For the new photographers selling disks of their work for under $100*

* The $100 is just an example. I cannot tell you what a good price is, but the bulk of what I see out there is under $100.

“OMG, it’s another ‘everything on a disk for $50’ newbie!”

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard those words. So may times that I turn off my auditory receptors and don’t engage in the outraged conversation that is guaranteed to follow.

Right now, my rule is to ignore the newbie drama and do my own thing. I can’t change what’s going on out there, it doesn’t do me any good to sit around and bitch and moan about it, so why bother? I don’t need the aggravation or stress, so I decline to have “bash the newbie” conversations.

But, as a teacher and mentor, I do have the obligation to try and make some kind of dent in this kind of business practice thinking, so here goes:

It’s great. Photography is, I mean. It’s great having a cool digital camera that offers instant results. It’s great that you’re making money doing something that is just downright fun. It’s great that all of your friends and family want you to take their pictures and the response you get when you post them on Facebook is great as well.

I’m not going to knock that, you are absolutely 100% correct. It IS great. I’m not here to talk about any of the above, I’m going to talk about pricing. I don’t even care what skill level you are at, this is advice for EVERYone that makes money from photography. More specifically, it’s for anyone that sells disks of images or is thinking about doing so.

Selling images on disks is not wrong, so you’re not going to get a lecture about that. In this day and age, some clients want disks and if those clients are who you want to make happy, then you will sell them disks. It’s as simple as that.

What the issue is – is the PRICE that you sell those disks at.

Now, you may be thinking that you took 2 hours to shoot the session and then you bought some disks, so for 2 hours of your time and the cost of a disk, which is less than $1, you have just made a pretty good pile of money.

I’m going to use my own way of doing things here as an example, so it might not be quite like  you do things, but it is a REAL example.

I recently shot a very small wedding for clients that only wished to have a disk. It was a last-minute affair that was planned in less than a week and they were scrambling for a photographer. it was on a Sunday, a day that I don’t book anything, so I was free and I thought “why not?” Since this was a new way of doing things for me, I kept close track of my time and expenses involved in this event.

The time spent for this was 15 hours:

• 1 hour: phone calls & emails with bride, contract prep
• 1 hour: meeting with bride and groom to go over details and sign contract
• 1 hour: clean lenses and camera sensors, pack gear
• 2 hours: driving to and from wedding venue
• 3 hours: shooting wedding
• 5 hours: downloading images, culling down to the best 200 images, straightening, brightening, tweaking 200 images, posting several sneak peeks on Facebook, converting final images to jpg, uploading to an online gallery
• 2 hours: prepping invoices, burning disks, prepping print release forms, packaging disks and meeting with bride for pickup.

Suddenly that 3 hour wedding shoot looks a little more involved, doesn’t it?

The process for a portrait session is similarly involved, although the hours would be cut down to about 10 hours due to sessions only being 1.5 hours and no travel is involved since I shoot in my own studio that is attached to my house.

So, for me to see a photographer offering a session on disk for $35 or $50 or $75…. and then mentally dividing that by the 10 hours that I KNOW is involved with this process…I shake my head because they are making less than minimum wage.

I’m not even going to talk about all of the overhead, insurance, equipment expenses etc that go into maintaining a business that aren’t included in this, because I already know – if you’re not paying yourself what you’re worth, which is a sound business practice, you certainly aren’t considering your other business expenses. So, rather than have you tune me out to a “blah, blah blah” I’ll just focus on what you are paying yourself. For now.

So, back to the numbers. A 10 hour job, with everything on disk for $35. Seriously? You are only deeming yourself worth $3.40 an hour? (I’ve deducted $1 for the cost of the disk). Oh please, please, please start valuing yourself, your time and your work more.

The big argument I hear is that “I’m new, I’m not worth as much.” That may be true. I know that’s how I felt when I started out. But think of this – at a “real” job, you go through a training period. A time where you’re “new” and have no clue what you’re doing and everyone around you is trying to help you learn. Did your employer start you off at less than half of minimum wage because you don’t know anything? No, they didn’t. They started you off at a competitive, fair wage. Because you were worth it, learning or not. Maybe later, when you got really good, they gave you a raise, but they never undervalued your time and offered you less than you were worth.

You are your boss and what you are doing is saying “I’m not worth a fair price.”

You are also telling your clients “I am ridiculously cheap.”

Sure, your clients are happy as clams. They paid you $35 and can take the disk to a self-serve kiosk and get an 8×10 for $1.78. They’re overjoyed at how much money they just saved. They’re also thinking you’re just a little bit stupid.

And that’s where the problem starts. After awhile of thinking that you’re a little bit stupid, they begin to look around and see that there are tons of (new) photographers offering the same service at the same price. And instead of it being stupid, it becomes the norm. They EXPECT that price at every single photography studio. And suddenly I have an outraged potential client standing in my studio throwing a tantrum because I charge way more than $35 for just ONE digital file.

You are making things hard on yourself and hard on me. Suddenly, I don’t want to have anything to do with the new community of photographers in my area because all they are doing is making it hard for me to do business. Yes, I’m excellent at what I do. I’m not bragging. I’ve worked hard and attained a high degree of success. My work is award-winning and sometimes downright stellar. I can charge more. I deserve more. I also have figured in my business expenses and overhead, so when my clients hear that it’s going to cost them a minimum of $250 just to walk through my door, they’re outraged. They throw my $35 disk competitors in my face and storm out.

*sigh* It really doesn’t have to be this way.

Yes, the clients that are angry obviously do not consider the fact that I’m a higher quality photographer than the new photographers and deserve more, they just know that the $35 disk has become the standard. Because of this, even the ones that admit that I am better and worth more, think that paying 3 times more is not reasonable. Yes, this new standard has made it difficult to charge more than $100 for a disk.

So please, reconsider what you are doing and what you are charging. You’re lowering the expectations of clients across the board and making it difficult on the photographic community as a whole.