Did Smugmug hold prices?

I was going through lots of reviews about Smugmug and noticed that they raised prices early this year. Did they maintain the rates on existing customers?

I dont want to get addicted to something that could get into a habit of asking for a 33% raise every year!!

kram wrote:
I was going through lots of reviews about Smugmug and noticed that they raised prices early this year. Did they maintain the rates on existing customers?

I dont want to get addicted to something that could get into a habit of asking for a 33% raise every year!!

I dumped smugmug after a year during which sales did not exceed expendature on the site. Somebody used my coupon code to get a site but apparently that $10 vanished in the system somewhere! I certainly didn't see it.

Personally, I believe that with the internet, minimal expendature is the order of the day. One day I'll get around to refurbishing my sagephotoworld site. Whether I'll turn it into a site devoted to selling camera gear or into a site devoted to selling photo books/calenders or just have it as a photo exhibition site remains to be seen. But... I don't feel that smugmug offers value for money. It's better to host the photos yourself, set up a paypal account and have people order the images from you then send the order to somebody like costco. That way, you are in control!

Rhys, I am not in the league to expect my pics to be sold at this point I will most probably take a basic or the intermediate membership level. Maybe once I have a reasonable portfolio, the way forward would be to look at my own site.

Anybody who renewed their membership in the last few months?

I checked out Smugmug in December, and their prices at that time were $99.99. When I got around to signing up in March, the price had risen to $149.99. With little advertising, I've managed to recoup half this cost. If that doesn't improve at the one year mark and if they don't increase the products they offer, I may switch to Shutterfly. I like the customer service Smugmug offers, but their product offerings aren't quite what I want.

Wow, nobody that renewed with Smugmug after their prices were raised??

I renewed in March of this year. The price for the basic account did not change for existing customers. I don't know about the other account levels, but I imagine they renewed at the old prices as well.

It's not time for me to renew yet, but I think accounts are grandfathered in at the old prices.

From comments I've read on their support site, current customers stayed at their origianl rates. Too bad I didn't sign up earlier...oh well, 1/3 of the way to recouping the cost already.

Well, having tried Flickr, fotopic (which was my favourite till they introduced storage limits), pbase, photobucket, dotphoto, shutterfly etc etc, the tossup for me is between pbase and smugmug.

I will probably go with smugmug just because of the really low storage offered by pbase.

And its good to see they grandfather prices.......

I've been happy with Pbase so will stick with them