How School Pictures Work

[Peacefield]

I'd like to approach some of my local schools about doing their yearly school portraits. Obviously, I'm mostly working with the parents on actual prints, but I'm not sure what the school expects:

What are they typically given for their yearbook pictures, print or digital? And color or B&W?

Also, is the school paid for giving me the right to be their photographer? Is it a flat fee, per student, a percentage?

Finally, who is that best first point of contact, the school board, someone in the administration, etc.?

Any insights will be appreciated. Thanks.

[MJPhotos24]

Schools are going to differ how they do it, the one school I coach at does it completely different than the one I want to try and take over. Best option would be to call the main office and find out who the yearbook coordinator is (sometimes listed on there site). They're usually teachers so getting a hold of them during the day can be difficult. Could always send a letter with your contact info saying you'd like to talk to them about the yearbook photography.

[_aravena]

If you're not an official business I wouldn't waste their time. There's a lot where you have to be approved to be allowed to take photos there (background check) and then you need to be searched up as an official business. No under the table stuff here or that spells big trouble. That's why they hire companies for the such. Unless you know someone there, they mostly work by word of mouth.

Yearbook coordinator wouldn't be of help really. There are tons of companies out there that offer more than a few prints, you'd have to be able to bring everything to the table. It's not easy. I only do personal photos for one grade but the parents still buy official portraits from Lifetouch as well as prints I take from day to day and K graduation.

[rabidcow]

Big bite, lots to chew. One school account is more than what one person can handle. Picture day coordination (speed and organization being VERY important), image sorting, portrait quality, commission for the school, background check, flyers, turn around time, a way to take and resolve complaints (there will be some no matter what), etc.... There is so much more too.

Our sales reps go to a school and pitch to the yearbook adviser and principle/vice-principle. All details regarding what you want to do must be answered, one big concern is the commission to the school, how much will they make?

I do not want to deter you, but be aware that this is a big fish to fry and not nearly as easy as it would seem. The pictures are only a small percentage of the entire pie.

[ssim]

I have done some local schools that are too small to be served by the national companies that serve the larger schools. The largest school that I did had approx 125 students and it is a demanding day. I had two assistants for that day but only one for the smaller schools. We had two setups, one for the individuals and then one for the class shot.

As _aravena stated unless you are an established business you don't stand much chance of even getting a meeting with the school. Contacting the yearbook coordinator does nothing for you as it is the school administration that decides who gets the school contract. There is of course quite a few pages in the yearbooks dedicated to candid/fun shots. This person might be able to get you to do some candid works at school production and sports events however, with so many persons having good quality digital cameras most of these are supplied via that method at no cost to the school.

Also, given that I had never worked with these schools I was required to either post a bond or cash with them to ensure that the work was up to their standards (which we all discussed clearly and, more importantly, that the job was completed within the agreed to timelines. You also have to prepared to go back for retakes which is standard.

Nothing ventured, nothing gained and if you want to take a shot at it go ahead but be prepared for some rejection.

[_aravena]

^The kind of rejection where they hang up on you or you never get a hold of who you want, for reasons as explained.

125 huh? That is a small school, gosh!

[MJPhotos24]

OK, when I said contact the yearbook advisor I meant they'd be able to give you what the photography company supplies in terms of images and not land you the job. I know at one local school they handle all of it including who shoots the student headshots (but not the athletics), it then goes to the board for approval. The advisor is a paid position, or used to be. However, at another school down the road I've been at awhile and have talked to them already about it the principal & librarian handle it all and hand it off to the superintendent to approve who in turn takes it to the board as usual. So I guess it depends on how the school is run.

BTW, those are good points about being an established business - kinda assumed the OP already was and just expanding but could be someone new that thinks it looks like easy money - and it is not. Forgot about that since I've worked in schools for years and already am established.

[jsanz11]

I do 6 schools by myself. The only thing I have is an editor is edit my class composite pictures. Other than that I get home edit all the pictures in about 2 nights. print out the proofs on the order forms by class and drop them off at the school. The smalles school I do is 612 students not including staff. If you have a good system it's pretty easy. You just gotta be committed. Also they call you back for more than just school portraits. Graduations, holy communions, plays, special events such as grandparents day, veterans day the kids take with their uncles and grandparents and such.
In my area you have to be a vendor through the school district. The principals are given a list of photo vendors they are allowed to hire. I send my porftolios to the schools and if they find me on the vendor list they call me. Now there is over 40 schools in our local district so I would believe there is over a dozen photo companies shooting for the district.
It adds up alos when you do the sports action and team portraits, class photos, cheerleading.. It's a lot of work but again if you have the right system in place and you stay committed it goes by as a breeze.
I have parents leave emails for any complains and make sure to get back to them promply. My phone rings off the hook as well and I return every call and make sure to get it right. In some cases I have to do reprints that cut in to my profits, but remember when you're shooting 600 kids in a school and depsoiting 15 thousand dollars just off yearbook portraits, it's completly worth keeping every parent happy since they will also be ordering for all the other events, sports, graduations etc from you.
-Joey

[The Fox]

I am doing most of the work for my schools yearbook(I did it when I went to school there last year), I am good friends with the yearbook coordinator, and a few of the sports coaches so I offer my services to them and they email me when they need me.

