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To the astonishment of photography professionals, who had written off the Polaroid as an expensive toy, Model 95 turned out profits almost as fast as it turned out pictures. Sales spurted further ahead each time Land dangled a new improvement before customers, which he did with increasing regularity: black and white film in 1950, 15-sec. pictures and a camera with an automatic exposure system in 1960, color film and film cartridges in 1963, the low-priced Swinger in 1965, and most recently a pair of low-priced color cameras, the Colorpack II in 1969 and the Square Shooter in 1971.
Many of these models were previewed during Land's now-legendary appearances at Polaroid's annual meetings, at which he stages a modern magic-lantern show to demonstrate the company's latest marvels. Several thousand people, including armies of securities analysts and newsmen, attend these affairs. To show off the SX-70 last April, Land set up a dozen displays—ranging from a simulated children's birthday party to a collection of antique miniatures—at which Polaroid employees clicked away with the new cameras.
Perhaps the most remarkable thing about Polaroid is that it has grown huge by creating products for which there was little detectable demand, until Edwin Land thought of them. Each is, as Land says, sui generis—in a class by itself. That distinction makes conventional market research, in the words of one of his marketing executives, "a waste of time and money." Polaroid did not spend a single dollar trying to discern in advance whether people would actually buy the SX-70.
For Polaroid the SX-70 is a pivotal business development. Following a favorite Land dictum—"Never do what others can do for you"—the company has always before relied heavily on outside contractors to assemble its cameras and large parts of its film packs. For the past several years Polaroid has bought $50 million worth of color negatives from Kodak and then done the rest of the work in turning them into film packs. But in bringing out its new camera, the company has made a major turn-around and converted itself into a big manufacturer, building five plants in the Boston area to produce the entire film package and assemble the camera's major components. Together, the plants are capable of turning out as many high-ticket SX-70s as Polaroid now sells in all price ranges.
Polaroid is still nowhere near self-sufficient. Without even being able to show them a finished mockup, Land persuaded nearly a dozen big corporations—including Corning Glass, Texas Instruments, General Electric and Ray-O-Vac—to make major capital commitments to produce the SX-70's complex, 260-transistor circuit, power cells, lens and flash system. But Polaroid is producing film for the SX-70 from scratch; that move will gradually sever its longstanding, and usually amicable, association with Kodak, as customers switch to the SX-70 and its less expensive successors. As a result, Polaroid stands to cash in even more on film sales, which account for half its revenues and are by far the most profitable part of the photography business. Kodak reportedly collects an 80% pretax profit on the millions of little yellow boxes of film that it sells annually.