Always concerned

[jjjdolfan]

I'm always concerned about how to price my photography work. I work full-time as an IT manager and love photography and have done a few weddings and sweet 16s the past couple of years and charge what I think are very reasonable prices.

I recently got a request to do a back yard wedding and they wanted me there for about 4-5 hours and a High-Res dvd. So my starting price was $600 and they said that was out of their budget. When I asked what is their budget they replied $300, then they asked if I can just use their flash card and hand that over when I'm done. That's when I pulled out of the whole thing and said I'm the wrong person for them.

Now most recently I got a request to do a Family portrait for a friend of the family at their house. They want a family portrait with a black background which I have. I quoted $175 and I will provide them with 2 - 8x10s and 4 - 5x7s and a sheet of wallets. That quote was about a 2 days ago and still have not heard back from them.

Another request was for Family portraits at a local park and they wanted 200 holiday cards along with an 8x10 and I quoted $250 - never called back.

I'm in New Jersey, USA - Am I pricing myself out of work? Please let me know.

[Jim Bryant]

Originally Posted by jjjdolfan

I'm always concerned about how to price my photography work. I work full-time as an IT manager and love photography and have done a few weddings and sweet 16s the past couple of years and charge what I think are very reasonable prices.

I recently got a request to do a back yard wedding and they wanted me there for about 4-5 hours and a High-Res dvd. So my starting price was $600 and they said that was out of their budget. When I asked what is their budget they replied $300, then they asked if I can just use their flash card and hand that over when I'm done. That's when I pulled out of the whole thing and said I'm the wrong person for them.

Now most recently I got a request to do a Family portrait for a friend of the family at their house. They want a family portrait with a black background which I have. I quoted $175 and I will provide them with 2 - 8x10s and 4 - 5x7s and a sheet of wallets. That quote was about a 2 days ago and still have not heard back from them.

Another request was for Family portraits at a local park and they wanted 200 holiday cards along with an 8x10 and I quoted $250 - never called back.

I'm in New Jersey, USA - Am I pricing myself out of work? Please let me know.

I don't think so..............you are just catering to the Walmart/Kmart crowd that's the only problem I see.

While shooting a wedding brides' father kept asking why I was charging a $100.00 and hour to shoot onto top of everything else when the photos will be out of date within five years and won't mean anything any more. I asked him, who much he paid for the flowers, the catering service and booze to impress his friends? "What different does that make", he asked. I replied, "Within three hours the flowers will wilt and die, and all that food and drink your guests are consuming won't mean anything to them in about six to eight hours. The photos have lasting power.
Needless to say, he realized what I was trying to convey.

[jjjdolfan]

True Jim, Sometimes I just feel that this is a missed opportunity but don't want to under sell myself as well.

[Jim Bryant]

Originally Posted by jjjdolfan

True Jim, Sometimes I just feel that this is a missed opportunity but don't want to under sell myself as well.

I understand. I've missed a lot of opportunities since the evolution of the digital age. That's the problem with the photography market place. There's too many folks who are so hungry to make money in this business that the only way they can compete is sell their services cheaply.

[jml79]

I undersold myself. Just once, that's all it took me to realize that I would rather not do it then look back and think 'I just worked a ton on a weekend and didn't even make minimum wage'. I would honestly rather give away my service to friends than not get paid what I am worth by strangers (and really it's not that much).

Your prices are very fair, even inexpensive for what you are being asked to do. If this isn't your living then you have no need to do something for nothing.

[nickbedford]

Some people simply can't afford much and will be disappointed when you quote the real price of a decent photo shoot.

A band we played with earlier in the year contacted me, had a good chat and then suggested I might come into the studio one day of their recording period to shoot "studio moments" for them.

I then said "What's your budget?" gave them a pretty cheap offer for some web sized images. Couldn't afford it (which is understandable). I eventually said "How's about $80 and you can use whatever watermarked images I throw up on my shoots gallery since I love bands and studios anyway" to cover some of my time and fuel.

$80 is barely anything, I admit, to drive 40 mins (one way) to photograph for a couple of hours at a studio but I'm pretty sure they were just expecting me to do all this on my own Saturday for free.

Their loss.

[courtney23cy]

This link sums it up pretty well, I think. Check it out
Why are Professional Photographers so expensive?

[Jim Bryant]

Originally Posted by courtney23cy

This link sums it up pretty well, I think. Check it out
Why are Professional Photographers so expensive?

How true, even then so many clients are cheap and don't care about all those important points. To them quality doesn't matter, only the price tag.

[funcrunch]

Originally Posted by jjjdolfan

I recently got a request to do a back yard wedding and they wanted me there for about 4-5 hours and a High-Res dvd. So my starting price was $600 and they said that was out of their budget. When I asked what is their budget they replied $300, then they asked if I can just use their flash card and hand that over when I'm done. That's when I pulled out of the whole thing and said I'm the wrong person for them.
[...]
I'm in New Jersey, USA - Am I pricing myself out of work? Please let me know.

$300 for a four hour wedding with hi-res images on DVD is ridiculous in any town, for a pro photog. Even $600 is too low. And handing over your card with unedited images is almost always a bad idea. Stick to your guns.

[Murtasma]

Trust me you aren't loosing anything by not catering to people with unrealistic expectations of the true cost of hiring a real photographer. There are people out there that will happily pay the money, those are the customers you want. Let the people who think your prices are too high find a photographer on cragislist or one of those instant portrait studios in Walmart of Sears.

The people who think photography should be cheep are the same ones that will become problem customers as well. You want to avoid getting yourself into a situation where you're basically making minimum wage and have a customer who isn't satisfied with the results. Do you dedicate more time to try and make them happy? You're already loosing money on the situation. If you choose not to make them happy they could complain to their friends, family etc thus hurting your chance for referrals. Then again do you really want referrals form a person like this? Odds are their family and friends are cheep as well.

I leave it up to you but personally it's not even worth getting involved in.