For a whole school of 1000 students, it is a nightmare. The company they hired to do it at my high school had 3 people working with 3 more people assisting them. It took them 4 days to do everyone. Much more work then you think it is unless you are just doing one sport or section with no more then 30 people. After that it is just a pain in the arse.
Nick

[jsanz11]

I always take an assistant to help. But most schools have parent volunteers show up to also help. And I don't mind free help :P
But yes I do split the photos into seperate days. As far as editing & processing the order forms I promise to have them back to them within 2 weeks but usualy have them back to the school within the week. So when I say two weeks and they get them early it's a little impressive looking to them.

[MJPhotos24]

I'll stick by my comment that it depends on how the school works. The whole "more then 30 people" comment seems odd since I shoot hundreds of portraits a summer usually ranging in the 20-60 a day in pro baseball on top of action shots and over 200/day in youth sports with action shots as well and it's never been a PITA. Is it time consuming yes, but a PITA, no. If it's 100 or below those are usually done within 24 hours, 200 is 48 hours. For pro ball I have to have them all cropped/edited and uploaded to clients that night (4 clients with different needs usually)...youth sports is prints only and those are usually back within 7 days as jsanz11 said. 1000 kids I could see spreading it out, I remember our high school had two days (500-700 kids), the middle and elementary the same so thats 6 days not including the teachers which is done before the school year starts.

[jsanz11]

Reason I have to spraed out my schools is that they range from kindergarten to 8th grade. & those kinders man lemme tell ya..takes a handful of shots to get the right smile, get them to stop crying, get them to not be scared...takes a few hours just to bust through the kinders. But once you clear the kinders it's smooth sailing from 1st grade on up.
-Joey

[_aravena]

Man these numbers are small. I know elm and middle are small, watch out for high school. Mine was 2300 students. Imagine doing those...

As it was the kindergarten class at my wife's school is just over 100 and the classes get bigger as they up for the most part. I couldn't imagine be one person doing all that.

[jsanz11]

It can be done. Again I shoot 6 schools of an average of 700 kids per school. they are all shot withing the same month of september and october. over 4000 student order forms were send out mid october to different schools and grade levels.
-Joey

[convergent]

In my experience, each school does it differently. But, you will need to contact the school administration to find out. If you are starting out, I would start with smaller private schools as they are likely to be easier to handle. Talk to the headmaster or principal. From what I've seen, a lot of the schools believe they are locked into contacts a year or more in advance. Some photographers have them sign the next years contract when they shoot. So, you will likely have a long sell cycle... 9-18 months to get a shot.

As far as what's given... it again varies by school. I've seen schools that require a 50% rebate on sales, and others that require none. Again, the smaller private schools will be more favorable on this. The other "give-mes" include yearbook images, packages for teachers, class pictures, ID tags, stickers for their file folders, composites, a yearbook CD, a CD for their administration system, etc. Its going to vary by school and what they have been getting and what they want. Most schools are now color, from what I've seen.

Now all of that said, you need to know what you are doing before you jump into this. Number one, most of the school portrait business is pre-paid, so the photographer is walking away with thousands of dollars at Picture Day, and the school is at risk if they never hear from the photographer again. Some larger schools with thousands of students require bonding to protect them. So if you are not an established photographer they are unlikely to trust you. Also there is the concern of having background checks done on all your staff... but that can easily be taken care of. From a staff perspective, to do a small school of about 400 kids, I used two photographers, two assistants, and 1 or 2 staging people. Some of the schools will give you volunteers to help with some of these roles. When I received that kind of help, I paid them. In some cases you can offer them free pictures in exchange for their help.

You need to find out what yearbook company they are using and what format they need the pictures in. You can work with a company like SchoolAnnual and make some money from the deal. They give the photographer a percentage of sales as commission and they assign a coordinator and handle everything... so if you want to come in with a complete offering, I'd recommend that.

Understand that you are competing with some big companies with very established ways of doing things in this space. You can win on customer service and quality. A lot of the big companies don't have photographers that put a lot of care into working with the kids to get the best images. You don't have a lot of time ... probably a minute or less per student, but you can still be nice to them and have "fun" with it. That is one of the biggest comments I've gotten from schools I've worked for is that the teachers told me it was fun... while in the past the staff had been rude and seemed to be just going through the motions and didn't care what kind of pictures they got back.

You will need a lab that can handle you entering your orders by person and packaging them for you that way, grouping by class, etc.

You also need to figure out how to deal with a re-take day and how to make sure the right images end up in the yearbook.

There is a lot to this and if you don't know what you are doing it could be a train-wreck. But there is a lot of money to be made if you do a good job.



I'd like to approach some of my local schools about doing their yearly school portraits. Obviously, I'm mostly working with the parents on actual prints, but I'm not sure what the school expects:

What are they typically given for their yearbook pictures, print or digital? And color or B&W?

Also, is the school paid for giving me the right to be their photographer? Is it a flat fee, per student, a percentage?

Finally, who is that best first point of contact, the school board, someone in the administration, etc.?

Any insights will be appreciated. Thanks.