Portrait session: is my approach for charging reasonable?

[canoflan]

Here is the scenario:

Asked by a friend from our former church to take pictures of his family's eldest lady in the family at her 90th birthday with her whole family. It is a small family reunion of sorts.

They are willing to pay for the entire process: time, cost, prints, cd's, etc.... But no discussion of money has taken place yet.

My experience is I have only taken pictures for money one other time. They are aware of this and just grateful someone is willing to take a picture and coordinate it a bit. They have seen the work I did for their church and know I can work a camera and handle photojournalism. I think I can handle portraits as well and have been practicing on my own family with flash techniques and posing. I know the equipment and time it takes to get a job done.

I will be taking approx. 18 different poses (2 for each grouping of the whole family), all are various arrangements of the various family members (i.e. all brothers, all sisters, grandchildren only, generational, whole famly, smaller nuclear families, etc...).

I have met with the family before hand and they know I am organized and I have done everything I said I would regarding making phone calls and coordinating with their schedule. They have been a pleasure to deal with.

Deliverables are: 1-8x10 of entire family, and 4x6's for each of the 18 poses, therefore 19 prints in all to begin with and about 6 cds with a slideshow (they aren't expecting fancy so I can easily impress them) and the processed high-quality jpegs (in color and B&W) copyrighted sent to various family members (they will do the sending, not me so no postage). FYI - I anticipate taking 2 poses for each grouping, therefore about 20 pictures in all.

I initially offered to do this all for nothing since they are church friends and I see it as an opportunity to get my foot in the door with them and all their other church friends and also help them out at other events (i.e. Christmas).

They insisted on paying me; so here is my deal. I will let them see the pictures first (ensuring they are satisfied) and tell them $50 for the whole package. They will probably insist on paying more; so I will tell them that my costs are around well over $400 for this type of service considering the costs for time, materials, expertise, and delivery. I will then quickly tell them that I wouldn't think of asking that from friends due to my limited experience; therefore, they will probably settle on something over $50 and under $400. I will provide them more business cards for them to share with their friends; I will ask them if there is anything else I can help them with; and lastly, ask permission to use their photos for building a portfolio of portrait work.

If the Lord chooses, I could end up with this beginning a small side business of taking various portraits here and there for a little extra money.

As I build a client base, I can begin to develop a pricing scheme and be a bit more structured and charge more after building a reasonable portfolio of professional looking work.

Thoughts?
Thanks for any input,
Pat

[ssim]

I will let them see the pictures first (ensuring they are satisfied) and tell them $50 for the whole package. They will probably insist on paying more; so I will tell them that my costs are around well over $400 for this type of service considering the costs for time, materials, expertise, and delivery. I will then quickly tell them that I wouldn't think of asking that from friends due to my limited experience; therefore, they will probably settle on something over $50 and under $400.

I don't like the approach of this. If you feel your work is worth 400.00 then charge that. Your hard costs in this is less than 50.00. What if they actually ask you to break that 400.00 down, are you able to do that. The part that offends me is that it is almost like you are trying to shame them into paying more than 50.00. I get the feeling here that you want more but aren't willing to actually ask for it. Providing photo services should not be a negotiation after the service has been provided, imo.

If you are confident of your abilities that you can deliver on the product then you set a price and charge it. It doesn't matter whether you have done this once or a hundred times, what matters is the product that you deliver.

If you are intent on getting known by word of mouth do you really want to be known as one that will negotiate his price down.

[canoflan]

ssim,

I think you have a point. Perhaps I should simply tell them $150 and that is that. I am sure they will pay that much and if they offer more, I will tell them thanks but the price is still $150. By the way, I can break down the $400 easy.

Thanks again ssim,
Pat

[dfoo]

So you'll be happy to do similar work for $150 in the future then?

[AussiePup]

ssim,

I think you have a point. Perhaps I should simply tell them $150 and that is that. I am sure they will pay that much and if they offer more, I will tell them thanks but the price is still $150. By the way, I can break down the $400 easy.

Thanks again ssim,
Pat

I would do this, we do it a lot with our billing to new clients or friends and family(non-photography business btw). On their invoice I show them the actual price it should have cost if I was to charge someone off of the street and then I show a "new client" or "courtesy discount" (in your case of $250 - I typically give no more that a 50% write off , but that is me) that I subtract from the normal price to get to the price I want to charge them. That way if you are referred to someone else they dont make the statement, "he did a great job, and he only charged $150". You need to let them know why they are charged what they are being charged.

If they offer to pay more take it - they are then paying you on the precieved value of the product and services they received - it is called value billing.

[canoflan]

dfoo and AussiePup,

I think somewhere in the middle will work. I believe that if I love the work and do a good job, the money will come; so future billings are not a concern for each job will need to stand on its own. Perhaps reducing the $400 regular billing to $250 and show a reduction to $150 on the invoice would a good compromise. That makes sense.

If I begin to have more than one session every couple months (like once a month), I will have a better idea as to pricing up front as I get my feet wet. I do know that sticker shocking the client (especially a friend) after the shoot when all the work is done would be the wrong approach and a guarantee for them to not think of me in the future, nor as a referral.

Thanks for all the help everyone.

[AussiePup]

I think somewhere in the middle will work. I believe that if I love the work and do a good job, the money will come; so future billings are not a concern for each job will need to stand on its own. Perhaps reducing the $400 regular billing to $250 and show a reduction to $150 on the invoice would a good compromise. That makes sense.

That makes sense and seems fair, for the amount of work you are doing...works out to about $40-60 an hour depending on the amount of PP involved.


If I begin to have more than one session every couple months (like once a month), I will have a better idea as to pricing up front as I get my feet wet. I do know that sticker shocking the client (especially a friend) after the shoot when all the work is done would be the wrong approach and a guarantee for them to not think of me in the future, nor as a referral.


Thats why it is important you discuss price before.

In my line of business (CPA) we always get an "engagement letter" before we begin a job. It spells out exactly the type of work we are going to do, our responsibilities, the clients responsibilities, our fees, when we expect to get paid, and when the engagement ends. We avoid getting to legal, but I would imagine that you should also include something about copywriites and use of photos, etc.

I know you are thinking...."this is only suposed to be for fun and I dont want to get this serious" but as the saying goes "an ounce of prevention..."

Most people have a hard time placing a value on there services and most undervalue themselves (well except attorneys ;)). As you grow, you want the clients that value you, and the products and services you provide, the clients that don't just take your time away from the clients that do.

It makes working a lot more enjoyable, trust me.:D

[canoflan]

You know what, I will share with you an experience with a former potential client that asked if I could come and take some pictures of their Christmas party for about 4 hours; candids, photojournalism and a few portraits.

I laid it all out up front: price, deliverable options, $/hour, etc.... I had covered everything and basically said that the total price would be between $300-$400, but that the final details would determine final price.

I never got a call back. Perhaps it wasn't meant at that time for me to provide a service for that person and I think they thought what I did for the church was simple and effortless (heck anyone can take a picture right?). Additionally, I may have scared him off since I really didn't get on the phone and talk about what they exactly needed and ask him what he thinks he can afford to pay for the service, etc.... I just laid it out there. Well, I know I may be taking it a bit easy on this, but the Lord has brought these people my way and He will provide the money as necessary. I cannot begin to charge what established photographers can, especially when I don't have a portfolio of work to share a potential client; nor a website; nor anything, but a willingness to try.

We'll see what happens and thanks to all for the advice. I will let you know what happens. The event is this weekend and I have a small wedding reception to shoot next month, so plenty of practice to work out this price thing.

Pat