A Price War Hits Digital Photos
A price war has broken out in digital photo printing.
Wal-Mart Stores Inc., Costco Inc. and other retailers are sharply cutting prices on digital-photo prints in a furious effort to win consumers who are switching to digital cameras from traditional film.
The companies that make home printers are also stepping up their bid to grab more of this business. Hewlett-Packard Co., which has sold many consumers on the convenience of making digital images at home, says it will effectively cut the per-print costs by 17% for people who own H-P printers and buy its paper and ink.
See Consumer Reports' ratings and guide to online photo processing
The price cuts come at a critical time for retailers and printer makers. With the shift from film to digital picking up steam, the next two years are seen by many experts as crucial in forming consumer habits.
As the heavyweights slug it out, digital-camera owners are the big winners. They are in many cases finding that it is cheaper to print digitally captured images than those taken with film.
Two weeks ago, Wal-Mart cut prices on standard 4-by-6-inch prints made from stored digital images to 19 cents from 24 cents. Wal-Mart, the nation's largest photo finisher, charges 29 cents apiece for prints from film.
For customers who don't mind transferring the images from their computers to Wal-Mart.com's Web site, the per-print price has dropped to 17 cents. (The prints are ready for pickup at the store in two days.) Wal-Mart's wholesale-club affiliate, Sam's Club, charges even less for a similar service: 15 cents, down from 16 cents before the recent round of cuts.
To undercut Wal-Mart, wholesale-club leader Costco is planning to lower its rates this week on one-hour processing to 17 cents from 19 cents. Meanwhile, drugstore giant Walgreen's Inc. is running a digital-print special at 20 cents a piece for 50 prints in some markets, compared with the 29 cents it normally charges for digital or film prints. Walgreen's store signs proclaim that its prints are "half the cost of printing at home" says a spokesman. The calculation is based on the prices of home-PC printer supplies like ink and paper.
A SNAPSHOT
A look at the dropping prices for printing pictures. The following are for 4-by-6-inch color photos.
FROM THE ARCHIVES
? Page One: As Cameras Go Digital, a Race to Shape Habits of Consumers
11/19/04
The other players in this battle are the online photo sites such as Shutterfly.com and Ofoto, which is owned by Eastman Kodak Co. These sites accounted for a combined 8% of all prints made last year.
Photo finishers are hoping that the lower prices will induce consumers to print more of their digital pictures. Consumers spent an estimated $8.2 billion for prints last year, including both those made at retail outlets and at home, according to Photo Marketing Association International, a trade group. But that is a fraction of the potential market: Only about 20% to 30% of digital pictures taken are developed.
The price cuts also come as digital cameras are rapidly stealing market share from film cameras. Of the cameras sold this year, about 80% are expected to be digital. But despite the growth in digital photography, the number of overall prints made at home and at stores fell 4.5% in the U.S. last year to 27.4 billion, according to PMAI.
With the film business drying up, retailers can ill afford to lose printing revenues, too. After a slow start, retailers are beginning to gain traction with digital printing. Digital prints ordered at retailers more than tripled last year, says PMAI, while the number of prints made at home were up 37%. And the momentum is clearly with the retailers: Last year, while about 61% of all digital prints were made at home, that is down from 90% in 2000.
A digital-photo-printing kiosk at a Walgreen's drugstore in Boston.
One reason is the sharp increase in retail outlets offering digital printing. Most drug and discount stores can now handle digital prints in their one-hour photo-processing minilabs. Labs can produce prints at a cost to operators of less than five cents a piece, says Greg Joe, marketing manager for Japan's Noritsu Ltd., a big minilab maker.
Retailers with less business can install cheaper, but also slower, digital kiosks. The number of photo kiosks in the U.S. is expected to grow to 121,000 by 2008, up from 75,000 today, says Kerry Flatley , a consultant with market researcher Infotrends. Last year, 17% of digital-camera owners used a kiosk vs. just 6% the year before, she says.
