So I was recently sent by my one of my publishers to shoot a portrait for a financial services client. The executive wished to run an ad in the next issue and wanted a new head shot. Normally we send one of my peers to shoot these, but at the client’s and ad sales manager’s request I was asked to make the visit. Now you may ask why I do not shoot all of these. Well it is because of my brand. Whether it is a single portrait, a four page spread or a cover, unless the available light is just spot on gorgeous (which is more rare than seeing a circle rainbow, which I have…it rocked!) I have to use lights. I was originally a speedlight photographer and in a pinch I will still use them, but for the majority of my work I use Profoto studio lights. I don’t care whether it is an office, home, park or a beach. On location studio lighting however is not an efficient way to shoot. So if the magazine needs to do many of these shoots in a short period of time, I am not the right guy for the job. Some will then ask, so why drag out your studio lights? Isn’t that overkill and who will notice the difference anyway? Well, the type of clients I am trying to attract to my business will definitely notice.
When someone sees one of my photos they do not know what equipment I used, how much time I had or how much I was paid. All they know is that it was shot by me. What if someone was in a meeting with Anna Wintour and said hey let’s give this guy I have heard about a shot… David ‘Art’. She says okay, Googles my work and it’s a group of images I rushed, shot with poor light and then slapped my name on it. YIKES! Additionally as a photographer I have tremendous competition on the low end of the market. National photo chains are courting small and medium sized businesses with low prices and fast turnaround
. They are basically saying to my prospects, you are a sucker to pay more than 70 bucks for a photo. Come down to your local mall and in 30 minutes you will have the exact same thing. Well if you intend to shoot that client against a white wall, light him or her with the flash sitting on top of your camera, whip out your laptop and had over a CD of unedited pics then the national photo chains are right.
I believe there are only three categories in business, the best (Mercedes, Four Seasons, French Laundry, iPad), the cheapest (McDonald’s, Honda Civic, Levi) and everyone else. Most photographers compete with the cheapest thinking they are easy targets. But the cheapest tend to be just as focused and organized as the best. It’s just that the cheapest operate on volume to reduce their cost of doing business. So when the independent photographer takes on the cheapest they do not have the customer volume and therefore have higher costs resulting in lower revenue for the same work. This is a bad situation but is far better than being in the middle. The photographers in the middle of the market are not the best or the cheapest and are therefore at the whim of the market. These businesses are constantly changing their prices, negotiating every deal and trying to carve out a niche to justify their existence. No fun at all.
So for these reasons I strive to be the best in my market by not only charging more but more importantly giving the client more. Sears is the preferred vendor of my client’s corporate office. But for $65 you will get a photo but you will not get love. In addition to a flatly lit, low contrast, low detail image, the photos often have a few flaws that the best would not allow:
- Hair not perfected,
- Since they do not offer a makeup artist, shadowing and fatigue under the eyes goes unfixed,
- Skin discoloration from rashes or shaving is not adjusted,
- Clothing issues like ill fitting shirts that do not meet in a ‘V’ are unnoticed,
- Puckering
- No one even fixed his shirt, before pressing the shutter.
‘Oh you are picking on Sears by choosing a bad photo’. No my friends this is the photo Sears chose for their marketing materials to represent their ‘Business Portrait Package’. Is Sears wrong for offering this package? Absolutely not. Sears is offering the cheapest business pic and you get what you pay for. My choice is to either educate Sears clients on why my work is better or seek clients who desire more than the ‘basic business portrait package’. I do both.
The majority of my business comes from either referrals where I exceeded the client’s expectations and the work of their previous vendor. Or when I shoot an individual who is a member of a group or organization and when the new portrait is seen side by side with the old ones, the difference in quality is evident and my phone rings. That is a good day.
