Looks like price increases in July 2024

[Herr Barnack]

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On 6/16/2024 at 7:25 PM, Stuart Richardson said:

Leica just came off its most profitable year in history. I don’t think they are cash strapped to the extent that they cannot afford to shorten their repair times. They have clearly made a calculation that fixing it quickly and dramatically is not a priority. Also service techs have to be trained and I imagine that is not a weekend workshop. Hopefully it will get better, but I have been shooting Leica for a quarter century now and their repair times have never been less than a month door to door for me, usually at least three months. I think they want the service times long so that people don’t send things in for all the little things that can and do go wrong on Leica bodies. 

Haven't you heard?  If something goes wrong, we are supposed to throw them away and buy a new M6 or M11-P. 

Edited June 22, 2024 by Herr Barnack

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[adan]

On 6/21/2024 at 12:57 PM, jaapv said:

Weirdly enough the special editions ARE great photographic tools and of course a great cash generator with little to no R&D costs. Leica has a tradition of building special editions - a lot of them- since the Luxus was announced in 1929. 

Sure, but are the special editions better photographic tools? Would the advance of photographic technology, and photography's impact in the world, have changed one iota, if the special editions never existed?

Interestingly, in his mention of the original "Luxus" of 1929, Leica Collectors Guide author Dennis Laney notes that this "attempt to tap the luxury market" was "not a commercial success."

Leitz dropped it, and went back to practical camera design considerations for the next 45 years or so. Any special designs were specifically requested by working photographers/customers for practical needs (250-exposure FF/GG/ Reporter models, M3-P Leicavit-friendly designs for LIFE magazine's Duncan and Eisenstadt and the press in general; technical models like the MDs or the Post-Office cameras or the experimental one for NASA).

When the M system nearly died in the late 1970s, what saved it was not special editions, but exactly, precisely some functional R&D (if in reverse). The back-to-basics M4-2, engineered to be less expensive (drop the M5 metering; drop the self-timer; stamp the "Leica" script into the top instead of engraving it; selling them as "any color you want, so long as it's black").

Then Leitz/Leica got the "luxury itch" again with the goldish Barnack-edition M4-2, https://cameraquest.com/M42Gold.htm

....and more and more special editions throughout the 1990s. Culminating in the Hermès debacle, and Drs. Kaufmann and Spichtig actually expending some R&D costs to get a digital M out the door, while skipping the special editions, and even letting the "a la carte" program die out.

Result - a more successful company.

[Herr Barnack]

On 6/22/2024 at 8:05 PM, adan said:

...

Result - a more successful company.

And damn all of us to hell, that's what we want.

Edited June 24, 2024 by Herr Barnack

[patashnik]

I have to admit that, to me, this means little. I have my Leica M11, and a few lenses. The list prices from Leica were already too high for my taste, so an increase means little. 

But to increase the price on the 50mm Noctilux f/0.95? Have they found a way to add more CA?

[dkmoore]

Prob raising prices to offset the M11 trade in program they will be offering because they can’t fix the freezing. 

[Derbyshire Man]

On 6/25/2024 at 10:39 PM, dkmoore said:

Prob raising prices to offset the M11 trade in program they will be offering because they can’t fix the freezing. 

You jest...

[setuporg]

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Also add the 10% tariffs come January 21, 2025.

[SrMi]

23 minutes ago, setuporg said:

Also add the 10% tariffs come January 21, 2025.

What kind of tariffs? Link?

[goodbokeh]

1 hour ago, SrMi said:

What kind of tariffs? Link?

SiMi, 10% tariffs across the board for all imports into the US. It's just talk now but since last Thursday it's looking more probable. I would expect it sometime in 2025. Here is one of many links available: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-tariffs-proposal-10-percent-1700-cost-per-us-household/

[SrMi]

7 minutes ago, goodbokeh said:

SiMi, 10% tariffs across the board for all imports into the US. It's just talk now but since last Thursday it's looking more probable. I would expect it sometime in 2025. Here is one of many links available: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-tariffs-proposal-10-percent-1700-cost-per-us-household/

That is one of Trump’s proposed “fixes.” If Trump gets elected, the increased cost of Leicas will be the least of our problems.

[hdmesa]

2 hours ago, SrMi said:

That is one of Trump’s proposed “fixes.” If Trump gets elected, the increased cost of Leicas will be the least of our problems.

We can hope for a miracle.

https://www.theonion.com/biden-trump-die-2-minutes-apart-holding-hands-1850282375