Astronomical Price For A Lens Hood?

[BillsBayou]

B&H price for an ET-155 lens hood for a EF 400mm f/2.8 lens is $559. I found a couple of other lens hoods that (to me) seem exceedingly overpriced.

From what I can remember from my business classes, you can't charge what people aren't willing to pay. Further, the principle of "Mutually Beneficial Exchange" gives us the rule that people exchange goods and money when both parties feel they'll be better off afterwards. So what is it that makes this hood worth the high price?

Am I missing something? It's a tube made of some synthetic material coated on the inside with some sort of non-reflective material. Is there something more or is this simply getting a big hunk of change out of people/companies that can afford a $6500 lens?

I'm really not trying to make fun of the price or anyone willing to spend this amount. I'm just completely clueless when it comes to this particular item's value.

[dekalbSTEEL]

The cost to have the molds fabricated for a small volume item such as this is the same as the cost to fabricate a mold to make the Et-65 hood

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/162046-REG/Canon_2655A002_ET_65_III_Lens_Hood.html

Which hood do you think Canon sells more of?

[adas]

They know whom they're selling to. :lol:
I mean, companies don't make such compromises, as to buy third party.

[ed rader]

B&H price for an ET-155 lens hood for a EF 400mm f/2.8 lens is $559. I found a couple of other lens hoods that (to me) seem exceedingly overpriced.

From what I can remember from my business classes, you can't charge what people aren't willing to pay. Further, the principle of "Mutually Beneficial Exchange" gives us the rule that people exchange goods and money when both parties feel they'll be better off afterwards. So what is it that makes this hood worth the high price?

Am I missing something? It's a tube made of some synthetic material coated on the inside with some sort of non-reflective material. Is there something more or is this simply getting a big hunk of change out of people/companies that can afford a $6500 lens?

I'm really not trying to make fun of the price or anyone willing to spend this amount. I'm just completely clueless when it comes to this particular item's value.

if you need the hood you probably don't have any other options.

so what's the hood really worth?

whatever someone is willing to pay.


ed rader

[condyk]

Rich guys are dumb enough to pay Canon so Canon take their money. End of story.

[BillsBayou]

The cost to have the molds fabricated for a small volume item such as this is the same as the cost to fabricate a mold to make the Et-65 hood

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/162046-REG/Canon_2655A002_ET_65_III_Lens_Hood.html

Which hood do you think Canon sells more of?

Unfortunately, cost has nothing to do with price; cost affects profit. Further, what you are describing is "fixed cost." When looking at profitability, a company wants to be sure to cover all of it's "variable costs."

In any case, the problem with costs is that the customer doesn't care about cost. The customer cares about price. If a company wants to sell something that's expensive to make, they need to communicate to the customer the value of the thing, not it's cost.

What is it about this hood that makes it worth $559 to the customer? That's why I'm here in the Canon Equipment Talk forum. I want to know who here would be willing to spend $559 for the hood and why it's worth so much?

I guess I'm willing to accept the answer "Because I can't shoot quality shots without it and Canon has me over a barrel since no one makes a cheaper substitution."

[bacchanal]

The cost to have the molds fabricated for a small volume item such as this is the same as the cost to fabricate a mold to make the Et-65 hood

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/162046-REG/Canon_2655A002_ET_65_III_Lens_Hood.html

Which hood do you think Canon sells more of?

Yeah, I don't buy that. I mean you can buy a 200 2.8L for basically the same price as the ET-155, and it's not like they are flying off the shelves.

[runninmann]

Unfortunately, cost has nothing to do with price; cost affects profit. Further, what you are describing is "fixed cost." When looking at profitability, a company wants to be sure to cover all of it's "variable costs."

In any case, the problem with costs is that the customer doesn't care about cost. The customer cares about price. If a company wants to sell something that's expensive to make, they need to communicate to the customer the value of the thing, not it's cost.

What is it about this hood that makes it worth $559 to the customer? That's why I'm here in the Canon Equipment Talk forum. I want to know who here would be willing to spend $559 for the hood and why it's worth so much?

I guess I'm willing to accept the answer "Because I can't shoot quality shots without it and Canon has me over a barrel since no one makes a cheaper substitution."When looking at profitability, a company must cover its total costs. True variable costs are the same per part no matter how many pieces are produced. Fixed cost per piece decreases as number of pieces produced increases. So, the fixed cost per piece will be greater for a lower volume product than for a higher volume product, given equal fixed cost.

