ARE DOING IT FOR THEMSELVES

Amid reports of baking temperatures and wildfires on the continent this summer comes the equally shocking but nonetheless not-all-that-surprising news that over 90% of people now exclusively use a smartphone for taking pictures.

Sales of dedicated cameras – the ones that exist outside of our handsets – have been in decline for some time, which isn’t news to anybody. But not all hope is lost. Film continues to enjoy its resurgence and is cool with a hip, young demographic, while seemingly everyone – not just those with chin-strap beards – wants to be a content creator, recording and sharing every aspect of their lives across multiple social media channels. That ensures a still ever-growing need for pictures and video, and once again our news pages are full of tools that will allow this in-crowd to fulfill this demand, while providing manufacturers and specialist retailers with the opportunity to turn a profit.

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While it may appear that photography and video today is more about the ‘selfie’ than anything else – as far as the mass market is concerned – at retail it’s increasingly about self-service. You only need to visit the local supermarket, or indeed WH Smith, to witness the gradual replacement of human-manned tills with rows of barcode scanners and screens, and self service kiosks for the ordering of prints have been a staple at photo retail for a long while now. As an evolution of this, we report in this issue on a new collaboration between high street greeting card staple Scribbler and photo trade stalwart Fujifilm that allows retailers to further expand their services by offering up to 2,000 of Scribbler’s card designs in-store, customers having the ability to personalise the message inside. In effect this means a mini Scribbler store within your own business, and potential expansion of your traditional customer base. Of course such services need to be quick and efficient to hook the consumer, and an output time of just 60 seconds fulfills the definition of an instant print service.

Also this issue we’re allowing you to take personal control by throwing open the nominations for this year’s BPI News Trade Awards. These are the awards exclusively decided by your votes – there’s no panel of journalists or industry insiders behind the scenes – so please do take part and let us know who you think is deserving of an accolade in each category. Usually we’d announce the winners around the time of The Photography Show in September, but with no TPS this year we’ll instead be ending the year with a bang and announcing them in our annual December / January edition. And yes, you’re allowed to invite your own customers to sing your praises. Enjoy the issue and let us know your view!