TWICE:
How is
the military channel doing with these all weather cameras? Is that a big
segment with all the activity in the Middle East?
Mark Sherengo, Pentax:
Huge.
It is huge. Honest it’s landed in
our lap more than we actually pursued it.
Our PR for the W90 and its design and style capabilities and the fact
that it has a green band helped us militarily just by getting a drop dead order
for the products. I think it’s helped us globally in the military. But it’s the 11th generation of this product,
so I think everybody is starting to accept it, and we just happened to have a
style that was accepted. To be honest
adding that little clip on the end of a camera… Who knew that would make a such
a huge difference? If you have an
adventure camera, and you have a way to put it on a backpack and a way to put
it on what you’re climbing in Iraq – what a huge difference for a two-cent
addition.
Ron Gazzola, Fujifilm:
We’ve seen really good success there with a
number of products, but our waterproof XP10 this year has done great, not only
what the product can bring, not only that kind of active use lifestyle which
obviously works well in that channel but we’ve also combined a great deal of
marketing and packaging efforts, working with the marketing folks at the
military channels to help deliver that product in a fashion that I think has
worked really, really well.
Rich Campbell:
They’ve certainly done a great job not only
promoting products that might seem more specialized for that environment, but in
also promoting and selling traditional cameras. We’ve done well with a number
of products across the line with them.
It’s always kind of a personal pleasure to be able to work with those
guys. It’s nice to be able to put programs and offers out to them. They’re
certainly going above and beyond for us and so we appreciate that opportunity
to work with them, but they’re consumers as well. They know where to shop. They spend time in the states. They grew up here. They know all the retail
stores. They look at all the same web
sites that an average customer does, and they’re looking for the same things. We
want to be able to provide them that resource to be able to buy it wherever
they may be stationed and make it easier for them to have access to the same
stuff that they would get at home. It
kind of gives them a sense of what home was like by being able to do that,
so.
