will go. I see the advantages of an EVF - but I see the advantages of an OVF even more. Best would be to have both of them. But the shortaer flange would just have the advantage of having space to put in between an adapter for other mount systems. As Pentax has a lot of very nice lenses now and from their history there would be only very tiny gaps that would be nice to fill this way. For everything else k-mount is almost perfect.

Best regardx

Holger

They are just the latest trend or invention that consumers must buy, just like everything else.

 

[Tom Lusk]

In the UK many people (millions) own Pentax lenses.... Supplied as standard with Specsavers glasses. I suspect this is a much larger contributor to their bottom line than their camera business.

... Is one of the most annoying TV adverts of mankind.

Ricoh makes interactive whiteboards? These are one of the worst inventions, students and pupils hate them and I never used them in the classroom.

Pentax should never have been bought over, Canikon didn't sell themselves out.

What should they do if there is no "white knight" at the horizon?

Each time I change lenses in not so simple environment I am glad that my sensor is protected by the mirror in between. I know that a regular first postprocessing step of mirrorless users is to remove all the dust marks on their photos from dust which is in great numbers on their sensors.

Holger

How did you come to this conclusion? :-O

If this is true, I will never buy a mirrorless camera.

 

[Holger Bargen]

In the UK many people (millions) own Pentax lenses.... Supplied as standard with Specsavers glasses. I suspect this is a much larger contributor to their bottom line than their camera business.

... Is one of the most annoying TV adverts of mankind.

Ricoh makes interactive whiteboards? These are one of the worst inventions, students and pupils hate them and I never used them in the classroom.

Pentax should never have been bought over, Canikon didn't sell themselves out.

What should they do if there is no "white knight" at the horizon?

Each time I change lenses in not so simple environment I am glad that my sensor is protected by the mirror in between. I know that a regular first postprocessing step of mirrorless users is to remove all the dust marks on their photos from dust which is in great numbers on their sensors.

Holger

How did you come to this conclusion? :-O

If this is true, I will never buy a mirrorless camera.

Look at photos of mirrorless cameras with open mounts: You see the sensible sensors in reach for your fingers when you change the lens. They are wide open without protection. I once saw a tutorial of a person shooting with a Panasonic camera. There he descirbed that his first step would always be to remove the distmarks within the photos - we selected special settings so the dust became more prominent - and then he removed all the marks - and there was a large number of them. He told that it is hard to change lenses without getting dust on the sensor - and that it is expecially dangerous to change lenses when there are lots of parts in the air that may come into the camera (dust, rain, snow ...).

Of course I have to clean my sensor of a DSLR from time to time - but the mirror is a pretty good protection of the sensor for direct sources of dirt and dust.

I thought I had read about a camera that would automatically put in a protection layer when the mount is opened - but I searched on the internet and yould not find anything. Maybe someone else knows. Without a protection like that I would always fear a damage of the sensor when I change the lens.

Best regards

Holger

 

[Pontoneer]

Someone recently asked if Pentax had good Black Friday deals, and that got me thinking... It's not like people line up to buy office copiers. Are they blind to the opportunity because they have no experience with consumer products?

A quick search of their site doesn't show anything.

Black Friday deals for Pentax cameras? For over 3 years, the still-alive, brick-and-mortar, decent, reliable camera stores in my city and its two neighboring cities (all major cities) have no longer carried any Pentax camera bodies and lenses. People with interests in Pentax gear must go online to Amazon and B&H, or maybe some auction site.

Ricoh does not maintain active consumer-product distribution channels. It does not consider consumer products as strategically and financially critical in its overall business.

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It all depends where you are .

Here in the UK there is a thriving network of Pentax Pro dealers and all of them hold decent stock levels , so it isn’t hard to go and see , try and buy.

Some of the larger chains like Calumet also sell Pentax , so there is plenty of choice .

As far as I know the situation is much the same on the continent.

--
With kind regards
Derek.

 

[moji]

We have to consider that we, consumers should not talk about Ricoh but Ricoh imaging. Ricoh imaging is not a B to B but a consumer company. We have to remember that the Ricoh company before involving in Pentax had it\s cameras ad was involved in consumer level business.
I think, in fact Pentax is in good hands. Ricoh management are not some guys who accidentally bought Pentax, they are professionals and most possibly had plans for getting Pentax, exactly like Hoya which wanted to get hands on Pentax' medical device business. I am confident.

I think you underestimate the power of corporate culture. If a company is used to doing things in a certain way, it will be very difficult for a single division to do things differently.

I don't see the relevance of your replay to my comment, sorry.

 

[Mark Ransom]

We have to consider that we, consumers should not talk about Ricoh but Ricoh imaging. Ricoh imaging is not a B to B but a consumer company. We have to remember that the Ricoh company before involving in Pentax had it\s cameras ad was involved in consumer level business.
I think, in fact Pentax is in good hands. Ricoh management are not some guys who accidentally bought Pentax, they are professionals and most possibly had plans for getting Pentax, exactly like Hoya which wanted to get hands on Pentax' medical device business. I am confident.