I still don't think that explains why the hood costs $559, though.

[gjman]

The EF 400mm f/2.8L comes with the following:
• E-180C Lens Cap
• Lens Dust Cap E (Rear)
• ET-155 Lens Hood
• Carrying Case 400
• Drop-In Gel Filter Holder
• Wide Strap

Sure the ET-155 costs $559.95, but if you got yourself a $6,500 lens you SHOULDN'T be loosing it (or buying it used without it) in the first place.

And if you had the misfortune of loosing it then Canon reckons that if ye can shell out $6,500, you can afford to spend $559.95 for an extra hood too.

[Bill Roberts]

That's life! Sometimes you just have to accept that if you want something there's a cost involved. You either pay it or you don't. I'm sure that Canon would justify it on the grounds of VERY small sales. After all they supply it with the lens and only a small percentage will be lost, so it's probably true that the aftermarket sales are tiny. It doesn't mean that it's worth $559.95 though because it clearly isn't.

[cosworth]

It's made from carbon fibre. If you want a $50 hood make one yourself.

[CoolToolGuy]

Some things to consider:

This hood only fits the 400mm f2.8, and the lens comes with the hood. So virtually the only customers for the hood are those that have lost, damaged or otherwise disposed of the original. That means that the customer base is rather small.

Canon must create and maintain model numbers, packaging, warehouse space, inventory tracking, etc. to create and maintain a sales path for the hood. Those costs must be spread across the number that they plan to sell.

The cost is outrageous, but I have seen things like this before. I don't think they are necessarily trying to rip people off.

Have Fun,

[Tapeman]

If I lost or damaged the hood for my 300 2.8L IS, I probably would pay the $400. or so for a new one. There would be a lot of crying though.

[dekalbSTEEL]

Some things to consider:

This hood only fits the 400mm f2.8, and the lens comes with the hood. So virtually the only customers for the hood are those that have lost, damaged or otherwise disposed of the original. That means that the customer base is rather small.

Canon must create and maintain model numbers, packaging, warehouse space, inventory tracking, etc. to create and maintain a sales path for the hood. Those costs must be spread across the number that they plan to sell.

The cost is outrageous, but I have seen things like this before. I don't think they are necessarily trying to rip people off.

Have Fun,

That's kinda what I was getting at;)

[DocFrankenstein]

It's made from carbon fibre. If you want a $50 hood make one yourself.
You sure?

That seems unreasonable.

I think the hood is made from unobtanium. :rolleyes:


Canon has created a religion and obscession among some people. I bought a grip from them for 100 bucks and it costs about 2 bucks to make it. I was willing to shell out the money even though I knew canon would make 60 bucks or so.

Same with hood. If you're shooting with that 400 everyday, it might just be worth 500 for some people. Canon exploits it.

I don't beleive it's the production numbers. The mold is not that expensive to make.

[gooble]

It's made from carbon fibre. If you want a $50 hood make one yourself.

If it is carbon fiber that would explain much of the price but as someone already more or less said: they charge what the market will bear. There doesn't appear to be a close substitute, if any and although I have never used the lens I would deem the lens hood a necessity. It is one of the finest lenses of its kind in the world so why would one use it without a hood which: a)protects a $6500 investment and b) contributes to better image quality.

Also, I don't know how many of these lenses are in the wild, and I have to assume that owners of these lenses are extra careful in general so how many of these could they be selling per month? One, two? I wouldn't be surprised if it was less than one. But let's say it's one. They have to figure fixed costs, variable costs, and overhead costs and weigh that against the profit. If total manufacturing costs are $50 and they sell them for $500 they have a $450 profit or only $5400 per year. But is that worth the effort? I don't know only Canon knows. And if the profit per unit is lower then stated above they may be only making a piddly couple thousand dollars a year of those plastic hunks. They may decide that at some profit there are diminishing returns and it may just be better for them to cease selling them.

What gets me is that when people get up in arms about the price of things such as gasoline or Canon L lenses they never consider certain possibililties. They only assume the company is gouging them and if they just lowered their prices everyone would be happy. There are certain things that are priced they way they are because if they weren't nobody would make them. So do you want a vital product at a relatively high cost or do you want no product at all?

Now I don't know Canon's costs and reasonings behind the pricing of these lens hoods but it is highly likely that if they produced and sold these by the thousands each month they would benefit from economies of scale and the prices would see a significant downward shift.

