Alright onto the budgeting of wedding photography. Does your wedding budget look like this?
or this?
Either way I am sure you don't want to feel like this:
But in all seriousness how do you know if you are wasting your money or paying way too much? Let's break it down into a few easy to understand points. I sincerely believe a better informed customer is a better customer. It is better for you to know how wedding photography pricing is derived so you can shop as an educated consumer.
If you remember back to the other post I recommended you spending about 10% of your entire budget on wedding photography. This will get you into the ball park of an average professional in your market. You may not get everything you were dreaming of, but you will get a professional. {ALERT} {ALERT} side track coming........ I understand that not everyone can afford a professional photographer. It is the truth. People get married every day with little or no fanfare. And with no budget for a wedding little alone a wedding photographer. I'm here to say to those folks, It's OK. I'm going to be posting a little later this week on how to score some photography on the way cheap.
Ok, sorry, so what do I mean by "ballpark" when I talk about a 10% budget? If your wedding budget is $30,000, and you budget $3,000 for photography in the Dallas market you will find you receive something like 8 hours of wedding day coverage, a basic print or album package. Not bad, but maybe you had your heart set on engagement and bridal sessions too. You also may want three to four large prints for your house, a nicer album, and say two parent albums to give as gifts. Well you just upped your bill to about 15-20% ($4,500 to $6,000) depending on the options. I'm just warning you now so you will not be shocked.
You may be asking your self, "How do photographers come up with pricing?" or "It's digital now why is it so expensive?" I'm going to break these questions down into two parts: Deliverables and Creative.
Let's talk Deliverables first. These are the items you actually can hold in your hand such as prints and albums. I think this is the easiest for folks to understand. They are receiving an actual physical product. It is easy to see that a better paper costs more money for prints or that a leather album costs more than one with a canvas cover, etc. Photographers will mark these items up in order to cover the actual costs we pay, time to post process images (color correct, sharpen, add contrast, etc), and obviously make a profit (yes folks we are in this to make money too!). The amount of profit or markup a photographer chooses to place on prints and albums can vary based on the photographer's work flow process. Some photographers process all of their own images and layout their own albums. Some outsource all of that to other companies or they may have staff. Either of those cost more money, and it get's passed onto the consumer. You will find that the more popular a photographer and if they travel for destination weddings that they tend to farm out these tasks because they have to be out shooting. Outsourcing these are not a bad thing, in fact the quality is often above what the photographer would do because the folks doing the work do it day in and day out. Think of like this: Your general family doctor could treat you for that broken foot, but he is going to refer you to a specialist because they do it more frequently and are more skilled. Same principle just minus the body parts and pain. You will see that print prices can double or triple with these highly sought after photographers due to this. Me? Well I outsource custom album designs, but I post process all of my own images still.
So deliverables vary in price based on quality, how the photographer handles their workflow, the profit margin the photographer is aiming for, and on quantity. Very often fulfillment labs will offer discounts for high volume customers, orders, or duplicate items such as two of the same album. Your photographer should be passing quantity savings on to you. I do. Make sure you ask your prospective photographer about that.
Second, and most likely the least understood, is the creative fee. This is what your photographer charges to show up and shoot. This really needs to be looked at separately from what your deliverables cost as they really have nothing to do with each other. Your wedding photographer must charge you to come out and shoot in order to cover expenses and make a living. I don't want to bore you with an economics lesson, but I am going to put into perspective how much it actually costs to be a wedding photographer with a quick list. It's not all inclusive, but you will get the idea.
Professional Nikon Camera Body: Nikon D3s $5,200
Backup camera body: Nikon D700 $2,200
Nikon 14-24mm lens: $1,800
Nikon 24-70mm lens: $1,700
Nikon 70-200mm lens: $2,200
Nikon 85mm lens: $1,300
Nikon SB900 flash: $460
Total of basic camera equipment: $14,860
Second photographer gear: $14,860
Basic lighting kit for group shots: $1,500
Insurance (annual): $1,200
Health insurance (annual): $3,600
Vehicle expenses (annual): $6,000
Second photographer pay (Annual): $5,000
Computer: $3,000
Total first year expenses: $50,020
In all seriousness that does not cover everything. There are some ways to cut corners on equipment costs, but the adage, "You get what you pay for" id very true when it comes to camera equipment. You may be thinking, "Yeah John, but once you buy that stuff you are set." Well, yes and no. Camera bodies have to be replace about every 18 months just like computers do. Especially if you shoot a ton, which wedding photographers do. There are shooters out there who run their cameras into the ground in a year they shoot so much. We're talking 1,000,000+ images per year. The lenses should last a very long time.....until you drop one and have to replace it. You either buy it outright or file an insurance claim, pay the deductible, and wait on a check. You have to plan, and budget for that.
Notice that these are just business expenses. What about a salary for myself so I can pay rent, buy groceries, buy my wife a Christmas present, etc? Don't get me wrong I am not bemoaning my career choice. I love it, and wouldn't trade it for anything. I just want you to think about what your photographer is actually trying to do. Now that you know all of this. Could you live off of $500 to $1,000 per wedding? Even if you shot 52 per year? Most likely the answer is no. Not to mention you'd never get a vacation or free weekend!
Alright enough with the boring economics of how to run a photography business. My point is this. Creative fees are a relatively non-negotiable item. You can choose to reduce the amount of coverage in order to reduce the price, but you will most likely be very unsuccessful in just trying to get a photographer to reduce his or her creative fee for the same amount of coverage. Make sense?
So how do you save money? Negotiate on print and album packages! At a certain point the profit margin on the creative service becomes very nice. If you were to approach a photographer and say, "Hey I'll book you for an engagement, bridal, and wedding day coverage at your rate if you can knock another 5% off of my print and album order." you most likely will find yourself making a heck of a deal, and the photographer will appreciate the fact that you aren't trying to talk them out of business. Negotiate deliverable prices, packages, maybe even quality (maybe a little better album for the same money). If you find you still can't meet your budget you should consider scaling back what services you are seeking. Maybe the photographer can do a couple of quick bridal portraits on the day of. There will not be as many, and they won't be on some romantic looking beach (unless that is where you are getting married of course) but you can save a little bit of money.
Finally, be honest with your photographer about your budget. I know people are hesitant to throw out how much they would spend because they feel like that is what the photographer is going to quote. This is just not true for professionals for several reasons. First we live on our reputation. If I charged you say $5,600 because that was your budget, and you then referred a friend to me. What if their budget was only $4,000 and I gave them exactly the same package you had. Don't you think that they will tell their friend, and then the next referral from them says there budget is $3,000 then the next is $2,000, and on and on. I'd walk myself right out of business and leave a bad taste in my previous customer's mouth. That is not the way we do business. Professional photographers have pricing structures and profit margins. We want you to get the most bang for your buck. happy customers send us more customers. tell us your constraints, be open minded, and we will work a solution to get you to where you need to be budget wise!
I hope this helps you understand how to approach your potential wedding photographer. One last thing. Don't forget that you are paying for an artistic service. You have to like what you see, not just the price point. Don't be scared to pay more for something which is visually attractive to you. These are your first memories as a family, love what you get!
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