A little help please.

[edvigil]

<p>I recieved this in my inbox from a friend this morning.<br>

<em>My son's baseball team is looking for a photographer to come and take team and individual pictures of the players during a practice which is normally Wed and Fri nights. They want someone that will put them all on a disk and then you can sell the disks. They last couple of years they have sold them between $1 and $10 each. You can set your price if you are interested and I will let him know. Not sure who else they are talking</em> <em>to so if you don't have time etc. not a problem.</em><br /><em>Thanks</em><br>

I think it's a good opportunity and something I am looking to get into. I have been shooting my nephew's games for a few years now. This would be my 1st individual/team shoot. This could get my foot in the door and possibly more business with sports and family. My issue is the selling them disks. The max in the email is $10 per disk. That seems really low to me. If there are 14 kids on a team that is only $140 not including cost of disk and time. I don't know who they used in the past to sell them for $1 - $10 possibly a parent. The second issue I have is I am not a big fan of selling the disk in the 1st place. In my experience I have not been impressed with some of the proccesing facilities like Walmart, Walgreens, etc. I do have a website and the parents could order directly from me. Now I obviously can't compete with the chains pricing but but can offer a discount. My gut is telling me to counter offer and pretty much meet this request and offer to shoot multiple games this season but the images will be available only through my website. Also if I am chosen to do the t/i pics for next year they will be only available through my site as well. That may be a bit arrogant but but this seems like a lot of work to me for $140 minus supplies, time and taxes. Thank for taking your time and any input is appreciated.</p>

[micah_robinson]

<p>Yeah, I think you're on the right track.<br>

It would be hard to to make it on $140 before costs.<br>

You also don't want to set a president of charging pennies, as you will most likely do more work for them.</p>

<p>I would figure out what you need to do it for, and how much the prints will be off your site.<br>

Then I'd get the contact info of the person in charge of hiring and talk to him/her yourself and tell them what it'll cost.</p>

<p>Either they say yes or no.</p>

<p>it's a bit of work doing this kind of shoot.<br>

You'll be there for hours.</p>

[tony_clark]

<p>I do not shoot those kind of images but perhaps a Commercial Photographers mentality would serve you well. We start pricing our work by covering our CODB or Cost of Doing Business then add the usage and then the actual expenses of the project. I would think that every parent would throw in $XX to just get you out there plus the online gallery to review the images and finishing with an order. </p>

[daverhaas]

<p>"you'll be there for hours" - This is flat wrong - if you are indeed doing Team / Individual photos for 14 kids - you'll be there for 30 minutes max. Action shots are a different beast entirely.</p>

<p>Team / individuals - for 14 kids - 2 shots of each kid - 1 team shot - give them a CD for $10.00</p>

<p>On T/I shoots - you're not trying to get a perfect portrait of the kids - you're creating a momento for them / their parents / family. Period. If the parent wants a studio shoot - and artist creations - fine - they can book me at my portrait rate ($75.00 per hour) for that.</p>

<p>Supplies - 14 (assuming no siblings) - cds - $.25 each. basic editing / cropping etc... 30 seconds to 1 minute each... Taxes - don't know where you live and what sales tax is - but say 5% - oh - cd sleeves - 6 cents each - (TARGET) - Don't even bother with prints / etc.... if they've done cd's in the past. The parents expect them on CD and don't / won't want to pay for print packages. Bottom line - if you don't make $100.00 profit on this - you're doing something wrong.<br>

Dave</p>

 

[Jerry_]

<p>I, my guess, think the parents want game photos of the players....Weds. and Fri. night games, in the original post.</p>

<p>Time to attend two games. Plus the time to put images on a CD (by player number?) and then returning to hopefully find the parents, who have the $$$s to spend.</p>

<p>Plus, if you get into the print business, you have to keep track of a lot of orders (you may have to wait for two paydays down the road for some parents to be ready to order, and by then, you may have another game or two for images to be picked from. More time....)</p>