Both retailers and home-printer makers insist that the future of digital printing is leaning in their favor. Pierre Schaeffer, Kodak's consumer imaging marketing manager, says some consumers may accept the higher cost of home printing to, for instance, easily print pictures at a party for guests to take. But if they have a camera full of hundreds of pictures from vacation, they would prefer to take them to a low-cost retailer, he argues.
Long term, home printing is likely to decline to just 15% of all prints, says Gael Lundeen, general manager photofinishing and Web services for Fuji Photo Film USA Inc., the leader in the minilab business with customers including Wal-Mart. "The third wave of digital photographers is coming in, and they find digital printing at home is very expensive and very inconvenient," says Ms. Lundeen.
Not surprisingly, makers of printers disagree. Next month, H-P will effectively cut home-printing costs -- not including the customer's initial outlay for the printer itself -- to 24 cents a print, for customers who buy a 200-sheet value-pack, down from 29 cents, says John Solomon, H-P's vice president of imaging. He believes that as long as home printing is only 25% more expensive than the retail option, consumers will generally prefer its convenience.
The online photo companies, meanwhile, are betting that consumers will print out many of their images in albums and calendars or on coffee-cups or refrigerator magnets. That is a prime source of revenue.
All photo finishers are trying to make it easier to order multiple prints and upgrade to 5-by-7-inch prints, because that is where the profit margins are higher. For the consumer, for example, a 5-by-7 print can cost five times what a 4-by-6 does, even though it is only 45% larger in surface area.
Of course, there's another possible answer to this debate over where people will print their digital pictures in the future. Frank Baillergeon, an industry consultant from Eagle, Idaho, contends that photo finishers are engaging in "a lot of wishful thinking."
Most consumers, he says, appear to perfectly content to keep most of their images in their PCs. "The evidence seems to be that the future for printing is smaller than anyone had imagined," he says.
美国数码照片冲印市场爆发价格战
