Jessops goes into administration

Earlier today the sad news was released that Jessops the well known and well loved photographic retailer was facing administration. Several hours later the sad news had been confirmed and a company has been drawn into to deal with the financial demise of the store.

Being a Photographer I am saddened by the news but honestly not surprised. In the past when I was a student I lived in Jessops. Buying film on a regular basic, visiting regularly to get my films processed, the excitement of not knowing what I would see develop in my images. Test's on film that took time and patience to think about, you wrote notes about the exposures used with each frame and experimented and learnt the skill of photography. But then the digital age was born, still I used my local Jessops store. I vividly remember saving up all my paper round money to buy my first digital camera, it was a fuji film camera and cost around £400. There were no digital screen's on the back of the camera like modern digital cameras today. You still had a view finder like a traditional film camera and used it very similarly to before. The memory card was a smart media card, this then came out of the camera and into a floppy disc card reader. It was amazing and I was thrilled with the camera and so pleased with the novelty of only printing the pictures that I wanted to and not paying to have whole films printed that weren't worth printing.

This in my opinion was the start of Jessops decline as a high street retailer, up until this point I was always using the store. However as I became further involved in photography and further involved with digital my requirements from Jessops changed. I can now upload the photo's that I want to print to an online photographic printers and they are printed and delivered to my door quicker and cheaper than visiting my local Jessop's store. Then there's my personal journey into more professional photography, This led me wanting more specialized equipment and my local Jessops store just didn't have these in stock. I have used their online store to buy products and collect them in-store, but just not on a regular basis, and sadly shopping around online has given me cheaper options to buy the same item.

I hope that this isn't the end of Jessops entirely, as to me it's a household name that doesn't want to get forgotten. My thoughts are with all the staff that are effected by today's announcement as it's a sad day for any one in the photographic industry.