I was working in a camera store in the mid-1960's. It was a regional chain that had about 30 or 40 stores over several states.
There were several models of Instamatics that started at about $15-$20. They came boxed with the flash bulb or cube of the day and a 126 cartridge of print film. The simple fact that you didn't have to have the skill necessary to wind the film on a take-up spool opened up photography to thousands of people. We still had several people that had older cameras that would bring in the camera, we would take the used film out for processing, then sell them a new roll and load it for them. The Instamatics sold like hotcakes and around holidays and graduation time it was hard to keep them in stock. More expensive models had better light meters, auto-film advance that worked on a wind-up mechanism, etc. We had no problem selling them at full retail because when you bought one from us, you got a "lifetime" guarantee. The small print said that was not your lifetime, but the lifetime of the camera. Defined to be as long as parts were available. In those days, that was several years. People actually repaired stuff back then. In that time period almost everyone shot Kodak color print film. Standard processing time was a week to 10 days. It seem like the cost for that was somewhere between $10 and $15. Mini-labs, free double prints and cheap processing were still a few years away. Our camera chain ran the biggest processing lab in the area. Almost all of the drugstores and other places that "developed" your film actually sent it to us. You could specify processing at the Kodak lab. It would be sent to an actual Kodak run lab. That took longer and cost additional. I shot 35mm slides because the processing was fast and cheap. $4 a roll and 24 hour processing was standard. If you got your film in by 7am you could get it back the same day. Keep in mind, those are prices are in 1966-7 dollars. As to quality? Maybe it wasn't great but It was certainly more than good enough. Our store normally took in 50-100 rolls a day and did less than a dozen enlargements of any size. After a big holiday you can multiply those numbers by 2 or 3. Even 35mm prints were typically 3x5 with a border. Borderless 4x6 prints didn't become common for a few years. A few years later Kodak consumer cameras went to even smaller negatives with the Disc and 110 film sizes. gs George Sinos -------------------- gsi...@gmail.com www.georgesphotos.net On Thu, Mar 14, 2013 at 6:38 AM, Mark Roberts <postmas...@robertstech.com> wrote: > Tom C wrote: > >>While I appreciate the nostalgia around Kodak and the Instamatic, I >>think it was a travesty. >> >>It short changed the general public, millions of people, including my >>father and myself for a good 20 years (not knowing any better being >>born in 1960) into accepting crap quality images in exchange for >>convenience. >> >>I wish the idea had never been invented, unless it was going to be >>provided in a larger format, which of course would have negated the >>profitability. >> >>I tend to think Kodak's demise is little recompense for the damage >>they did to photography after practically inventing it for the common >>man. > > Can't argue with a word of that. > > -- > Mark Roberts - Photography & Multimedia > www.robertstech.com > > > > > > -- > PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List > PDML@pdml.net > http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net > to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow > the directions. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
