orwograph
Hello!
I saw in a shop yesterday that Agfa APX 100 KB has made a comeback on the shelves – in that trendy Agfaphoto packaging, with an expiry date of 2010. Is this a new batch, or are they just flogging off ‘old’ stock from some insolvency estate again? It says “made in the EU” on it – which film factories are even still operating in the EU?
Peter.
MirkoBoeddecker
There is a company run by three former Agfa employees.
At the time, they bought up the largest stock of raw materials and secured the licences for the brand name from AgfaPhoto Holding.
In theory, the film should still be genuine Agfa film, as all the 100-exposure pancake rolls still on the market are dated 2010 and, according to my information, there is still plenty of film in circulation. The difference in the packaging is due to the fact that the new packaging must comply with the brand licence because it was produced after the insolvency.
There could be many reasons why it says ‘made in EU’. Firstly, the EU wants to do away with ‘made in Germany’ (and who knows how much packaging was produced in advance), and secondly, the packaging was certainly done somewhere in the EU and no longer in Windhagen (as there is nothing left there).
As the raw materials from the insolvency were certainly very cheap, the packaging was probably more expensive than the film inside, and so legally it would have to bear the ‘Made in EU’ label.
Less likely is the scenario where all the APX Pancakes have been used up and a different film is now in APX packaging. That would be possible under trademark law, but I haven’t heard of anything like that so far. It would be worth testing that out if in doubt.
Best regards,
Mirko
