Note: this page assumes that you live in the United States or that you
live in Europe and will be mail ordering from the United States. If you
are visiting Japan, you probably want to read
Buying a Camera in Japan.
I want to support photo.net
I started photo.net in 1993 as part of my personal Web site. Today the
site attracts almost 1 million unique visitors per month and the server processes
more than 2 million requests every day. Four of my friends from MIT
(Lisa, Luis, Rajeev, and Waikit) are working full-time on editorial,
programming, system administration, and customer service. After much
discussion with readers in the spring of 2000, we concluded that the
best way to keep photo.net alive was referral fees from retailers. So
if photo.net has been a valuable resource for you, please help by
following one of the following encoded links:
- Adorama
(full-line professional store)
- B&H Photo
(full-line professional store)
- DealTime
(comparison shopping)
- Ritzcamera
(over 1000 U.S. Locations, low prices guaranteed, free shipping for orders more than $100, and no sales tax)
For more specialized needs, here's our original "where to buy" page ...
I want it cheap and fast
The two New York stores that historically have offered the best
combination of price and stock are Adorama and B&H. Adorama often
has lower prices and sometimes faster standard shipping. Adorama also
has a rental operation that will do mail-order rentals for a minimum of
one week (contact George Hertz at (212) 627-8487). Finally, Adorama
will pay photo.net a referral fee if you place an order after clicking
through from
this
link. B&H also pays photo.net a referral fee if you place an order after clicking through from
this link B&H has a huge inventory and retail space. If you're in
New York City and want to shop in person, this is a fun place to visit.
If Adorama is out of stock on a hot item, try B&H next (though
curiously it will be local and regional dealers who are most likely to
have, in-stock, the latest Nikon lens).
Adorama
42 West 18th Street
(between 5th and 6th Avenues)
New York City, NY 10011
US voice (800) 223-2500
overseas voice +1 (212) 741-0052
FAX +1 (212) 463-7223
email: info@adoramacamera.com
Adorama website
|
B&H Photo
420 9th Avenue (between 33 & 34)
New York City, NY 10001
US voice (800) 947-7786
B&H Photo website
|
Both companies regularly ship to customers worldwide and I know many
satisfied Adorama and B&H customers who have never set foot in the
United States.
One thing that these big New York retailers can do that your local
camera shop cannot is go to Japan or Europe and import cameras
themselves. Suppose that Nikon USA is selling F5 bodies to retailers
here for $2500. Adorama has enough volume that they can fly to Japan
and buy a bunch of F5s from a wholesaler there for, say, $1800 each.
They bring them back to the US and sell them as "grey market" (parallel
import) for $2200. It is exactly the same camera but you get a lower
price (though you may miss out on any rebates that Nikon USA is offering
and the Nikon USA warranty (though the US retailer will give you their
own warranty)). Camera bodies are very reliable, lenses are even more
reliable, and the authorized importers usually offer extremely slow
service to consumers. Hence, I can't think of any reason to ever pay
more than $25 extra for a "USA" model. Sometimes grey market bodies
even have important features that were ripped out of the US models, as
with the Canon EOS-5/A2E.
I want to get screwed
Place an order with Cambridge Camera, Smile, Executive or any of the
other bottom dollar places advertising in Pop. Photo. The most common
fraud is to advertise a Canon A2E, say, for $500. When you have
finished reciting your credit card number, they'll say "oops, that
price was for the grey market version; right now we only have the US
version in stock and that is $800." [They will conveniently overlook
the fact that the A2E is a US-only model.]
Here are some of the more common frauds:
- Grey market film or short-dated film. Fuji isn't so bad because I
think they make all of their film either in Japan or the US, but
with Kodak you can get some weird old emulsions made in Australia. You
have to specify "Rochester" and "fresh" at many shops. Adorama's ad in
Popular Photography lays all this out in a very
consumer-friendly manner.
- Cheesy filters. Somehow shops other than B&H can't resist selling
you a really offbrand filter for $15 (their cost $1.50) even though
they can make 50% profit on the real brands (e.g., Tiffen, B+W).
- Outrageous shipping charges. Always ask for the total price
including shipping. If you need it tomorrow, expect to get raped by any
of the NY shops (on the plus side, if Adorama or B&H says you'll
have it tomorrow, you'll have it).
