Walmart stopping film processing?

bigdog

bigdog

Established
Local time
6:37 PM
Joined
Mar 5, 2005
Messages
144
I dropped off a roll of color film yesterday only to find out my local Walmart will no longer process color negative films as of August 10.

Has your local Walmart decided to stop processing color film yet?

I didn't ask if they will have an option to send it out of house. I was told they will still make prints, do digital services, but won't process the film.
 
bigdog said:
I dropped off a roll of color film yesterday only to find out my local Walmart will no longer process color negative films as of August 10.

Has your local Walmart decided to stop processing color film yet?

I didn't ask if they will have an option to send it out of house. I was told they will still make prints, do digital services, but won't process the film.
Click to expand...

That's actually pretty shocking news! Some of the local pharmacies here have gradually stopped processing film or switched to sending out. But this totally shatters my image of Walmart as the bizarre super store with everything under the sun in it.
 
Is this walmart in question discontinuing in store developing or sending out film altogether?

A lot of stores have stopped in house processing and use the send out service to Fuji. As for the send out program I'm not sure if there's an expiration date on that service too.
 
"Sounds like Walmart settled their own film vs. digital debate."

It's kind of the chicken and egg thing. If Wal-Mart can make money peddling something, they will. If Wal-Mart can't make a profit processing C-41, the other shoe (to mix my metaphors) will soon drop. As goes Wal-Mart...

Wal-Mart, the great Satan.
 
Is this walmart in question discontinuing in store developing or sending out film altogether?
Click to expand...

I was told it applies to in-house processing, I do not know about sending out film. The clerk said it may be due to insufficient volume and cost of chemicals even though her store's film processing volume doubled when the Walmart 30 minutes down the highway stopped in-house processing.
 
At least two local Wally World shops (which I very seldom shop at, actually) quit doing film last year.

According to a FOAF who works at one, the criteria was less than so many rolls per day for so many weeks.
 
EVERY Wal-Mart store in my area has stopped doing in-house processing. All film is sent out and the "truck" only runs 3 times a week. A person I spoke to at WM said that all stores will be switching over to the 1-hour digital print service.
 
bigdog said:
The clerk said it may be due to insufficient volume and cost of chemicals even though her store's film processing volume doubled when the Walmart 30 minutes down the highway stopped in-house processing.
Click to expand...

That's the problem with bad mathematics. One store stops doing film, the other store picks up the slack, their demand goes up (as expected). But just doing the math isn't very smart. The overall trend remains down (which is why the first store stopped doing processing), and thinking that the second store should keep doing processing because their demand doubled isn't thinking over a longer interval. It's still going to go down.

The costs associated with processing film commercially are somewhat fixed (no pun intended). The chemistry lasts a period of time regardless of how many rolls are processed. The employees have to be trained regardless of how many rolls are processed. The equipment has to be maintained (and perhaps lease payments made) no matter how many rolls are processed. And the equipment takes up valuable floor space. So as the number of rolls processed goes down, the cost per roll to do processing goes up. The price to process film can be raised to a certain level to compensate, but consumers will only pay so much and no more.
 
We have two W-M in the county. The original one (down South) quit processing film over a year ago... their machine "broke" and was never replaced. Could be true... the thing was frequently out of service for repairs.
The new, North store opened just before Christmas last year, has never offered the service.
FWIW - CVS has again raised their prices for process and save to CD. (Cause and effect?)
 
Last edited:
All of this is very old news. 6 months at least since my local Walmart (Houston) yanked the Fuji Frontier machine out. The Sam's Club (closer to me than Walmart) still has their machine but not for long.

The good news: Put your film (any 35mm, APS or medium format-that's right, even 220) in a Walmart send out for processing envelope. Kodachrome, E-6, C-41, B&W. Walmart sends the film to the nearest Fuji lab. Fuji process the 35mm C-41 film. Everything else goes to Dwayne's. In the past month I have sent out 4 rolls of Kodachrome and several rolls of 120 & 220 C-41 film. All came back fine. They only charge $0.88/roll of 220 C-41 for develop and sleeve only. I do my own scanning. Kodachrome is $6.88/36 exp. roll.
 
My local Duane Reade here in Manhattan recently stopped C-41 processing. They've gone to digital printing. It's inevitable I guess.
 
According to the spec sheet given by the local rep of a big film company, a film processor of those mini 1 hour lab units has to be fed more than 30 rolls per day to be feasible.
 
I think consumer film processing in general is going to take a SERIOUS hit when the current generation of seniors either finally goes digital or are no longer with us to take pictures. Every time I walk by the Wally World photo desk or the 1 hour in the grocery store, nine times out of ten if someone is dropping off film they're over 50. The consumer film user demographic may not help in the fight for polaroid or kodachrome... but they definitely do more than us to keep the 1 hours going. I'd hazard a guess that the majority of film shot by this forum is black and white and developed at home. And when we do get stuff done at 1 hour labs we're probably just getting the basic dev service and maybe not even prints done. We're not getting a lot of 5X7's and 8X10's that help their profit margins.

I only get the 4X6's that come with the roll because my local 1 hour lab won't do just developing... and if I'm getting enlargements I scan at home, tweak, then take the file to a pro lab to get big prints. It'll be a sad day when I can't get cross processed E6 done at my drugstore for $6 in an hour and have to go to a pro lab that charges almost double to do it in 2 days. I do think film will be with us through out my lifetime at least... but I can definitely see the number of in house labs dwindling VERY fast... and soon we'll all be sending our C-41 out for 3-5 day outsourced lab service from all the consumer photo labs. It's all just a numbers/profit game and you can't really blame a store in this economy for doing what's just good for business. If they don't do what's good for business they won't even be there to send our stuff out :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom