Do you rent out your own gear?

snoopaloop · Dec 21, 2013

I have an idea and I am interested in seeing how other photographers feel about it.

If there was a website that allowed you to rent out your own gear and to rent gear from other photographers in your area would you do it? This would be similar to other "classified ad" type sites but would also allow users to set up and pay for the rental through the site only it would be renting to and from other photographers in your area.

Would you use a site like this? Please include why or why not.

If you did use it, what kind of gear would you rent out to others? would it be just your stands and lights or extra lenses and camera bodies too?

tirediron · Dec 21, 2013

Not a chance in hell! Completely aside from the fact that I'm pretty sure my insurance provider would drop me like a hot potato, what about the last minute call that comes in where I KNOW I'm going to need my 85 1.4 or my 400 2.8 and someone's rented it? Oh, and let's not forget that people very rarely treat rental equipment with the same respect they treat their own. Case in point: How likely are you to buy a car that's been an Avis rental car for the last five years????

robbins.photo · Dec 21, 2013

snoopaloop said:
I have an idea and I am interested in seeing how other photographers feel about it.

If there was a website that allowed you to rent out your own gear and to rent gear from other photographers in your area would you do it? This would be similar to other "classified ad" type sites but would also allow users to set up and pay for the rental through the site only it would be renting to and from other photographers in your area.

Would you use a site like this? Please include why or why not.

If you did use it, what kind of gear would you rent out to others? would it be just your stands and lights or extra lenses and camera bodies too?

Well as much as I am absolutely sure that hundreds if not thousands of folks would be lining up to rent my fabulous D5100, my answer would be absolutely not. I haven't seen the site and I don't know how they operated, but I get the impression that they probably are just like one of those craigslist deals where they have no responsibility in the transaction whatsoever, and all they do is just put you in touch with an interested party.

So, how would this work for you exactly? I mean if you don't get enough of a deposit out of the guy that you could buy a replacement, odds are good one of them is going to walk off with your lens and you'll never hear from them again. If they are willing to put up that kind of a deposit, well they could just as easily go out and buy the same lens themselves.

Tee · Dec 21, 2013

A lot of studios already allow body and lens rentals. For an individual person to do this would be a tiny niche in the market.

skieur · Dec 21, 2013

Unless you have loaned out equipment, you will not realize how irresponsible and dumb people are with equipment they have borrowed or rented.

robbins.photo · Dec 21, 2013

skieur said:
Unless you have loaned out equipment, you will not realize how irresponsible and dumb people are with equipment they have borrowed or rented.

Lol.. I've seen how dumb and irresponsible people can be with equipment they actually own.. no way I'm handing over my gear to somebody else.

manicmike · Dec 21, 2013

Um no. Just because I was taught to treat borrowed equipment better than my own, doesn't mean other people will.

kathyt · Dec 21, 2013

No way. My second shooter and I share our gear, but that's it.

Tailgunner · Dec 21, 2013

I'll pass.

snoopaloop · Dec 21, 2013

Tee said:
A lot of studios already allow body and lens rentals. For an individual person to do this would be a tiny niche in the market.

yes this is true but ideally people would rent it out for less because rental shops have much more overhead they have to pay for and make a profit on top of that. It would have to be less than the rental shops to get anyone interested in it.

Overread · Dec 21, 2013

Eh its not worth it.

Insurance is one problem - the company would have to provide insurance for the rented gear just like any other rental shop because individuals would not get insurance cover for loaning their gear out. So now the company is loaning out gear - and paying insurance which basically means they are already doing what every other rental company is doing during their running costs.

However you're also increasing the work load because now you've not only got to post a lens out but you've got to get an individual to post it out on the right day to another person. That's adding a lot of risk. An individual might post it late; they might not package it correctly; they might try and pull a fast one and claim to have posted it when its not. That will seriously dampen the companies reviews.

About the only thing you save on compared to a normal rental house is the start up costs because you don't have to purchase a whole slew of lenses; everything else is either going to be the same or worse. Furthermore the people loaning gear out won't get that much; especially if you're market plan is to undercut existing companies and also take a cut for the company itself.

Finally people just don't want to lend stuff out - you'd get a LOT of people with rebels and cheap camera gear eager to cheaply loan expensive gear; but someone who has spent thousands on their own personal camera is very unlikely to want to loan it out. They'll want to keep it to shoot themselves. So you'll get a huge number of wants coupled with a much smaller number of providers.

The average person is just not going to turn around and loan £1000 camera body or lens to a total stranger - heck if all they can afford is a £300 lens they won't even want to loan that. And you can totally forget super telephoto lenses like 300mm f2.8 and the like .

I can see the attraction - its dead cheap to setup (excluding insurance costs) since all you need is a website and method of payment acceptance. You'll also get a lot of people wanting high end gear ready to rent it on the cheap.
You just won't get many if any actually willing to trust their top end gear to strangers.

Studios do it because the gear isn't personal, its a company asset plus its often not leaving site or if it is only for shorter periods and there are insurance policies that can cover the risk.
Rental companies do it because, again, the gear is a company asset and the whole company is geared toward loaning those assets - they are bought to be loaned.

A photographer buys their own personal gear to use and if they find they are not using it they are more likely to take a bigger profit and a simple transaction and sell it on.

slackercruster · Dec 21, 2013

OP....HELL NO!

I'm not a camera fondler by any means. But I don't let others screw with my gear. When I need it and find it fudged up what then? I don't need $ that bad.

robbins.photo · Dec 21, 2013

slackercruster said:
I'm not a camera fondler by any means.

Wow.. the mental images that engenders.. rotfl

bratkinson · Dec 23, 2013

As one who USED TO loan out my hand tools and about 20% never returned (in a couple of instances, my big brother, no less!), and hand power tools where one coworker claimed to have a Milwaukee Tool circular saw of mine stolen after he had had it for 3 MONTHS! and another who still has a reciprocating saw of mine going on 12 months!, I can state an big, unequivocal =N=O=

And as far as how 'well' people treat rental photography gear, check out some of Rogers Blogs at LensRentals.com and how he has to fully inspect and test everything that comes back in...LensRentals.com - Photo/video thoughts from the largest rental house