q: why don't you charge more?

So, it's a popular thing to say to each other, and we photographers often do, "Oh, you should be charging more for your photography!" This past weekend I attended a [b]ecker workshop in the town of cows (Calgary lol) and had some very interesting conversations regarding pricing strategies. We all have very different strategies for coming up with our prices, but they essentially boil down to a consideration of some or all of the following:

How much money do you need to make vs. how much money you want to make?

Would you pay for your services what you are charging?

Volume vs. price ie) several sessions at a lower price vs. a few sessions at a higher price?

Is my work worth the price I'm demanding vs. other peoples' work, and do I care?

Frills or no frills?

What is my target market and can they afford the prices I'm charging?

How much are my overhead expenses including postage, equipment, packaging, materials, etc?

How much training, experience and expertise do I have?

I'm sure I missed about a bazillion things, but when it comes time to come up with a pricing strategy, we have to sit and contemplate a LOT of things before we come up with something that works for us. And the bottom line is, ultimately, that there is NO RIGHT ANSWER. Some photographers (and even clients) will say you you need to raise your prices because they think your work is worth more, but there are often more sinister underpinnings to this compliment. In order to illustrate this, I need to explain what in the workshops I discuss as the "Photographer Pyramid." Somebody send me off and email and I'll try and JPEG up the slide so you have a visual, but it looks a lot like the food or energy pyramid, where the photographers who are charging higher prices compete for a very small percentage of the market, while in the middle there is more to go around, and at the bottom there are department store studios and new, inexperienced photographers looking to break into the market.

What I have learned is that the closer to the top of the pyramid a photographer climbs, the stiffer the competition. Because there isn't much room to stand your ground up there, many are less willing to share their trade secrets, don't refer their clients out, and are terrified of the cheaper photographers in the lower echelons who they somehow feel are a threat to their position up on top. Because there is ALWAYS someone better, hipper, and cooler ready to topple them over, this makes it difficult to trust peers (the competition) and gives an understandable but unjustified fear of the lower priced newcomers.

The reason I say it is unjustified is quite simply because the people who are willing and able to pay elite premiums for photography services (which is really all too similar in form and function for comfort) aren't going to shop based on lowest price. You doubt me, but let's put it this way - a person who shops for Christian Louboutin, dresses their kid head-to-toe in boutique clothing, takes vacations in 5-star hotels, and owns a summer villa in Europe isn't going to buy $500 wedding photography services from a no-name photographer any more than they are going to stock their fridge with generic orange juice. In fact, they often won't even accept free services from up-and-comers who are wanting to break into that market, and would probably sooner die than ever be caught dead in WalMart shopping much less getting portraits of their kids taken. Quite simply, people with that kind of money desire the gratification of dropping a name and eliciting admiration of others when they announce who did their family portraits or who shot their wedding. There is only a small fraction of shooters in the photographer pyramid who have the drive, ambition, and desire to go for a hostile takeover of the photography world and knock you off your spot. You don't need to be worried about the multitudes of cheap photographers at all. Promise.

So how does someone break into the market, then? The truth of it is, usually lucky circumstances. (Read Outliers - it will BLOW YOUR MIND.) They happened to grow up in the right environment, have the right influences and opportunities, then be in the right place, at the right time, with the right people, under the right circumstances to have the opportunity to get their foot in that door - second-shooting a wedding, having a wealthy relative hire you on a lark, whatever. And yes, you can command your destiny and by sheer tenacity probably get into that market if your personality and skills are up to snuff. Go for it. But you certainly have to WANT it, and you have to want all the other stuff that goes along with building a name for yourself. If you're a poor farm kid with a twang in your voice, you better read My Fair lady and study the moves in Catch Me If You Can.

While there are always exceptions to the rule, the elite photographers know that if you want to make it to the top, you're going to have to step on a few heads to get there, and stand on a few shoulders to stay there. The ones who realize it was circumstance that got them there quickly realize it's hard work, integrity, and professionalism that will keep them there. They are the ones who will reach a hand down to help a fellow up, while others will cling desperately to the bricks, kicking the little guys off.