I think you underestimate the power of corporate culture. If a company is used to doing things in a certain way, it will be very difficult for a single division to do things differently.

I don't see the relevance of your replay to my comment, sorry.

You say Pentax is in "good hands", I suggest that maybe they're in the hands of a company that doesn't understand all the nuances of retail sales. And that this misunderstanding might constrain the actions of Pentax.

Of course it's only a theory. But I was hoping to find some contrary evidence.

 

[moji]

We have to consider that we, consumers should not talk about Ricoh but Ricoh imaging. Ricoh imaging is not a B to B but a consumer company. We have to remember that the Ricoh company before involving in Pentax had it\s cameras ad was involved in consumer level business.
I think, in fact Pentax is in good hands. Ricoh management are not some guys who accidentally bought Pentax, they are professionals and most possibly had plans for getting Pentax, exactly like Hoya which wanted to get hands on Pentax' medical device business. I am confident.

I think you underestimate the power of corporate culture. If a company is used to doing things in a certain way, it will be very difficult for a single division to do things differently.

I don't see the relevance of your replay to my comment, sorry.

You say Pentax is in "good hands", I suggest that maybe they're in the hands of a company that doesn't understand all the nuances of retail sales. And that this misunderstanding might constrain the actions of Pentax.

Of course it's only a theory. But I was hoping to find some contrary evidence.

What Ricoh got from Hoya was the whole old Pentax company with the exclusion of it's medical device division. It means the whole Pentax camera people and it's distributors still were those people as before. They joined Rick. Which Ricoh? The consumer photo equipment division. So, in practice the Pentax brand is prepared and sold by old Pentax people and new Ricoh people. I think this means better than it was when it was independent.
I agree with you that all we say based on our very limited information, in the best, is our assumption.

 

[22codfish]

We have to consider that we, consumers should not talk about Ricoh but Ricoh imaging. Ricoh imaging is not a B to B but a consumer company. We have to remember that the Ricoh company before involving in Pentax had it\s cameras ad was involved in consumer level business.
I think, in fact Pentax is in good hands. Ricoh management are not some guys who accidentally bought Pentax, they are professionals and most possibly had plans for getting Pentax, exactly like Hoya which wanted to get hands on Pentax' medical device business. I am confident.

I think you underestimate the power of corporate culture. If a company is used to doing things in a certain way, it will be very difficult for a single division to do things differently.

I don't see the relevance of your replay to my comment, sorry.

You say Pentax is in "good hands", I suggest that maybe they're in the hands of a company that doesn't understand all the nuances of retail sales. And that this misunderstanding might constrain the actions of Pentax.

Of course it's only a theory. But I was hoping to find some contrary evidence.

What Ricoh got from Hoya was the whole old Pentax company with the exclusion of it's medical device division. It means the whole Pentax camera people and it's distributors still were those people as before. They joined Rick. Which Ricoh? The consumer photo equipment division. So, in practice the Pentax brand is prepared and sold by old Pentax people and new Ricoh people. I think this means better than it was when it was independent.
I agree with you that all we say based on our very limited information, in the best, is our assumption.

Moji,

You are in Norway, Mark is in USA & I'm in Canada. I believe you can go to just about any camera store anywhere in North America and not find a Pentax camera to check out. They are mostly non-stocking dealers. I'm glad it's different in Europe.

It will be interesting to read the next annual shareholders' report in March 2019. From the 2018 report in my above posting, I think they watch "profit per employee" and don't spend a lot on R & D for any product. This could mean more buying or outsourcing production and technical information. I use to think Ricoh has a lot of Pentax goodwill and technology to be acquired by another camera company if they wanted to sell their consumer cameras. However, there is certainly some company reputation to protect for being in the camera business a 100 years that will keep Ricoh and Pentax together for some time.

After that, like all the camera manufacturers, for Ricoh, it could just be cheaper just to dump an unprofitable product line if it can't be sold. Sell or buy for amalgamation presently seems to be the best profitable/cost saving route in a declining market. I wonder if Ricoh is checking this out?

Cheers,

Jack

 

[LargeFormatPrinter]

Trying to sound amiable...

Ricoh has a long history of developing, producing and marketing cameras since at least 1937.

Personally, my first two SLRs were Ricoh K-mount bodies from 1980 and 1983.