[BillsBayou]

When looking at profitability, a company must cover its total costs. True variable costs are the same per part no matter how many pieces are produced. Fixed cost per piece decreases as number of pieces produced increases. So, the fixed cost per piece will be greater for a lower volume product than for a higher volume product, given equal fixed cost.

I still don't think that explains why the hood costs $559, though.

I would argue that the only real fixed cost is the mold and the set-up time on the factory line. The factory can make different types of hoods using the same machinery. Therefore, the fixed costs assigned to any one hood is similar to any other hood. Your statement is true, but the fixed cost may not be as high as you think.

As far as covering your total costs, you do that when looking at the net present value of a project. However, once you've built the factory and installed the equipment, your capital costs move into the category of "sunk cost." All of the equipment, settings, molds, etc, involved in producing the ET-155 are already sitting there waiting to be utilized. Sunk costs have no bearing on the cost of each production run from that point forward. Amortizing the set-up costs over the production run is the only remaining factor when determing when to build more ET-155 units and how many to build.

OH! OH! OH!

I'm such an IDIOT! I just figured it out!

It's Supply and Demand, Bill! Sheesh, how could I forget that one?

Let's say that Canon is going to make X number of 400mm f/2.8 lenses. They then calculate breakage and loss in the consumer market for the hoods. Let's call that percentage Y. The excess volume, X*Y, we'll call Z. They then make X + Z hoods and put the excess in storage (somewhere cheap). The fixed costs associated with making the Z hoods was covered by the hoods they NEEDED to make to include with each lens. (You could say that the Z volume has fixed costs, but the project manager pushed all that into the NPV calculation. Z is nearly all variable cost.) Now the only fixed cost is storing the Z excess! Man, that's GOT to be cheap. Considering the small value of X, the value of Z is considerably small compared to the larger number of other lenses and hoods.

Now when the consumer needs a new hood, there's only a limited supply of hoods available in the Canon warehouse; Limited supply = high price. Factor in the low fixed cost of these Z excess hoods and that's 99.99% gold.

Putting all of this into a Supply and Demand graph and you're not looking to hit the optimum price point, you're looking to bilk the few saps that are lying on the far right of the curve (where high price has squeezed most everyone else out of the market).

I might have this figured out yet.

[cosworth]

It costs $559. No amount of bitching about it will do anyone any good. Wasted hot air.

I propose this. Go and buy one. Send it to Taiwan and ask one of their reverse engineer houses to make a batch of 300 for you. See what you can sell it for. Seriously, if you can afford a 400 2.8 and you bust the hood then you're pretty flush. buy another. If you lost it - fie on you. If you bought the lens cheaper cuz it's missing the hood (I even saw one recently) then you're cheap.

Suck it up or solve it.

[StealthLude]

This thread is just hilarious.

Its an expencive lens, and u get an expencive hood... and its done..

You even wonder why when you own a $100,000 car the oil change or gas cap seems to cost 5 times as much as a normal one... I assume if you lost the gas cap to your Benz u aint gona be crying about $200 bucks to get it back.

[StealthLude]

The EF 400mm f/2.8L comes with the following:
• E-180C Lens Cap
• Lens Dust Cap E (Rear)
• ET-155 Lens Hood
• Carrying Case 400
• Drop-In Gel Filter Holder
• Wide Strap

Sure the ET-155 costs $559.95, but if you got yourself a $6,500 lens you SHOULDN'T be loosing it (or buying it used without it) in the first place.

And if you had the misfortune of loosing it then Canon reckons that if ye can shell out $6,500, you can afford to spend $559.95 for an extra hood too.


haha yup

[ed rader]

It costs $559. No amount of bitching about it will do anyone any good. Wasted hot air.

I propose this. Go and buy one. Send it to Taiwan and ask one of their reverse engineer houses to make a batch of 300 for you. See what you can sell it for. Seriously, if you can afford a 400 2.8 and you bust the hood then you're pretty flush. buy another. If you lost it - fie on you. If you bought the lens cheaper cuz it's missing the hood (I even saw one recently) then you're cheap.

