Albums - how to sell so many choices ?

Hi guys, my questions is this.

When you are selling album choices, how the heck do you offer all of the choices that are available ?, or is it a simple case that you don't ?, do you offer a very limited set of options and that's it ? or what.

Looking through the various album manufacturers options .. they have sooo many choices.
I mean, square, portrait, landscape, and then there's the various covers, and different papers that they can offer, and they all come in 30 different sizes. e.g Graphistudio's pricelist.

Not to mention the options of parent books, and coffee table albums, hardback or paperback, with or without the 2010 calendar ?, or the guest books, and the bridesmaid books .. God ! it goes on forever.

So just trying to find out how you all go about selling such a vast range of options.

I offer two styles of albums from one manufacturer (Queensberry), and I offer each style in two sizes. Working with one manufacturer means I get to know how they work, I get volume discounts, and they work harder to keep my business. I also offer parents albums - the choice there is take it or leave it.

Thanks Tim, so basically you only offer those options, nothing more, nothing less ?.

That'll keep it simple, I guess, but don't you limit your market then, i.e. people might go elsewhere if your options aren't even close to what they're looking for ? either in size or style ?.

Jim..

Queensberry are one of the best album manufacturers in the world, if people don't like them they're probably not the type of customer I want. I can also do books but I don't any more, as they won't last near as long as a QB album.

In practice people only buy what you show, so unless you have samples from all these manufacturers people won't buy them. For a couple of years my only large sample album was a 14x10" matted album, with a small 8x6" magazine style album. 90% of people bought the matted album. I later added an 18x12" cherry red leather bound album, now 70% of people choose to that album style, even though I charge more for them.

Dealing with multiple album manufacturers would involve more work, more learning, and more hassle for you, and would make you very low volume for all of them and therefore not really important to them. Make your life easier, choose one or two manufacturers and have samples of their range with your photos.

i offer all sizes of Graphi, and all covers as well, but i try and lead the couple towards the Crystal Glance, its such an amazing cover!

Robert, so do you carry samples of all this ? or just a sample of 3 or 4 covers, and then one or two different sizes of albums or what ??

I'm trying to get an idea of how you guys actually demonstrate the different sizes, and covers options etc .. it was graphi that I was thinking of going with, but to be honest I've heard so many bad things about their customer service, but that aside, I'm really struggling as to how you show, or give the client the idea of all their options ... without it all getting too messy, and losing them .. God after trawling through the graphi album, I've got a sore head with all the options and variations that are possible. Know, I appreciate nobody is gonna have ALL the options, so gimme an idea how many you present to them .....
Thanks

I have one matted album, and one magazine style, in different sizes. I tell people both styles are available in either size. For covers I have the Queensberry swatch book, as well as a couple of smaller samples.

we have a couple of sizes, but only 2 covers, the rest we just describe to the couple..

i have no complaints about Graphi, they take my order over e-mail, but they're working on a new online ordering system. my last book was a 50 side photo paper with 8 sides of metallic (x2) and 16 10x13 books, it took approx 3 weeks to arrive from when i submitted my PDF file

I'm just starting to get into albums as well. I went to WPPI this year and searched the whole convention floor for a vendor (20+ album companies) who reflected my style and the quality of album I wanted my clients to have. It is up to you what you think your clients will want to buy.

Important things for me was a layflat album, no page gaps in the middle, and custom photo cover. I found Vision Art and love them because of all the reasons I stated. They do offer leather albums, but I will probably add a 2nd vendor exclusively for leather cover options. Do not offer your clients to kitchen sink when it comes to albums. Make choices for them and offer what you like and what you think they like. If you think they like leather, options, a certain paper etc. choose that.

I ordered 2 wedding albums in different sizes (square and horizontal) and one engagement album sample from them and my clients seem to love it.