Bella Sold

<p>Ok - I had to post this - </p>

<p>Bella has been sold (or is in the process of being sold) to CPI Studios - the same folks who run Sears Portrait Studios; Picture Me Studios and Kiddie Candids.... and - I believe the studios at Wal Mart - </p>

<p>Bella photographers received an e-mail yesterday - there is nothing on either the CPI or Bella websites as of this AM.</p>

<p>Does this mean that they will be offering a Blue Light Special on the Denis Reggie experience? </p>

<p>Or that lowball Craigslist photographers have finally met their match? </p>

<p>No word on price or what is going to happen to Bella or the Denis Reggie Experience that I could find. </p>

<p>Dave</p>

 

<p>Hmmm. Wonder what (if any) changes they will make to the way they have done things?</p>

I'm sooo happy! Lots of people that got maried hired them and the photographers never showed up. They probably had to sell from all of the lawsuits!

<p>Schadenfreude................</p>

<p>"schadenfreude" 1. A malicious satisfaction obtained from the misfortunes of others..... 8-)) </p>

<p>Hahahaha! hehehe! You guys are too funny. It must be the name... ;) IMHO I think it's a good thing from our stand point. Meaning professional photgraphers running legitimate businesses who actively market, network and participate. <br>

My brides haven't ever even heard of Bella. I think Bella is on their way out...</p>

Bella actually had the right attitude. They wanted to book 10 percent of all weddings. Thats a fantastic goal for sure, not to comment on the amount of money being made. They tried or are trying to take an art form and turn it into a huge business. That takes guts. I can't fathom the amount of work it would take to get most of the photographers to shoot alike. Also to find experienced ones that don't have there own gig. Wow what a trust factor to deal with.

 

Colleen, Bella was a national wedding company and they advertised for photographers here on PN for a few years that I know of. I think they wanted to be like a Sears or Pennys portrait studio, but for weddings. It's a great idea if everything fell into place, but it didn't.

 

The poor owner(s) must have been so stressed booking all of these weddings and trying to find decent photographers to shoot the wedding or even show up to the events. They paid around $300 for a job. Everything was in .jpeg. They even supplied you with the CF cards. (Had a friend that shot for them)

My friend said they kept him busy most weekends. I remember something said about or around the 30 wedding mark per year. I could be wrong. He's actually a decent photographer, a person that fit in well to Bella's style.

<p>Bella was founded by one person or a group of like minded people that wanted to share their photography style and teach others that same or a similar style - hip, young, focused on artsy images - not your mother and father's studio / wedding photographer to be sure.</p>

<p>At some point it became more of a commodity than a teaching / sharing opportunity - and that's when it started to get abused on the bridal forms. Although I notice that they are still highly rated by several mags. The problem was / is that the company (Bella) was putting its name on the product and relying on photographers hired from ads on CL and other places for photographers. Pay was (as Bob pointed out) not the best - $300.00 to show up and shoot a 6 hour wedding - but all you had to do was show up and shoot.</p>

<p>What ended up happening is that photographers who had been with them for a while and could shoot eventually started booking their own - higher paying gigs - then ignoring or not going out for the $300.00 shoot and run gigs...</p>

<p>Now - I see one or two new "Bella's" pop up every year - same concept - company handles the couples, contracts a photographer to do the shoot, photographer sends cards to the office and is done.</p>

<p> </p>

Since Bella advertised here on this forum did anyone here ever get to work for them?

<p>Looks to me like Bella had their ups & downs, I don't know that they were ever an actual "teaching/sharing" entity.....I think the goal was profit & business oriented. IMO, they thought that they could fulfill a niche by marketing and managing a huge stable of mostly "up & coming" photographers.....kind of a remote control studio. However, how can you maintain standards and conduct training when you're spread out all over the country?</p>

<p>The larger issue is the ever changing wedding photography industry. WPPI (which was also recently sold) continues to grow in numbers each year however it seems that the number of full-time pros and stand-alone studios has dropped significantly while there has been an influx of the "new up & coming" shooters. The larger question, IMO, is did Bella advance the industry and make a positive contribution to wedding photography or did they take advantage of a temporary niche? Since I'm in a philosophical, reflective mood, I'm also wondering how much a forum such as P-net helps.....especially with all the spoon-feeding of information/experience to newcomers.</p>

<p>I inquired but never submitted an application. $300/week doesn't sound very appealing to me.</p>

<p>The equipment I own and bring to weddings would cost me $785 to rent for 4 days. Why is that important, if I already own the equipment? What if something happens, and I'm forced to rent just to cover an event? My break even point is almost double what Bella was willing to pay.</p>

<p>If I could rent equipment for half the going rate and then have somebody throw in free labor to operate said equipment for me, I'd jump on that deal, too. :)</p>

<p>Eric</p>

<p>All of those companies are falling apart. MJS was sued so many times that they are now called Timeless. They'll deny it, even though it's easy information to find and they are in the same location with the same employees.</p>

<p>To me it smells like an old dot.com business plan, at least more recently ... get something going and then sell it.</p>

<p>The most pointed indicator of this was the Denis Reggie deal with Bella ... where it seemed Bella deliberately decided to <em>polish the turd</em> to enhance the perceived company value by using an undisputed icon of wedding photography. Hoodwinked come to mind.</p>

<p>Whether Denis was one of the hoodwinkies we'll never know ... depends on whether he owned a chuck of Bella as part of the "Denis Reggie Experience" business deal ... but I seriously doubt he saw this coming.</p>

<p> </p>