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PACA AND INIMAGO
November 16, 1997
On November 2nd the International Image Agents Organization (INIMAGO) was formed in New
York. There were 346 individuals from 195 agencies worldwide in attendance.
The mission of the organization is to encourage throughout the world, the use of
images, the protection of copyright, and the harmonization of standards and ethical
business practices.
An informal survey was conducted and 104 of the 195 companies responded to the survey.
Eighty-nine percent of the respondents stated their 1997 sales are currently better
than 1996. Fifty-three percent already have a web site and 27% had sites in the
planning stages. Forty-four percent either have now, or plan to have searchable sites.
Eighty-four percent of the respondents either have or represent a print catalog. An
interesting figure that came out of a private meeting with Eric Bach of Superbild in
Germany is that he estimated that there are more than 450 print catalogs available in
the German market. If we assume an average of 2,000 images per catalog (and some of
then now days are up to 4,000 and 5,000 images) that would be around 900,000 catalog
images available to art directors.
One surprising response was that 67% of the agencies reporting said they either have or
represent a CD-ROM catalog. We suspect that many who responded YES participate on a
joint CD-ROM disc like the Stock Workbook Disc, and have not independently produced, or
represent the disc of another agency.
On the Royalty Free issue the question asked was, "Is it likely that your company will
market some form of royalty free product within the next three years?" The answers
were 13 True, 43 False and 35 Maybe.