Suck it up or solve it.


that's a very good point. say you had 300 hoods made for about $10k.

if you sell the hoods for, say, $250 each you might break even in a decade :D .

of course the updated 400 f2.8 which we'll be out by then will use a different hood.

so yeah if the price of the hood is so outrageous i wonder why the entrepreneurs in China aren't knocking them off :D ?

ed rader

[PetKal]

Those supertelephoto hoods (or molded cases if you wish) are readily seen as being grossly overpriced.

However, for mass produced consumer grade electronics/instruments like Canon professional cameras and supertelephoto lenses, I think that's where selling prices seem kinda obscenely high to me. Canon does get their money though because I believe between them and Nikon they've cornered a captive market.

I have spent many years buying and using nuclear power application grade and mil-spec grade instruments and components....so I thought I had been sensitized to very steep pricing of low volume production , exacting standard goods. Wrong ! Canon's prices go well beyond that, and I still find them very hard to rationalize.

[Myles7]

if you sell the hoods for, say, $250 each you might break even in a decade.

That's about the size of it. The custom lens-cases cost rather a lot (replacement-wise) compared to the equivalent womens' vanity case - but how many do Canon sell worldwide (without the lens). Square-root of zero, most years, I'd guess. ;)

[gooble]

The demand for these hoods is inelastic. That means that if they suddenly lowered the price to $250 would there be a rush on them? No. How about $150? No. Why? No matter the price you only get one if you need one regardless of price. Even if they raised the price by $50, $100 or $200 the demand would probably not change at all. So if they sell x amount now, within reason any change in sales price will result in x sales with new price, lower or higher. There absolutely no incentive to sell at a lower price.

[gooble]

The demand for these hoods is inelastic. That means that if they suddenly lowered the price to $250 would there be a rush on them? No. How about $150? No. Why? No matter the price you only get one if you need one regardless of price. Even if they raised the price by $50, $100 or $200 the demand would probably not change at all. So if they sell x amount now, within reason any change in sales price will result in x sales with new price, lower or higher. There absolutely no incentive to sell at a lower price.

[oldsquawk]

All the people who complain about the high prices of Canon's best lenses and accessories crack me up! All the people who say ya' gatta be rich to afford them crack me up, too! You know what? I ain't rich. I just saved for 13 years to buy my 500mm f 4L IS lens and all the support accessories. If I lost the hood tomorrow I'd shell out the $519.00 immediately. Why? Because when I look at the images I make with this lens, there's just nothing else out there that makes comparable images. :) Worth every penny, to me.

[turboflame]

$559 for a lense hood :shock:

I would just find the dimensions of the hood, go to a craft store, buy some black posterboard for 99 cents and make it myself.

It would have the exact same effect, minus the protection factor

Then again, I'm pretty cheap ;)

[Billginthekeys]

im sorry.. what is everyone complaining about. the hood COMES WITH THE LENS. its not like you HAVE to pay $500 for the hood when you buy the lens, provided you dont damage or loose it you don't have to pay for the new hood. as said above the hood is made out of Carbon Fiber, so is far more expensive than a plastic hood. Also, seeing as there arnt that many 400 2.8's out there, there is even less demand for hoods, since the majority of owners have their originals. the other option is for canon to not offer a replacement hood at all, and that wouldnt help anyone, so quit your b*tchin.

[PetKal]

im sorry.. what is everyone complaining about. the hood COMES WITH THE LENS. its not like you HAVE to pay $500 for the hood when you buy the lens, provided you dont damage or loose it you don't have to pay for the new hood. as said above the hood is made out of Carbon Fiber, so is far more expensive than a plastic hood. Also, seeing as there arnt that many 400 2.8's out there, there is even less demand for hoods, since the majority of owners have their originals. the other option is for canon to not offer a replacement hood at all, and that wouldnt help anyone, so quit your b*tchin.


Easy, Billy boy, this is just a discussion.;)

[Benandbobbi]

All I know is that I am going to take better care of mine now that I know what they cost.

[MikeCaine]

Why not print your own lens hood?

http://www.lenshoods.co.uk/hoods/Canon-EF-600mm-f-4-L-IS-USM.php

:-)

[WMS]

$559 for a lense hood :shock:

I would just find the dimensions of the hood, go to a craft store, buy some black posterboard for 99 cents and make it myself.

It would have the exact same effect, minus the protection factor

Then again, I'm pretty cheap ;)


Two comments

1)Actually sense this is a L lens you should use white poster-board. :p

2) As a jeweler you don't even want to think about how much I get for a gram or two of cubically crystallized Carbon.

WMS