<p>You have to determine if you want a fresh start in pricing a CD (...$20 to $25, for 30 images?) as a starting point.</p>

<p>Last year's photographer paid less than $3.00 a gallon for gas; this year, you get to pay more....</p>

<p>Good luck!</p>

<p> </p>

[daverhaas]

<p>Action Shots - (if that's what they want) - I'd suggest picking a single game to attend - and doing photos at that game -</p>

<p>KISS - Keep It Simple Stanley - For a single team - I wouldn't sort them by player - each parent that wants to buy (minimum required) buys - and they get all the shots...</p>

<p>Dave</p>

 

[micah_robinson]

<p>Jerry,<br /> My thoughts exactly.<br /> Even if they say they don't want action shots, you get there and sure enough they do.<br /> Which is why I wasn't "flat wrong".</p>

<p>Could turn out that all you wind up doing is a couple of each kid and a couple of the team and then leave.<br /> If so, shouldn't have more then a couple hours in it (prep time, setup, photo time and driving).<br /> Your post will take a couple more though (including delivery and or shipping).</p>

<p>Point is;<br /> Why would you spend, at the very least, 4 hrs. (and most likely more) on this for $100 profit?<br /> If it's worth it to you then I guess do it, but no way I'm doing it.<br /> I think you need to find a way to get more money out of this and I don't think you'll know if you even can until you talk to the person in charge of "hiring" the photographer.</p>

[daverhaas]

<p>I guess I'm a little feisty today -</p>

<p>If I'm the T/I guy - then I do T/I - period. If they want action shots - that's another deal... period. If they want both - prices go up (calling Mr. Otis) not down.</p>

<p>Yeah - It's a hundred bucks - and probably not worth it for everyone - but $100 is $100 - which is $100 then most would have by sitting at home - or just taking shots of their dog, yard, trees, what ever...</p>

<p>Plus - it's a foot in the door for the next year - when that friend is on the league board the board is discussing photos for 300-1000 kids. </p>

<p>I know this because it happened to me - I don't speak theory - I speak from practical experience - A friend (who knew my work) asked me to take photos of his kid's team one year. 12 kids - $10.00 per cd - Team shots - took me exactly 30 minutes to get them together, do the photos and - boom - gone. Next year he was on the board - and I had the League contract. 300 kids - and a nice 2 year run - and increased sales and profits both years. Now he's off the board - and they have another photographer - but that's the business - The 2 years I did the league - more than compensated me for "Only" making $100.00 for 30 minutes of work.</p>

<p>Dave</p>

 

[micah_robinson]

<p>Hey if you know this is the way it's gonna be going in and you're ok with it then more power to you.<br>

I know allot of people that live for, and off of, this kind of work.</p>

<p>Me on the other hand... I like to get paid good for what I do and am not a fan of promised, or otherwise implied, work to come.<br>

But allot of people work like this everyday.</p>

[edvigil]

<p>Thanks everyone for your input. I think I will pursue this. If it doesn't work out I'll chalk it up to experience. You all put in some good info thanks again!</p>

[funcrunch]

<p>Ten dollars for a disc full of photos is insulting to a professional photographer, regardless of the amount of time the shoot takes. Even if you're an amateur, at the very least you need to figure out the real amount this project would be costing you before deciding what would be a reasonable amount to request. Personally I would put the photos up in an online gallery (I use Zenfolio) and let the parents order the shots they want individually.</p>

[rdm]

<p>I agree with Julie Bernstein. Don't give out electronic copies of the photos. Whats to stop them from copping that photo CD several times and making prints themselves. Then you end up only selling 2 or 3 CDs</p>

[funcrunch]

<p>I think it's fine to license digital images, just at a price high enough to justify the fact that they client can use them to make their own prints. (Of course you could also forbid them from doing this in your license terms if you wish, and hope they comply...)</p>