High volume corporate head shot pricing?

I've been approached to do a high volume of corporate headshots. All identical setup. Approx 500 total employees at 3 different locations. I asked all the questions - licensing terms, usage, budget etc.

Basic usage is internal, LinkedIn profiles etc. no advertising usage at this point.

For those that do this regularly, do you typically charge a day rate or per person rate? This is a global Fortune 500 company.

I feel I'm being severely low balled with the initial offer (works out to just under $10/head).

On the flip side they want color corrected images only. No retouching.

How do I proceed?

I've done it a few times and just charged my day rate. Make sure you have a company-provided assistant to wrangle the people you're photographing; 10-20% will want to reschedule outside of their assigned time slot or want other special considerations. Those people will make the job much more complex unless someone else is handling them.

You're right that it's not much per head, but it's a decent rate per day. Assembly-line setup and minimal processing makes it pretty easy money. It's unlikely they want to deal with any sort of complex licensing agreement or anything like that. Headshots don't last forever anyway; they'll need updates every year or two.

Opinion: Shoot it, get three days' day rate in your pocket, export the images and hand them a flash drive or dropbox link before you leave, and give them some incentive to hire you again for an update every six months or year.

"Many of the other companies I work with like to get annual updates to their headshots. Some fast-growing companies even get updates every six months, since their staff is changing and growing so rapidly. Do you want to go ahead and schedule that? I can get you on my books right now. I'll bring the exact same setup, so you can be certain that next year's headshots are exactly consistent with this year's headshots."

Thanks so much for the thorough response and great info! I will definitely work in the assistant! Great ideas!

Thanks!

nathancarter wrote in post #18333928
I've done it a few times and just charged my day rate. Make sure you have a company-provided assistant to wrangle the people you're photographing; 10-20% will want to reschedule outside of their assigned time slot or want other special considerations. Those people will make the job much more complex unless someone else is handling them.

You're right that it's not much per head, but it's a decent rate per day. Assembly-line setup and minimal processing makes it pretty easy money. It's unlikely they want to deal with any sort of complex licensing agreement or anything like that. Headshots don't last forever anyway; they'll need updates every year or two.

Opinion: Shoot it, get three days' day rate in your pocket, export the images and hand them a flash drive or dropbox link before you leave, and give them some incentive to hire you again for an update every six months or year.

"Many of the other companies I work with like to get annual updates to their headshots. Some fast-growing companies even get updates every six months, since their staff is changing and growing so rapidly. Do you want to go ahead and schedule that? I can get you on my books right now. I'll bring the exact same setup, so you can be certain that next year's headshots are exactly consistent with this year's headshots."

A couple of things I want to repeat to the OP for emphasis.

One, is that corporate headshots need updates, usually annually. You can become their regular photographer for this work if you're fast, reasonable in price, easy to work with, and reliable. This repeat work has become a significant bit of money for me in January, when other things are slow. Yep, line them up for the next session as you finish the first.

They don't want a lot of post-processing, so, yes, set up the workflow so you can hand them the product before you leave. Get your lighting setup, exposure, et cetera, down pat. That will make them happy and make whoever hired you a hero.

And I agree on pricing it in terms of what you need for the day rather than any kind of per-person rate. That way, again, you make yourself easy to hire. It's easy to know exactly what you're going to cost them, no surprises.

Here is a good YouTube video:

https://www.youtube.co​m/watch?v=JrHvCH8imQY

I've done this a few times. I charge a flat rate 'setup fee' plus a per-person shooting fee. The setup fee encourages the companies to be organized and strategic about how they engage with you (IE: they won't make you come out to just shoot one or two people). Also, give them an idea of how many people you can fit in per timeslot (say 15 or 30 minute windows), and have them assign people to each slot. If you say you can shoot 5 people every 15 minutes, ask them to schedule 7 people per 15 minute slot. Even if there's a slight line at times, you'll get more efficiency all around.

Definitely second the suggestion to hire an assistant (or ask the company to provide one) when it comes to keeping track of who is being shot, or which frames are which people. Most companies will likely have a few 'VIPs' that they need turned around quickly (or that they want to 'cut the line'), and a lot of other employees who just want or need headshots as a nice added value. Let them determine who those people are, and assign someone to help with identifying those people on-site.

Finally, be sure to add a quick text document to any file you turn over (zip via dropbox, flash drive, etc) with the date, your name, and your contact info. That way, if there's turnover in who booked the headshots, they can at least identify you at a later date to re-book you.

I charge $1200 per day plus $250 for an assistant. I budget 1 person per minute, but 30 seconds is usually enough. The assistant signs people up, makes clothing adjustments, puts their name on a white board for the first photo, and then adds their file numbers to a spreadsheet. Use a stool, backdrop, and tripod to keep the lighting identical for all. There should be no color correction if your WB is accurate. Everyone says "no retouching" but I use an automatic skin smoothing plugin that makes everyone look better. Shoot .jpg and use LR to keep PP quick..

The money is decent, but almost nobody wants to take photos or will like their photo. This could be done as a 1 day shoot per location, plus 1 more day for stragglers.

JacobPhoto wrote in post #18334284
I've done this a few times. I charge a flat rate 'setup fee' plus a per-person shooting fee. The setup fee encourages the companies to be organized and strategic about how they engage with you (IE: they won't make you come out to just shoot one or two people). Also, give them an idea of how many people you can fit in per timeslot (say 15 or 30 minute windows), and have them assign people to each slot. If you say you can shoot 5 people every 15 minutes, ask them to schedule 7 people per 15 minute slot. Even if there's a slight line at times, you'll get more efficiency all around.

Definitely second the suggestion to hire an assistant (or ask the company to provide one) when it comes to keeping track of who is being shot, or which frames are which people. Most companies will likely have a few 'VIPs' that they need turned around quickly (or that they want to 'cut the line'), and a lot of other employees who just want or need headshots as a nice added value. Let them determine who those people are, and assign someone to help with identifying those people on-site.

Finally, be sure to add a quick text document to any file you turn over (zip via dropbox, flash drive, etc) with the date, your name, and your contact info. That way, if there's turnover in who booked the headshots, they can at least identify you at a later date to re-book you.

Good note about the VIPs.

Also good note about the setup fee. Figure out some way that works for you and your client. I don't charge a separate setup fee, but my day rate assumes that I'll have 30-45 minutes to set up and test before the first subject arrives. It's an 8-hour day with about 6 hours of actual shooting time. If I'm delivering files before I leave, it's an 8 hour day with about 5 hours of actual shooting.

I'm happy to charge my half-day rate to shoot just one or two people

Lots of great info! Thanks again!