Portrait Photographers - Question

[CThomas817]

You've listed 13-15 hours you work on a single session for less that $750 and you provide images at that price?
Hell no! You've barley been paid for your time.
I fully agree with a studio space to account for all of the travel time.
If I shoot at a clients location I don't charge mileage, I charge by the hour of travel time. .5 hour minimum. I don't care if you live two houses down.
Stop doing anything free. If you're working, you should be charging.

P.S. Raw file are for me to see. I don't run around naked, neither do my images.

Yes, your math is about right. Studio space is so expensive by me. I have looked for even a small office in a corporate park and for 500 sq/ft I'm looking at $2k. I think I need to be making about $4k per month before I can commit to something like that.

 

[CThomas817]

Can you set up a home studio?


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

I have been going back and forth with this idea. My home is not small but also not practically laid out. When I offer indoor mini sessions I do them at home, but I have to clear out my entire living room to do so. It's not any more convenient to do this because I still have to setup and break down.

We are looking to move next spring and we plan to purchase a home with studio space.

 

[CThomas817]

... And keep your digital files to yourself. They may call again next autumn to order more prints.

Or charge appropriately for them. I will provide digital files to clients (if they insist), but they can buy a lot of prints for the cost of a single digital file.

If you're providing 3-5 prints and up to fifteen digital files, and that, along with your session fee isn't well north of $1K, you REALLY need to re-evaluate your pricing. DON'T take on jobs simply because they're there; take on jobs because they're worthwhile. If all the client wants is a bunch of crappy .jpg files on a memory stick, maybe they're not the client you should be chasing.

That said, I understand that your target market is predominately young mothers, who have grown up with the cell phone and digital imagery. You need to show them why they're wrong. When you do your consult with clients what sort of portfolio do you show them?

I am also not sure if this is just the client that I am attracting but no one wants to spend on products. The ease, availability and affordability of ordering consumer grade gallery wraps, wood prints, acrylics, etc. is cutting out the middle man. If you sell a client a high res file, they can easily order any product I offer for half the price. Perhaps lower quality, but half the price.

Perhaps I need to work on marketing to higher end clients. Any ideas?

 

[Designer]

Studio space is so expensive by me. I have looked for even a small office in a corporate park and for 500 sq/ft I'm looking at $2k. I think I need to be making about $4k per month before I can commit to something like that.

In addition to rent, you will have utilities to pay. So here's where you need to be very creative. Don't stop at the first commercial property available, but look everywhere. Network with business people and keep mentioning your need for inexpensive space. That 500 sq. ft. office is not going to be big enough, IMO.

 

[CThomas817]

I know a guy who tethers his camera to his macbook. The clients choose their images at the end of the session. He then edits the selected images. Or at least that's how I understand it. I have been to a couple of his shoots in his Detroit studio. His stuff is live and very interactive, I have no idea if that's right or wrong but his method. I even seen a lady take a flash drive from him. I heard him say something about pre-sets, I assume some are edited automatically? I was there for the strobe learning experience.

He probably used preset editing filters in lightroom. For newborns this is harder to do because clearing blotchy or flaky skin isn't a one click fix. I would consider this for older children or adults.

 

[tirediron]

...Perhaps I need to work on marketing to higher end clients. Any ideas?

One of the best sales tools I have is a four-sheet portfolio. In it there are four copies of the same print. One from the lab I use, one from Costco, one from Wal-mart, and one from London Drugs (large regional chain with decent in-house "labs"). The differences are very noticeable in terms of colour, clarity and quality of print. I explain that they can X for a digital file and purchase cheap prints from one of these labs, or they can order from me. I also keep samples of canvas gallery wraps, metal prints and large-format prints. Being able to see a big print with their own eyes helps a LOT.

As far as marketing, increase your prices. Martha Stewart often relates a story from early in her career. She was selling pies at a local market at a price slightly lower than her competitors and having no luck. She raised her prices to be significantly higher than anyone else around and they flew off the shelf. Why? Because of the perception by soooo many people that price = quality/value.

 

[JBPhotog]

The Client doesn't see the Raw files as there are so many options in a Raw file that can be tweaked in post. I render small JPEGs of the files and package them in a PDF. Some have presets applied but typically very little retouching is done prior to proofing. The client selects the ones they want and I finish them off, no point in working on a file they don't want. I may choose different ones for my use but the client doesn't pay for those.

One way to get around the issue of pre-editing, is to explain in detail to your clients that the proofs are just that, no extensive adjustments are done until they pick the ones they like. Full colour grading and adjustments are done to the finals which is time intensive and no point in doing that to all the proofs as it saves the client money. BTW, I don't work for free, any work on files to render proofs is charged out to the client, usually embedded in the estimate.

 

[smoke665]

I have looked for even a small office in a corporate park and for 500 sq/ft I'm looking at $2k

If that's per month you definitely can't afford it, unless you're doing a whole lot more gross then I think, and retail service businesses don't belong in a Corporate office park anyhow. They don't need to be in the high rent district but they need visibility. In general the rule of thumb is roughly 3-8% of your gross revenue as an allowable percentage for rent. Business that relies on high traffic counts will be more toward the high side, but that's something that you will have to analyze carefully. Case in point there's been a lot of Mall property for rent in about every city, businesses can't justify that expense. Thought you might find this online calculator interesting. Calculator Not saying it's totally right as presented, but by entering in your own numbers it will help you realize where you need to be.

