SECOND FIDDLES… AND LOST OPPORTUNITIES LEICA’S 35mm SLRS

Alegendary chapter in the story of Leica concerns the time when it was seriously considering ending production of its M series 35mm rangefinder camera line. The year was 1974 and Leica – without any Leitz family involvement in the business for the first time in nearly 70 years – was in a bit of trouble… well, OK, in quite a lot of trouble.

Sales of 35mm rangefinder cameras had been in steady decline since the late 1960s, and the two attempts that Leica had made to help attract new customers – the M5 with built-in TTL metering in 1971 and the compact CL in early 1973 – had both failed to turn things around, although for quite different reasons. The M5 remains the ugly duckling of 35mm M series flock and its bigger size – compared to the previous M3 and M4 – also turned buyers off. The CL, in comparison was not only compact, but also cute – so it actually sold pretty well, but at the expense of both M4 and M5 sales. And, as it was the product of a joint venture with Minolta – established in 1973 – Leica had to share the spoils with its Japanese partner which was building the camera at its factory in Osaka.

But the bigger issue was that the future in 35mm photography looked to be SLR-shaped, and Leica was anything but competitive in this sector with its heavy and antiquated Leicaflex SL models. Furthermore, it was becoming more and more expensive to manufacture in Germany, so Leica was being squeezed from quite a number of different directions.

Drastic situations call for drastic measures, and Leica’s management decided to do two things. One was to collaborate further with Minolta in the development of a more competitive 35mm SLR, and the second was to