Now studios are giving it away

I'm sure the thought is to build up clientele, but it's the wrong clientele for a boutique business that provides a custom, luxury service...and like or not, that's what a portrait photographer running his own studio is.

tkbslc wrote in post #11284880
I didn't claim to have access to their books, but $80 an hour at full booking doesn't seem like it would go very far once you have to cover rent, props, camera gear, advertising, insurance, taxes, and then still have money to take home.

Whats to say he doesn't own the equipment and the space? Or, maybe he owns the equipment and has a trade out for the space....?

Or, as stated earlier, maybe this is the way to get people in. Offer a really good product for a price that no one can turn down. Create a database of hundreds of people. Raise prices later but offer 'customer loyalty' discounts to people in your database.

If they do a really good job and next year the prices are just a little higher.....most people will use them again. But, by then, they will have a lot more clients.

It sounds to me like this person is just employing the walmart approach....less profit per client.....but a lot more clients. If the studio is open 8 hours a day it is making $632 a day, assuming they can only shoot one family per hour (which seems like a long time for a family portrait). If they cut that time to 30 minutes, then he can double his gross to $1264 a day. I don't shoot portraits but every time we have had them done it never took an hour to shoot. It was always like 30 minutes.

Look at it like this...at this price, he even got YOU to come in....that's genius!

There's money in this method if you're a straight to CD shooter but that leaves a lot on the table. A recent senior of mine added more than his fee in extra prints for just three images...and I even heavily discount reprints (leaving dough on the table too).

I don't see why anyone would go the volume route. That's too much hustle, IMHO.

well if he does 6 a day, 5 days a week its $2,370 a week..thats $123,240 a year before taxes if they work every week (52 weeks in a year)...and he still has weekends off to do weddings if he/she chooses...maybe its not sustainable...or maybe it is..yep its a lot of work..but it averages out to $59/hr for a 40 hour work week..and since its done in studio (and if they know what they are doing) the pp'ing should be almost non-exsistent..just saying

Or maybe the guy recently came into some money, has everything paid off... Home, car, equipt etc. and just wants to get people in the door to get word of mouth advertizing for bigger stuff.

cdifoto wrote in post #11287008
There's money in this method if you're a straight to CD shooter but that leaves a lot on the table. A recent senior of mine added more than his fee in extra prints for just three images...and I even heavily discount reprints (leaving dough on the table too).

I don't see why anyone would go the volume route. That's too much hustle, IMHO.

It's not just too much hustle, it just isn't sustainable for that kind of business. Heck, not even Walmart can always keep such a photographic business running profitably.

Gaarryy wrote in post #11287048
Or maybe the guy recently came into some money, has everything paid off... Home, car, equipt etc. and just wants to get people in the door to get word of mouth advertizing for bigger stuff.

If that's the case, then as cdifoto mentioned in another thread, why is he hustling after Walmart traffic when he would have the financial leeway to court the the Rolex traffic?

RDKirk wrote in post #11287049
It's not just too much hustle, it just isn't sustainable for that kind of business. Heck, not even Walmart can always keep such a photographic business running profitably.

I think it ultimately depends where you are and if the volume is consistent. Most of the time it's not, so you're right. But if by some miracle you're in an area where cost of living is lower and the doors are continuously rotating, you could do fine.

Either way I wouldn't do it. I like downtime. Lunch breaks, sleep, etc. I also hate monotony.

You also have to take into account that just because you need XX amount of money to live doesn't mean the next guy does as well. I have a very good friend that owns a tattoo shop and I would fall out of my chair if he were to tell me he made more than 30k a year, in fact that's probably the high end.. he is absolutely fine with it, he doesn't live beyond his means, is happy with simple things, never complains, and always seems to have money to buy a round or three when we go out to the bar.. who's to say this guy isn't the same?