Event Photography question

I have noticed some people like to try and book photographers to do portraits at a events without charging them for their time. They just want you to sell prints. My experience at these where I was charged for my time only about 10 people bought prints and they bought the least expensive prints. So is it really worth it to do this? Have any of you had any luck with it?

sarahashleyphotos wrote in post #15640170
I have noticed some people like to try and book photographers to do portraits at a events without charging them for their time. They just want you to sell prints. My experience at these where I was charged for my time only about 10 people bought prints and they bought the least expensive prints. So is it really worth it to do this? Have any of you had any luck with it?

I have a tentative event later this year for a photo booth type of setup for kids and optional prints for sale. My only source of revenue is the prints. I have no contract, only an informal agreement that I attend.

My take on it is - if the event has poor sales, I probably will leave early and not show the next day. I honestly don't expect to make much money though, I was more doing it for fun, assuming I'm available for the event date.

I have tried to stay away from these events because you run a huge risk of not covering your time and costs if no one buys. That said I actually just did a week long shoot for prints for a kids gym. Now this was not an event per-say, rather 27 classes of gymnasts in total about 700 kids.

They couldn't guarantee me anything, only that in the past a good number of people had purchased photos. I crunched my numbers and felt my worst case breakeven was below what I expected to shoot, and my expected profit would be above my base rate, so for the first time I did a prints only shoot.

End of the week, my sales were almost directly in line with my projections, and I ended up making my normal hourly rate and profit. On top of that I got another large shoot out of the event for another club.

I guess my point is, you can make money on these, however you need to do some research and determine what the potential revenue opportunity. (high side, low side, expected), then factor in you time and effort as well as costs and see if you believe that you can profit from the shoot. Without any information on past years sales, I would have passed at this one without a second thought, but now I am glad I didn't.

I do a few events a year, not many...but I charge $200 for a 3 hr event, plus print sales. The $200 basically covers the paper and ink that I would buy for the event so if there a few sales, at least my expenses are covered. I also advertise and offer an event portrait special to try to gain contacts.

Can it work? yes.
Is there a norm? Nope. Every event will vary.
What price structure works best? you'll need to judge the crowd that you anticipate showing up

one thing to keep in mind - theme parks have banked on a model like this for years. Take your picture to 'capture the moment', then sell you the print on site. IMO, the key is to make buying the print a now-or-never type of decision where people feel enticed to buy now. That means on-site printing. If you let people walk away without buying anything, especially if you give them an online proof (even watermarked), sales will likely be much much lower.

sarahashleyphotos wrote in post #15640170
I have noticed some people like to try and book photographers to do portraits at a events without charging them for their time. They just want you to sell prints. My experience at these where I was charged for my time only about 10 people bought prints and they bought the least expensive prints. So is it really worth it to do this? Have any of you had any luck with it?

I would never shoot on speculation. Actually in 30 years never have.

It's almost never worth your time and energy to do spec work (speculation). With that said, I do spec work about once a year for an event that I have personal interest in.