Yashica USA Dealer Price List from 1990 - fire sale
dalegreer
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Post: 60 (7 liked)
Status: My first SLR was an FX-2 in 1979. I've been shooting and collecting Yashica/Contax gear ever since.
Yashica USA Dealer Price List from 1990 - fire sale Nov 8, 2021 23:02:10 GMT
on Nov 8, 2021 23:02:10 GMT
Last Edit: Nov 8, 2021 23:11:58 GMT by dalegreer
I have several Yashica U.S.A. Dealer Price Lists, but I just acquired one from 1990 — the latest date I have seen.
flic.kr/p/2mHwAxB
Yashica was on the ropes at this point, struggling to get AF off the ground while its manual-focus gear languished. The book has three full pages of clearance items, including the FX-103 body, 14 ML lenses, one DSB lens, and one AF lens. This appears to be the fire sale that shut the door on a great legacy of fine lenses.
Some other findings from the book:
- The 230AF and 200AF took center stage, along with nine AF lenses and an "AF" flash (five pages)
- Next up were the Samurai cameras (three pages worth)
- Finally, we get one page for the 108MP camera, and another page for ML/DSB/DX/MC lenses. The only lenses left in the non-clearance catalog (including apparently unsold old stock) are: 15mm f/2.8 ML Fish Eye, 28mm f/2.8 ML, 50mm f/1.9 ML, 200mm f/4 ML, 1000mm f/11 Reflex, 100mm DX Medical, 28-50mm f/3.5 ML, 28-80mm f/3.9-4.9 MC, 28-85mm f/3.5-4.5 ML Macro, 35-70mm f/3.5-4.5 MC, 35-105mm f/3.8-4.8 DSB, and the 75-200mm f/4.5 MC.
- Five pages are dedicated to the Contax 167MT and Zeiss lenses.
- Point and shoots get six pages
- The Dental Eye II and Medical lens get three pages
- 12 pages are dedicated to accessories, filters and lens hoods
- Three whole pages list discontinued/close-out priced products
- No mention is made anywhere of the FX-3, although I am quite sure it was still in production
- The final eight pages are dedicated to 8mm video cameras that Yashica sourced from another company. The later models were branded Kyocera, as we see the parent company beginning to ditch the Yashica name.
Yashica USA Dealer Price List from 1990 - fire sale Nov 9, 2021 0:57:08 GMT
on Nov 9, 2021 0:57:08 GMT
Last Edit: Nov 9, 2021 22:10:15 GMT by lumiworx
There's a lot of interesting groupings within those pages, and you may well be on the right track about clearing inventory but I think it might be premature about it being a fire sale. Granted, I was never a camera dealer for any brand, but I have been an IT equipment dealer and it was routine to receive addendum packs after the initial catalog releases for discontinued items or overstocked gear that didn't meet forecasted sales projections, and inventory needed to be 'aligned' with a hefty discount for X period of time. However, having those items show up as permanent pages seems to be someone's way of setting the stage for what must have been talked about in-house. It could mean that it was step 1 in a long term plan to streamline the company portfolio prior to closing it entirely. I could certainly envision someone formulating drastic measures long before the ax fell.
The fact there is no FX-3 may not be all that surprising. The start date I have for the 2000 Super is September of 1986, but unlike the other models I have nothing to suggest what the end date would have been, so it may have been the year before the catalog printing, and it really was out of production. I suppose that they could still have been making them and Kyocera had already contracted the design out to Jebson or whomever was the ultimate licensee. It may have been part of the deal that all production models in later years were done at the same 3rd party plant where they were doing the other rebadged models for other brands that the FX-3 morphed into.
One shocker is the Dental Eye and the Medical 100 being listed. Once upon a time before Kyocera got involved, at least the Dental Eye was exclusively sold through a single value-add distributor and never made it into any catalog but theirs - but I've yet to see even a single one of the dealer sheets to be certain that it did indeed appear in them, or it was only targeted brochures and sales pitches from retail suppliers and wholesalers. Medical gear seems to have it's own odd sales environment. I'm unsure if the 100mm Medical had the same type of arrangement, but biggles3 might know if that could be the case.
Posted: Nov 9, 2021 13:00:09 GMT
Nov 9, 2021 0:57:08 GMT lumiworx said:
One shocker is the Dental Eye and the Medical 100 being listed. Once upon a time before Kyocera got involved, at least the Dental Eye was exclusively sold through a single value-add distributor and never made it into any catalog but theirs - but I've yet to see even a single one of the dealer sheets to be certain that it did indeed appear in them, or it was only targeted brochures an sales pitches from retail suppliers and wholesalers. Medical gear seems to have it's own odd sales environment. I'm unsure if the 100mm Medical had the same type of arrangement, but biggles3 might know if that could be the case.
