The camera industry is changing, but old-school camera stores like Garland Camera will be there through its ebbs and flows. Today, mobile phone cameras democratize photography, but film and digital cameras are still a strong force in the market for those who appreciate photography as an art form.
“Film [was] brought back more so due to the pandemic because you had people at home digging through the closets finding something to do,” says Kirk Meca, who has owned Garland Camera for 8 years. “We saw a lot of parents and grandparents giving film cameras to their children and grandparents, and really help perpetuate the art of photography. So a whole generation came into film processing who had no idea what film was or how it works.
Devotees trade in camera after camera; the next person inherits the former’s previous camera and the cycle continues. “I don’t think it’s going to go further just because financially it’s not going to be feasible for everybody," Meca says."It’s going to be a rich kid’s sport.” Because of this change, the price of Kodak film has increased significantly. The higher cost of film, perhaps married with TikTok’s recent Y2K undercurrent, now means a newfound interest in digital cameras.
“The neat part about it is that I took over when the film side was still pretty much dormant, and, as it evolved, we were able to evolve with it because we had everything that people were looking for,” Meca says.