一场价格战已在数码照片冲印行业爆发。
在消费者日益从传统胶卷转向数码相机的大趋势下，沃尔玛(Wal-Mart Stores Inc.)、Costco Inc.等零售商为吸引客户，纷纷大幅调低数码冲印价格。
与此同时，家用打印机生产公司也加大了业务争夺力度。为众多消费者带来家庭数码冲印便利的惠普(Hewlett-Packard Co.)宣布，将通过降低耗材售价的方式，使得惠普打印机客户单张照片的成本降低17%。
此轮降价出现在对零售商和打印机制造商都至关重要的一个时期。随著数码相机的日益风行，许多专家认为未来两年是消费者习惯形成的重要时期。
在各路商家一决高下的过程中，数码相机用户将是最大的受益者。很多时候，他们都能找到比传统胶卷更便宜的数码冲印服务。
两周前，沃尔玛将标准的4x6英寸数码照片冲印价格从每张24美分调低至19美分。作为全美最大的照片冲洗服务提供商，沃尔玛对传统胶卷照片的冲印收费是每张29美分。
对于那些不介意将个人电脑上的图像传至沃尔玛公司网站Wal-Mart.com的客户来说，数码冲印价格已跌至每张17美分（客户可以在两天后前往沃尔玛商店取照片）。沃尔玛旗下会员制批发店Sam's Club的收费更低，经过最近一次降价后，每张数码相片从16美分降至15美分。
为了与沃尔玛竞争，会员制批发商店业的领军人物Costco正计划本周将1小时快印服务的费用从每张19美分降至17美分。与此同时，药店业巨头Walgreen's Inc.正在一些市场上提供50张以上照片每张20美分的数码冲印特价服务，其数码或胶卷冲印的正常价格是每张29美分。Walgreen's店铺悬挂的宣传海报称，其数码冲印价格是家庭冲印成本的一半。这是根据墨盒和纸张等家用电脑打印机的耗材价格计算的。
这个市场中的其他竞争者还有Shutterfly.com以及伊士曼-柯达(Eastman Kodak Co.)的Ofoto等照片冲印网站。这些网站冲印的照片占到了去年照片冲印总量的8%。
照片冲印服务提供商希望降价能鼓励消费者更多地冲洗数码照片。据行业协会Photo Marketing Association International(简称PMAI)估计，去年消费者总计冲印了82亿美元的照片，包括在零售商店和在家自行冲印。但与潜在市场相比，这微不足道：大约仅有20%-30%的数码照片最终进行了冲印。
降价也适逢数码相机迅速抢夺传统胶卷相机市场之时。预计今年出售的相机大约有80%将是数码相机。与数码摄影日渐风行形成对比的是，PMAI的数据显示，去年美国人在家和在商店冲洗的照片总数减少了4.5%，为274亿张。
在胶卷业务逐渐萎缩的情况下，零售商很难再承受冲洗业务收入下降的冲击。虽然起步慢，零售商的数码冲印业务目前已开始加速增长。PMAI的数据显示，去年零售商承接的数码照片冲印量增长了两倍多，家庭冲印量增长37%。目前的趋势显然对零售商有利：去年大约有61%的数码照片是在家冲印，低于2000年的90%。
一个理由是提供数码冲印的零售商店数量大大增加。大多数药店和折扣店的1小时快印室现在都能处理数码冲印。规模庞大的小型快印室生产商、日本的Noritsu Ltd.的营销经理格里格?乔(Greg Joe)表示，小型快印室冲洗单张照片的成本不到5美分。
业务量较少的零售商可以设立价格便宜一些、但处理速度稍慢的数码冲印亭。市场研究公司Infotrends的顾问凯里?福莱特里(Kerry Flatley)称，预计到2008年美国的照片冲印店数量将从现在的7.5万家增至12.1万家。
零售商和家用打印机制造商坚持认为，数码冲印的未来对他们有利。柯达的消费者影像营销经理皮埃尔?谢弗(Pierre Schaeffer)表示，一些消费者在某些情况下可能会接受成本较高的家庭冲印方式，比如迅速打印聚会上的照片以便让客人离开时带走。但如果他们度假回来相机里有几百张照片，他们可能会选择交给价格低的零售商。
Fuji Photo Film USA Inc.照片冲洗和网络服务的总经理格尔?伦丁(Gael Lundeen)表示，长期来看家庭冲洗的比例可能会降至所有冲洗照片的15%，第三波数码摄影潮已经来到，消费者发现家庭冲印非常昂贵，也不方便。Fuji Photo在小型冲印间行业居领先地位，客户包括沃尔玛。
毫无疑问，打印机生产商并不同意这种观点。惠普影像副总裁约翰?所罗门(John Solomon)表示，下个月惠普将出售“200张”耗材超值套餐，使得家庭冲印成本从每张29美分降至24美分（不包括客户购买打印机的初始投入）。他相信，只要家庭冲印的成本比零售店价格贵不超过25%，大部分消费者就会因为便捷选择家庭冲印。
与此同时，网络冲印公司认定消费者会将打印更多的照片用于影集、挂历、咖啡杯和冰箱磁贴等。这是一个优质的收入来源。
所有的照片冲印服务提供商都试图让消费者能更容易的选择一印多服务，并升级至5x7英寸的规格，因为这样利润率会更高。例如，对于消费者来说，5x7英寸的照片冲印价格可能是4x6英寸的5倍，虽然从表面来看只大了45%而已。
当然，关于人们未来会在哪里冲印数码照片的问题或许还有一个答案。来自爱达荷州的行业顾问弗兰克?巴耶荣(Frank Baillergeon)认为，照片冲印服务提供商们有些“一厢情愿”。
他说，大多数消费者们似乎都非常满意将大多数照片保留在个人电脑中，“从各种迹象看冲印业务的前景似乎并没有他们想像的那么宏大。”