My worries about Pentax are independent of RICOH. I'm hungry for affordable improved bodies with denser sensors and matching lenses. That is, a full frame camera with the pixel density of the k-3, KP and K-70 or just an APS-C successor to K3

 

[Holger Bargen]

We have to consider that we, consumers should not talk about Ricoh but Ricoh imaging. Ricoh imaging is not a B to B but a consumer company. We have to remember that the Ricoh company before involving in Pentax had it\s cameras ad was involved in consumer level business.
I think, in fact Pentax is in good hands. Ricoh management are not some guys who accidentally bought Pentax, they are professionals and most possibly had plans for getting Pentax, exactly like Hoya which wanted to get hands on Pentax' medical device business. I am confident.

I think you underestimate the power of corporate culture. If a company is used to doing things in a certain way, it will be very difficult for a single division to do things differently.

I don't see the relevance of your replay to my comment, sorry.

You say Pentax is in "good hands", I suggest that maybe they're in the hands of a company that doesn't understand all the nuances of retail sales. And that this misunderstanding might constrain the actions of Pentax.

Of course it's only a theory. But I was hoping to find some contrary evidence.

What Ricoh got from Hoya was the whole old Pentax company with the exclusion of it's medical device division. It means the whole Pentax camera people and it's distributors still were those people as before. They joined Rick. Which Ricoh? The consumer photo equipment division. So, in practice the Pentax brand is prepared and sold by old Pentax people and new Ricoh people. I think this means better than it was when it was independent.
I agree with you that all we say based on our very limited information, in the best, is our assumption.

Moji,

You are in Norway, Mark is in USA & I'm in Canada. I believe you can go to just about any camera store anywhere in North America and not find a Pentax camera to check out. They are mostly non-stocking dealers. I'm glad it's different in Europe.

I live in Europe - in Germany. If you fnd a camera shop at all you must have a lot of luck if they have Pentax cameras at the store. There will be no problem for them to order one for you - but don't expect to go into a shop and get a Pentax camera or lens immediately.

If it comes to me I can't tell you when I bought the last camera, lens - or even any other consumer product with a higher value in a shop. I have the internet and there are lots of good shops - including Amazon - where I prefer to buy.

It comes to my mind that the last more expensive thing I bought in a shop was a bicyle. I bought it in a shop that was about to change its location and they had a lot of bargain offers. I bought it, had a look in the internet - and saw that the price I paid was exactly the offical price on the list of the company ...

Best regards

Holger

It will be interesting to read the next annual shareholders' report in March 2019. From the 2018 report in my above posting, I think they watch "profit per employee" and don't spend a lot on R & D for any product. This could mean more buying or outsourcing production and technical information. I use to think Ricoh has a lot of Pentax goodwill and technology to be acquired by another camera company if they wanted to sell their consumer cameras. However, there is certainly some company reputation to protect for being in the camera business a 100 years that will keep Ricoh and Pentax together for some time.

After that, like all the camera manufacturers, for Ricoh, it could just be cheaper just to dump an unprofitable product line if it can't be sold. Sell or buy for amalgamation presently seems to be the best profitable/cost saving route in a declining market. I wonder if Ricoh is checking this out?

Cheers,

Jack

 

[Barry Pearson]

.... I still don't know why everybody is so keen on mirrorless.It should be possible to put the advantages of mirrorless cameras (EVF, AY on sensor) into a DSLR with hybrid viewfinder and mirror flipped up.

The advantage in size seems to be negnectable to me. Many mirrorless cameras are hard to hold - especially if you have a long lens on it. You must put it into a rig that is even bigger than any DSLR of the world. And regarding lens desing we have advantages of a shorter flange only for extreme wide angle lenses.

I would like to see a camera with hybrid viewfinder from Pentax - but I don't see a need for going mirrorless

It depends what the camera is being used for.
Here are situations where I use cameras:

If I simply want a carry-around camera without any intention of doing "serious" photography I use my Panasonic Lumix LX100.
I expect next year to replace it with a Ricoh GR III.
I still expect high image quality. And here is a video that shows what can be achieved, see from 3:40 onwards for the results he achieves:

Flash Q20 + Ricoh GR

If I want something FF with better image quality but still not too heavy I am currently likely to use my K-1ii plus D FA 28mm-105mm lens. But I want something smaller and lighter and a mirrorless FF camera with a new-mount mid-range zoom sounds right:

My new-mount mirrorless walk-around system
Shoots where I would have liked a mirrorless camera

I currently can't get the reach and AF I want for distant fast-moving objects with my Pentax equipment. I doubt whether I will get what I want from Pentax in the next year or two.
I'm investigating the alternatives. I expect the lenses to be heavy, but that is acceptable if I get the results I want. I doubt if the replacement will be an SLR:

SLR-viewing is NOT optimum viewing

My current K-1ii plus all the recent Pentax FF K-mount lenses will be OK for much of my photography for years. But I note that I am increasingly using Live View rather than OVF-viewing.

Note that for some purposes I am resigned to need heavy lenses while for other purposes I want small and light equipment. And note that I will be glad once I can get rid of mirror-flipping while panning in burst mode.