Walmart printers verses a professional lab and the case of a price conscious client

[Elisha Frey]

Hello all. My question is- Once I give my clients their photos on a disk, how do I persuade/encourage/convince them to print them at a decent lab rather than a Walmart or someplace worse. I want to write something up and include it on the disc. Thank you in advance for any help or suggestions.
Elisha Frey

[OsmosisStudios]

Write it into your contract. Specify a particular lab or machine type, and say that all others are in violation. Impose a penalty for violations.

[Izzy]

Just write the release for anywhere but Walmart. They have to show it most times when they print anyway. They even ask me for a release when I am printing my own stuff

[Rentham]

The only surefire ways are to stop giving DVDs with print licenses, or graduate to better clients that understand the difference between value and cost.

[faeriegodess612]

Originally Posted by Rentham

The only surefire ways are to stop giving DVDs with print licenses, or graduate to better clients that understand the difference between value and cost.

+1........

[Izzy]

Originally Posted by Rentham

The only surefire ways are to stop giving DVDs with print licenses, or graduate to better clients that understand the difference between value and cost.

+1 I could not have said it better - and I didn't

[High_Speed]

I don't know where you guys/gals are, but my local wal-mart would probably print anything for anyone. I doubt they know what a "print license" is around here. LoL

What about this? Take a good "sample" photo and have 50 small prints (say wallet or 4x6?) printed at a professional "lab" and then 50 of the exact same prints done at wal-mart. Don't do anything different to what you submit to the lab vs wal-mart so they are identical (ie the only difference is the paper and print jobs). Then when you package each disc, give an example of each with them to SHOW the difference.

Also include a document explaining the differences, and how in order to get quality prints that look and last as good as they were intended, then "cheap labs" like wal-mart and local drug stores, etc won't cut it.

You actually wouldn't even have to give each client two prints for comparison. You could do a larger (say 8x10) from each (again, same photo, same processing, etc) and just show them those when you meet with them to explain what to expect. That way you could just recycle your "comparisons."

Oh, you could also do this. Have a cheap print done and a quality one, and leave it in "harsh" conditions for a long time. I dunno, like sunlight or under a lamp. See if the cheap prints fade/discolor faster in comparison. That would be yet another pair of comparisons you could show.


PS: Check this out: http://blog.stantonphotostudios.com/?p=266

[Rentham]

Originally Posted by High_Speed

Oh, you could also do this. Have a cheap print done and a quality one, and leave it in "harsh" conditions for a long time. I dunno, like sunlight or under a lamp. See if the cheap prints fade/discolor faster in comparison. That would be yet another pair of comparisons you could show.

This is what I do, albeit without stacking the deck. I have an 8x10 black and white of my daughter that I took maybe 2 years ago and had printed at Walmart or some comparable drug store. We put it in a little frame and hung it. It didn't get any direct sunlight. Later I had it printed at a lab on true black and white paper.

During client consults I let them handle both prints. The Walmart print has a green cast that pervades the entire image. You can already see where it is fading and the paper has a natural tendency to want to curl.

The thing that resonates with the clients most, it seems, is the fact that the Walmart print is already starting to degrade after just 2 years. What are your wedding prints going to look like in 20 years?