timcorridan Posted April 29, 2005 Share Posted April 29, 2005 have any of you seen "very streamlined" (legitemate) wedding buissneses for the part timer, say, 2 weddings a month. i understand i'd have to make my own plan. but have you seen them work for different poeple. marc williams and nancy stock gave some pretty sobbering advice for my kind. mostly about having insurance...will this be just a fun project that i let go in a few years? i know life well enough to know, i'm not sure, yet. by the way, the thoughts they gave me was some of the best advice ive read. anyway, i'll see this summer how much seasoning i need. hey thanks all tim Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
todd frederick Posted April 29, 2005 Share Posted April 29, 2005 Tim, Maybe I'm just getting really old, but I don't have a clue concerning what you're talking about. Could you please explain what a "Streamlined Photo Business" is in very simple, step-by-step terms? Most appreciated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
timcorridan Posted April 29, 2005 Author Share Posted April 29, 2005 sorry todd, "streamlined" is a word i picked up, your not getting old. streamlined, as i put it, means i'm not out to GROW a business. I know what i want to do and thats it. a set number of gigs per month, keeping liability insurance costs and expenditures, to a minimum to support a legitamate business, but part-time. so i would make a business plan based on doing 2-3 weddings per month. just to supplement to my income. forget about the rest of my entry, my kids were bugging me and nothing came out right. the question is: has any beginer-wedding photographer declared income (and losses), bought liability insurance, registered the business, ect.. and made a profit doing 2-3 weddings per month? i realize no one knows how much i'll spend or what i'll charge. but is it done succefully by one of you. sorry about my origional post. my two year old, bit my four year old, again, and i wrote it quickly. thanks tim... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nstock Posted April 30, 2005 Share Posted April 30, 2005 The only way you can know the answer to this is to figure out your expenses and be really brutal when you do it. Include EVERYTHING from how much it costs you to run your car per mile to how much insurance costs you per year. Remember to figure out replacement costs of equipment and figure out how quickly that will happen and then figure that cost per year. The IRS has depreciation schedules for business equipment. Sometimes the schedule is dead on accurate for replacing something and other times it is not. If you owe any money on equipment, figure the cost of payments and know how much is interest and how much is principal and how much that is for your car or your camera... and if you use your car 10% of the time for weddings.. then 10% of that payment is a cost of doing business. Now.. assuming you have all of that figured out, figure what price you have to charge to break even. If you can only get $500 for your work.. and you only shoot 2 weddings a month for a season lasting 5 months.. well, you probably are losing money and it is never smart to lose money in a business (tho most businesses do not make money for the first three years). OTOH if you can get $5,000 for a wedding and it costs you $1,000 to shoot it and you are doing 3 a month year round, you probably are foolish to be working your day job at all because you really ought to be growing your business. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
timcorridan Posted April 30, 2005 Author Share Posted April 30, 2005 hey thanks nancy, looks like i have studying to do, hope i can return the favor sometime. tim from arizona, ( the wedding season here doesn't end)... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nstock Posted April 30, 2005 Share Posted April 30, 2005 Tim, I am glad I can be of help. I wish you success. If you do figure out a business plan and the business aspect of what you want to do FIRST and then follow the plan (with the ability to modify and change it as experience is gained) you will be successful. I have been across AZ several times and I certainly think you have a lovely State. I am not sure what part of the State you are hailing from, but I prefer Nothern AZ. I am suprised at the continued (seemingly unchecked?) development in areas like Tuscon and Phoenix due to the desert conditions and a dropping water table. Last year I traversed AZ east and west and north to south and got some really lovely photos of Saguaro National Park at sunset. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
timcorridan Posted April 30, 2005 Author Share Posted April 30, 2005 i know the state well, although i live in phx area. flagstaff is my favorite. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
superia400_junkie Posted April 30, 2005 Share Posted April 30, 2005 Isn't there a PDF or some other type of guide at one of the big wedding organization website that helps with "cost of doing business " matters? I seem to remember Al Kaplan or someone else had provided a link. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
timcorridan Posted April 30, 2005 Author Share Posted April 30, 2005 thanks junkie, a more specific, model business plan, would be a help, instead of the non -specific ones on the sba site (small bus. assc.) i'll order some recomended books also. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carl_miller Posted May 1, 2005 Share Posted May 1, 2005 Tim, My best advice - since you only want to do 2 weddings a month, do it really well and after you have a good portfolio, price higher than you are comfortable with. I say that because if your any good, you'll get a lot of referrals - and if your also "underpriced" you'll eventually get way too many referrals. By pricing high, you'll be able to keep the number of weddings down while maximizing your profit. Even if your cheap, people still expect you to be good. A friend of mine fell into the trap of only doing "two" weddings a month. He happened to be a really great photographer (but not all that confident in himself) beside being a helluva nice guy/people person. He was charging $900 for all day coverage (that sometimes means 12 hrs), all formals in color and B&W, 4x6 proof album and releasing negs. Eventually he was booking "four" weddings a month at least 7 months of the year beside turning some down. He thought people were booking him because they wanted an inexpensive photographer but he was shooting weddings where they paid over $1000-$2000 for the cake. In reality people loved his work and personality - but because he was also priced so low he ended up getting swamped. I told him almost two years ago he needed to add a $5000 package and he looked at me like I had just told him I had actually been born a woman. Long story short he's just sold that package for a third time now. (in dollars that's 16 cheapo' weddings) The only difference on the actual wedding day he pays a second shooter about $150. Bottomline - assuming you do decent work, don't sell yourself short. I look at it this way, if your good but low priced, eventually you'll be turning down a lot of work to keep yourself at 2 weddings a month. If you do crappy or only so-so work, most people won't want you to shoot their wedding just because your cheap. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
timcorridan Posted May 1, 2005 Author Share Posted May 1, 2005 carl baby, when your right, your right. this is the advice i was realy looking for. this is the direction i wanna take. thanks - tim corridan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carl_miller Posted May 2, 2005 Share Posted May 2, 2005 Hey Tim glad that helped. Good Luck! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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