New to this site, and photography looking for some C&C :)

[Kerbouchard]

Oh, one last thing. I think I've made myself clear about how I view your business, and I don't want to beat a dead horse, so hopefully, you can take this post in the same spirit you took the others.

From a long term perspective, you are hosing yourself. You have 6-8 sessions a weekend on word of mouth...that is good marketing. Heck, there are a lot of professional photographers that don't have 6-8 shoots per week. The problem comes in what you are marketing. You are marketing $40 shoots. This lowers the expected price for your area and makes it a bit tough if, or when, you decide to raise your prices. Those same word of mouth referrals will expect that same deal. You will run yourself ragged for about 16K a year.

There are only two reasons why photo businesses fail:
1. They don't get enough clients.
2. They get so many clients for too little money and get burned out.

The problem is, when #2 realizes what they are doing and decides to raise their prices so that they can pay their bills, they often turn into #1. You don't want to be branded as that $40 photographer. It may get you 8 gigs a weekend, but it will hurt your ability to become anything more than that.

Just my .02.