The DX 100m f4 Medical/Dental was an odd-ball in terms of the catalogues over the years. In 1976 it was included in the standard brochures for both Contax and Yashica systems and continued to be featured for a number of years. It was sometimes missing from Yashica lens catalogues but featured in their Macro brochure as well as a number of camera brochures for the FX-3/7, FX-D and FX-70 models under their Macro sections. It also disappeared from most Contax brochures following the introduction of the 159MM.
After this, the lens was only being offered to the public as part of a kit which included a camera: sometimes a modified FX-3 with a Date-back but also, much more expensively, a Contax 167MT with a D-7 back. I have a number of German trade brochures from Kyocera only listing the Medical/Dental lens as part of one of these kits. The FX-3 version did not appear in any of my European lists. I have seen at some stage in the past, an advertisement for the lens and a 167 in a German dental trade magazine but I can't recall the price or the wholesaler/distributor. All I do remember is that it was still available to the public to buy as a kit in the USA (at a heavily discounted price) at the same time as it was being offered to the dental/medical professions here in Europe. It would be interesting to know when production of the DX 100 f4 ceased - my earliest serial number for a stand-alone lens with power pack is A00032xx but all my lenses that are part of a kit have numbers that are around A00065xx. I would imagine that most of the late production lenses will have been offered only in kit form which might make the total production around 3,500+.
biggles3 wrote: I would imagine that most of the late production lenses will have been offered only in kit form which might make the total production around 3,500+.
This 1990 catalog offers the Medical 100DX lens for purchase with or without a kit.
Kit price with a Contax 167MT body, D-7 data back, foot switch, battery pack and case is $2103.60 retail (dealer cost is $999)
The price of the lens and battery pack alone is $945 retail ($539.95 dealer cost)
Nov 9, 2021 17:02:27 GMT dalegreer said:
Many thanks for the information. It all helps to complete the jigsaw...
The following are the manual-focus lenses listed as discontinued in 1990 but still available (with retail / dealer pricing)
- 24mm f/2.8 ML with case, $195 / $99
- 50mm f/1.9c ML (Cosina) no case, $87 / $43
- 50mm f/1.7 ML no case, $101 / $50
- 135mm f/2.8 ML with case, $158 / $80
- 300mm f/5.6 ML with case, $296 / $150
- 55mm f/2.8 Macro ML with case, $257 / $130
- 100mm f/3.5 Macro ML with case, $277 / $140
- 500mm f/8 Reflex ML with case, $456 / $230
- 42-75mm f/3.5-4.5 ML no case, $145 / $73
- 70-210mm f/4.5 ML Macro, $235 / $129
- 70-210mm f/4.5-5.6c ML Macro (Cosina), $253 / $139.95*
- 75-150mm f/4 ML with case, $190 / $97
- 28mm f/2.8 DSB, $125 / $57
* This is the only instance in which I have seen a published reference to this lens in official Yashica documentation.
Fascinating.
In Europe it was very different; I have two 1990 price lists (1st half & 2nd half year) from Kyocera for Germany and the only non-AF lenses being offered to the trade were:
ML: 50mm 1.9, 15mm, 28mm, 500mm, 1000mm, 100-300mm; MC: 28-80mm f3.9-4.9, 35-70mm f3.5-4.5, 75-200mm f4.5.
On the Medical & Dental sets, it also proved interesting: both the Dental Eye (55mm f4 Ringflash & FX-3 Camera) and Dental Eye II Set (100mm f4 Ringflash & 108 MP with Dateback) were available until July 1990 and then removed from the lists. However, both Medical 100 DX Sets remained available, Set 1 being the full set including the Contax 167MT & D-7, and Set II being just the lens.
Yashica USA Dealer Price List from 1990 - fire sale Nov 10, 2021 12:43:15 GMT
on Nov 10, 2021 12:43:15 GMT
Last Edit: Nov 10, 2021 15:36:14 GMT by dalegreer
biggles3 wrote:
The list of current (not discontinued) manual-focus lenses in the 1990 Yashica USA price list is similar:
-50mm f/1.9 ML, $91 / $45
-15mm f/2.8 ML with case, $730 / $370
-28mm f/2.8 ML with case, $180 / $90
-200mm f/4 ML with case, $212 / $107
-1000mm f/4 Reflex with case, $1399 / $710
-28-50mm f/3.5 ML with case, $490 / $245
-28-85mm f/3.5-4.5 Macro ML, $250 / $139.95
-35-105 f/3.8-4.8 DSB, $250 / $139.95
Plus the three MC zooms (28-80mm f/3.9-4.9, 35-70mm f/3.5-4.5, 75-200mm f/4.5)
The Dental Eye kit is not offered, but the Dental Eye II kit (with a 108 body) is advertised as NEW.
A few other interesting things:
- The Dental Eye II kit includes a 2x teleconverter engraved KYOCERA, not YASHICA.
- A three-year warranty is advertised throughout the book. Yashica was apparently trying to boost sales with this relatively low-cost perk while maintaining retail pricing.
- The ultra-rare Yashica 55mm clip-on lens cap is still listed as available at a dealer cost of $2.70. I would love to have about 20 of these! Impossible to find now, of course.