Gast
Hello!
Will Fomapan R100 narrow-gauge film now become cheaper? It’s manufactured in the Czech Republic, which has been part of the EU since 1 May 2004, so there are no longer any customs duties to pay. Surely that saving could be passed on to customers, couldn’t it?
Gast
>> Surely we could pass that on to the customers, couldn’t we?
Yes, but also to the Czech workers, so they can buy our fantastic cars.
Best regards,
Ferdinand
MirkoBoeddecker
The Czech Republic has had a preferential agreement with Germany since the fall of communism. Hungary, incidentally, has too.
All the current accession countries have concluded preferential agreements with the EU over the last 14 years.
This means that no customs duties have ever been incurred.
As for the Fomapan R, we have to sweet-talk Foma every time just to get them to continue producing it at all, guaranteeing minimum purchase quantities and accepting price increases.
I believe that we haven’t passed on the price increases of recent years and are currently scraping by on a margin of almost zero.
The film is really more of a prestige product. If we were to factor in the hours of telephone calls (labour costs) that narrow-gauge filmmakers make to us about our technology (how does reverse exposure work...?), then it would probably have to cost double.
But that doesn’t mean, of course, that you can’t negotiate with us. From 50 rolls upwards, we can always work something out, because the product cost price is one thing, but the retail price must also include a certain handling margin (the €4.50 flat-rate postage doesn’t even cover the postage for 1 kg within Berlin). It’s not much you can knock off, but the import duty on black-and-white film is currently around 3.8% (for non-preferential countries) and you can negotiate such discounts. :angry:
Regards
Mirko
Gast
I didn’t know about these customs agreements. The price can stay as it is, because the cost of film development at Andec has gone up again this year. Now you end up paying more for development at Andec than the film itself costs. Please keep persuading the Czechs to continue manufacturing the film in all formats, as for many DS and 8mm filmmakers this is the only alternative to the extortionate prices charged by Kodak and the Americans. We must strengthen the EU so that we can show the Americans what we’re made of. Keep up the good work.