Here's the funny thing. Here's why I always take the comment that I should raise my prices with a grain of salt. Many higher-priced photographers figure the best way to make it fair is to equalize pricing, meaning everyone raise their prices to drive prices up. In theory, equally high pricing is supposed to level the playing field and open the market up by giving people no choice but to pay more, but this makes no sense because increasing our prices isn't going to magically increase a client's incomes. If we all put our prices up where only a few people can afford us, a lot of us will be out of a job because the people who only make enough money to go WalMart or, heaven forbid, support a newbie who is building their portfolio, unless we're willing to move in on the few people who can still afford a photographer. Which means that there would in effect be a thousand times the competition for the same 1% of the population. Beyond that, the ability to get a portrait of your child or have coverage of your wedding done becomes impossible for those who love their children as much as the rich folks but have limited incomes (like single parents or single-income families.) Is that REALLY what you want?

So now, I want to answer that question for anyone who cares to know the answer: why doesn't Yours Truly of Hope Walls Photography charge more for her services? Here's how it adds up:

While I'm admittedly a shoe lover (man, do I ever freakin' love shoes!) I am not a flashy kind of person. I don't care if your shoes cost you $5 or $500 - either way, I will like or dislike them, and won't ever go, "Wow, I admire you because you paid $500 for your shoes." I place no value on that sort of thing and I'm not therefore going to think one baby is better, more loved, smarter, cuter, or better because they got driven to my session in a Lexus and are on the waiting list for Miss BonBon's Pre-playschool University Prep Program. This precipitates to the equivalent of, I am probably not going to do a very good job of showcasing that person's lifestyle because it isn't a lifestyle I lead nor is it one I wish to lead. If I won the lotto, I'd be more likely to give up my day job and be a full-time photographilanthropist than start paying for the ooh-aah designer label on a pair of jeans made in the same factory that pays the same 10-year old kids 18-cents an hour to sew pants for WalMart. This does not mean that I think these people are shallow, dislikable, or greedy - it just means that I don't have the same appreciation or desire for a luxury lifestyle that they do. When they start talking about their investment portfolio, I'm seriously thinking, uh... did I remember to turn off the downstairs bathroom light, and whose turn is it to wash dishes?

As photographers, our personal life experiences will shape the type of photographer we strive to be. If we grew up with parents who always chased money, chances are good we'll chase money, too, and attach our happiness and our feeling of being successful to how much money we make, and how admired we are for that money. In my never-humble opinion, it's a common misconception that money is the ultimate measure of success, and the key to happiness ergo, lack of money is a sign of failure and a reason to be unhappy. This to me is superficial (in the literal sense of the word) because I'm personally in the, "Be happy FIRST," camp. I am free to always have enough, to be genuinely grateful for what I do have every day, weather the storm with a smile, revel in a state of serendipity when the windfalls come, and not be disappointed when they go away or just don't happen. Humility makes it possible to get what I need, and want what I have.

Which leads to my pricing strategy, which is more a philosophy than anything. Photographs give us a visual document of the passage of time that illustrates the unfolding story of our lives - marriage, pregnancy, birth, first day of school, graduation, grandparenthood, death... Therefore, I believe that everyone, regardless of income or social status, should have access to affordable photography services whether that's owning a cheap camera, paying for WalMart pictures once a year, or buying a $35,000 wedding package. None of these is more or less valuable, and price is irrelevant because someone who makes a net income in 6 figures is not going to feel the pinch of a $35,000 price tag as much as someone who makes a net income of $35,000. There is more than enough business to go around. Swear it.

The people who are building their portfolios provide this service to people at the base level, which will hopefully give them a different experience than department store or school portraits. Once they have a positive experience with a photographer, they are unlikely to return to Walmart and will either grow with that photographer as they increase their prices, or will remain at the base level and provide a clientele for the next new photographer in the pyramid. Win-win. I charge enough to cover my expenses and my time, but I don't charge more for my photography services than what I would be a) willing and b) able to pay, because gouging people makes me feel icky. Lastly, as I use free or inexpensive web albums and sites, and don't pay for a studio, provide fancy packaging, give out promotional items, use 3rd party services, have a staff, pay for memberships and/or attend a lot of expensive conventions/conferences/seminars, or invest in hoity-toity frills, I do not have to pass those expenses on to my clients and can therefore keep my prices lower. I then have the ability to serve a huge portion of the general mid-pyramid clientele while still turning enough of a net income to meet my needs.

Heavy, heady stuff. Any questions?