The ease, availability and affordability of ordering consumer grade gallery wraps, wood prints, acrylics, etc. is cutting out the middle man.

If you want to be a photographer as a business, then you really need to operate as a business. Photography is like any other product it takes marketing and business savvy to actually make a living at it. The hardest part is convincing the customer to purchase your product/service in the first place, but once they've made that buy decision, they're in a unique position, and more easily open to suggestion to up sell and cross sell. The further away from that buy decision in time, the less likely you can generate additional sales. Expanding on Tirediron's comment above, having samples to pull out at the right time is paramount to capitalizing on that buying mode. In the above link look at how increasing the "non-assignment" income (up sales and cross sales) can affect your daily cost of business.

 

[Designer]

Perhaps I need to work on marketing to higher end clients. Any ideas?

I've always got ideas! That's what I do.

As I wrote earlier; you absolutely must provide a top-notch product. If you can't do that, then that is where you should start. Get good. Get so good that even other professional photographers and artists will say; "Wow!" when they see your work. Obviously, you never show your mediocre stuff to anyone. Assuming you are there, here are some ideas:

Advertise and network mainly in the more affluent parts of town. Create a checklist (that only you see) by which you "grade" new inquiries. For instance; they have to be a referral from one of your previous clients, and they don't flinch when they see your prices, (you can make up the rest of it). Yes, even wealthy people try to stiff the hired help, but the money you make from the ones who pay will make up for those losses.

Speaking of losses; always have a contract. Pay a lawyer to write up the "boiler plate" and you fill in the blanks.

Practice "selling" yourself with supreme confidence, especially when you talk about your prices. You can practice with a close relative, but you are going through a transformation, so this is the "new you". Always wear nice clothes, keep your studio and automobile spotless, and hire a young person to run the office. He/she needn't be full time, but they need to be present when you have a client appointment coming in. They greet the client, offer to hang the overcoat, offer a place to sit, and offer a drink.

If your studio is in your home, never let a client see/hear/smell any domestic aspect of your home. There is a door, and it is always closed. You should try to have a separate entrance. Your studio is never cluttered or frantic, but always serene and professional.

 

[jcdeboever]

I just did a session today. I rented a studio with most of the equipment (strobes) on rails. Everything is there, honey combs, snoots, barn doors, back drops, etc. I brought my own backdrops that I hand painted. It was easy and convenient. The results were worth it. Lighting is so awesome. I don't do enough of it to warrant buying all the stuff at this point. $50 for an hour for rental, which I pass on to the subject and tell them ahead of time. I upcharge it to include my time and cost of getting there and home. Not much but enough to cover my cost.

This particular session I did prints right after for the family, it's a camera store so it was seamless. I planned ahead of time for the camera stores printer profile, and bumped down the brightness of the display. I did the pre set route with Capture One from a practice session with the wife. The subject actually was seeing the edited JPEG (super fine) output image on my wife's Surface Pro, they were satisfied. I actually bumped a couple of images for the ladies, skin smoothing and lipstick saturation. It all went quickly, I had taken 20 images in about 30 minutes that were all keepers. Actually, 20 for 22. We printed 10 images, they received the remaining 10 images on Google drive, full resolution. All ten were 16x20. $65 ea print. +$225 single mat print, + $25 double mat. My breakdown.

Studio $75
Session $250
Consult edit $150 (flat charge, includes first consult and 10 edit after studio.
Print setup $75
Print ea 16 x 20 $65
Mat, frame, ea. $185

$3050.00

Invoice total less tax and delivery charge

 

[Derrel]

I re-read each reply in this post, and it seems that there are 10+ things the OP could do differently to cut down on set-up/teardown, shooting, and processing time,and to boost profits in multiple ways. There seems to be a nugget of wisdom in many of the replies...but some of the nuggets are well-hidden...

 

[Designer]

I rented a studio ..

New mommies might not want to or even feel like taking baby out somewhere, especially in the winter. And if she has other children at home, she would have to find a sitter or take them as well. I understand photos in the home, but there is a need to make it easier.

 

[Derrel]

A lot of modern-era baby photography is "taught" by YouTube videos, and Bloggers, who pass along a the current (me-too?) approach based upon a hot room,a sleeping newborn, and a set ofcookie-cutter poses, like the "Froggy", which... it's a very slow, labor-intensive approach, one that simply did not used to exist. The rub is...now, with instant Cell Phone snaps, "photos" are different than they used to be, and so is the business...

 

[diehardhoo]

I agree!! If you undervalue your own work, why would someone volunteer to pay more? You're creating an experience for your client. Price yourself accordingly. One of the things I have found very helpful is to ask my clients what they intend to do with the digital images, then educate them. Some will say they want to be able to print them later, and then I show them the difference between the print quality I provide with what they will receive from their local drugstore/Walmart, etc. With a side-by-side comparison, I have never had a client decide they'd rather have the latter. Educating them about archival quality images helps as well. You're the expert! Teach them what they need. Then you have the clients who want the digital file for social media. I get it. You get it. Social media is communication. It's how they share their experience with your NEXT client. Easy solution. Upsell a personalized app. They contain a set number of images that are web quality and contain your mark. There are a number of companies that provide this custom app service. Cheap for you, preserve your files and your potential future profits.