Can you have a brand resurgence while a business is in decline?

theapocalypse

Originally uploaded by distillerymedia

I bemoaned the passing of Polaroid’s Instant Film a few months back which will cease making it’s namesake product shortly.  I was further saddened when, at a party I hosted a few weeks ago, I pulled out my camera to realize that some of my film had started to turn bad. I felt like it was the end of an era.

The economic model never really made sense (over a buck a photo) in the digital age and of course they were an environmental disaster…but so much fun. And the people having their picture taken always seem to have more fun.

SwissMiss cheered me up today by posting POLADROID. A free app that lets you recreate your favorite images as if they were taken on the spur of the moment, with money to burn and free of life’s cares. Personally, I think all photos should look like that.

As for Polaroid, I hope someone can buy the license and figure out how to bring prices down while keeping the technology around so the brand may continue in its current form.

Polaroid Fades To Black

my best polaroid ever ….Originally uploaded by james m

The Washington Post announced today that Polaroid is shuttering its factories…

“Polaroid, based in Waltham, Mass., is shutting down factories in the United States and abroad as the company abandons the technology that made the instant photo possible, the Boston Globe reported yesterday. The company will cease production of its film by next year.”

This essentially means that I have to start stocking up now. Polaroids, while environmentally unfriendly, are little bits of pleasure to me. Whether by livening up a party or bringing smiles to the faces of kids I meet in places like Ivory Coast, Polaroids have long been a big part of my photographic life. Somehow printed snapshots just don’t do justice to the spontaneity of life captured through the plastic lens.