Wholesale Equipment - My Own Camera Store

[jclswv519]

I've given it some serious thought and would LOVE to open my own camera store/photo printing service/studio. I'm looking and cannot find any way whatsoever to get equipment to resell in a shop for any profit and still set a price that people would actually pay. Does anyone know any secrets that I don't?

 

[Derrel]

Marry a multi-millionaire, and be very endearing....that is a time-honored method...

 

[2WheelPhoto]

Marry a multi-millionaire, and be very endearing....that is a time-honored method...

+1

Might I add do it as a hobby and expect it to be a no profit money pit.

There's a reason why Ritz storefronts and bestbuy are tasting bankrupt and Adorama, Amazon and BHPHOTO thrive =)

 

[SCraig]

It's a Catch 22 situation. You'll never make any money at it until you grow as big as B&H and Adorama, but you can't grow until you start making money.

We have one full-time camera store left in Nashville. There may be a couple of Wolf Camera stores left open, and of course there is BestBuy, Walmart, and Paul C. Buff, but we have exactly one full-time full-range sell-nothing-but-camera-gear store left. They used to have about 6 stores here but over the years have consolidated back to just one. They do a pretty good business but even so I have to wonder how much longer they can last.

 

[Aloicious]

I don't deal with camera equipment, but I do deal with automotive stuff as a retailer...generally you need to get setup with the manufactuer or a distributor to get the product. most of the time you'll have minimum purchase levels that you need to meet, and an ongoing amount of sales to maintain your status as a 'reseller' or 'retailer' (something like a $20-50k+ buy in per manufacturer and likely something like $20k in yearly sales would be a guess at the figures you'd be looking at, though the camera equipment market is likely different than what I'm used to)...

your best bet is to contact the manufacturers directly and talk to them about your plans, and inquire about how they are setup with retailers, if you can get into industry conventions, that is usually a good place to make face to face contacts. Ideally you'll already have a business setup (i.e. tax ID, DBA, business address, etc) possibly even a physical storefront (and web too), sometimes manufacturers won't take you seriously and may not even respond to you unless you have some kind of established buisiness. it kindof depends on what amount of funding and income you already have as to how you progress, if you're just getting started without alot of startup capital at your expense, you may want to start a small business that will allow for expansion into a retailer area (say start a studio, or printing service first, get established and profitable, which likely will take a while, then build into the retail sales aspect), which will take ALOT of planning and foresight. start by researching and writing a business plan, what you want to accomplish, how plan to get there, goals, etc...

photo retail is likely a very hard field to get into and maintain profitability in, you'll be competing with huge operations like BHphoto and adorama, Ritz, best buy, and many others...It'll be VERY hard but not impossible, and profit from the business may not be seen for years, even if you're doing it right. I don't want to discourage you if this is really something you're looking at, but keep your short term expectations realistic and keep building what you want it to be....if you're not already well versed in business, you'd probably benefit greatly from taking some courses in business management, marketing, accounting, etc...there's far more BUSINESS than PHOTOGRAPHY in the photography business...if that makes sense.

 

[jclswv519]

All very helpful tips! I was operating on the mentality there would be a wholesaler online I could purchase from. I do have most of a business management degree completed, so that should be a plus. I do currently have a business license for our photography business, but didn't have these ideas in mind when my wife and I filed for it.

 

[Aloicious]

research it all up, and start with a solid business plan. and try contacting the manufactuers to see how they handle wholesale to retailers. there may be an online wholesaler that you can go through but they likely have strict guidelines to qualify to be setup as a retailer with them. You'll definitely have to go through an application and approval process to prove you're a business and in the market to re-sale the equipment rather than just someone who wants to get cheap stuff, regardless of if you end up going through a distributor or straight from the manufacturer. also, try to get to some kind of photography business conference, I'm not sure of all the ones they have, but something like photokina perhaps...somewhere that the manufacturers and suppliers are at displaying their product with people that you can talk to....in the automotive industry its the SEMA and AAPEX conventions, but I'm not fully aware of all the photography ones of similar caliber.