You'll find more stories about bad (and good) retailers in the
photo.net
Neighbor to Neighbor service.
I want to see it in a catalog and have it explained to me
Try Calumet,
based in Chicago at 1-800-CALUMET. Their catalog is almost as nice as
their Web site is lame. Their sales people tend to be patient and
experienced. Calumet caters to professionals and studio
photographers. Thus they tend to be very good about supplying film,
with low prices, accurate stock information, and shipment when
promised. I've found that Calumet isn't really competitive for
common items such as Nikon lenses.
I've also found that they push their house brands, oftentimes
when the consumer would be better served with a name-brand product.
For example, their view cameras aren't really much cheaper than
equivalent Sinar products, but any working photographer would be much
better off with Sinar (see "Choosing a Large Format
Camera"). And a friend of mine bought two of their house-brand
flash packs. They had some nice electronic features and were a bit cheaper
than equivalent name-brand flashes but neither triggered
reliably when one hit the test button or used the sync cord. By
contrast, I've seen lots of cheap strobe packs that didn't have the
features of fancy Broncolor packs. But the cheap packs always worked.
I want an intelligent recommendation for serious equipment
You want to talk to Jeff Hirsch at FOTOCARE, 136 West 21st Street, NY,
NY 10011. (212) 741-2990 (http://www.fotocare.com/). Don't ask him which point & shoot to buy,
but he rents all the good large- and medium-format stuff plus studio
lighting. Because he rents and uses this stuff, he knows what
matters. This is the place to buy weird but essential stuff, e.g.,
ballheads, quick releases, etc. Jeff's prices on those items are
often identical to B&H's.
(I bought a FOBA Superball from Len Rue (see below) and it started to
bind after a year or two (not a good thing in a $385 ballhead). Sinar
Bron, the importer, refused to fix it, claiming that it had been
abused. Len Rue and Jeff have a business relationship going way back
so Jeff let me trade it in for a brand new one and only charged me
$135 even though I'd never bought anything from him. Of course, now I
realize that the only true ballhead religion is delivered by the
ARCA Swiss B1.)
I want to trade a Hasselblad and a Leica in for a new Linhof
Gil Ghitelman,
www.gilghitelman.com,
info@gilghitelman.com.
Gil used to be a psychologist in the Montgomery County public schools,
where I suffered through 10 grades, but I won't hold that against him. He
started collecting Leicas and then decided to go into the family camera
business. You can trust Gil, he'll go the extra mile to make sure that
you get what you need, and you might pay less than you would at B&H.
Although Gil is hidden away in Weston, Connecticut, he is a pretty
high-volume Hasselblad dealer and has an in-house repair service (forget
what anyone says; 'blads need a lot of maintenance). He also stocks
oddities like $800 English camera bags.
I've bought a bunch of Linhof stuff from Gil, new and used.
I want to take a picture like this
You want to talk to Leonard Lee Rue III and Len Rue, IV. When they
aren't out chasing wildlife or sitting in a blind with a 600/4, the
Rues operate a mail-order service for wildlife photographers.
They've personally used every piece of equipment in their illustrated
catalog and don't sell it if it doesn't work. Much of the stuff you'd
be unlikely to know you needed. If B&H has the same item, it will be
somewhere between the same price and 25% cheaper.
Leonard Rue Enterprises, 138 Millbrook Road, Blairstown, NJ 07825,
(800) 734-2568, http://www.rue.com.
[Note: Bear photo was taken with Nikon 300/2.8, FOBA ballhead, 8008
body, Ektar 25 film, 1/60th at 2.8 under overcast skies. From Travels with Samantha.]
I want to buy a used camera
If you don't see anything you like in the
photo.net Classifieds, rec.photo.marketplace and
Shutterbug magazine are the places to look for
advertisements from shops and individuals selling used cameras.
Midwest Photo Exchange,
3313 N. High Street, Columbus, OH 43202,
614-261-1264, FAX 614-261-1637, is a good source for old view cameras and the like (esp. strong on
Linhof Technicas).
KEH Camera Brokers puts out a big
catalog that is useful for reference prices.
Sponsors:
CameraClub.com (Low prices. Great selection of photographic, video and digital equipment.)
focuscamera.com (30 years of combining lowest prices and personal service.)
