Printing and maybe pricing advice!

[Scottie68]

Hi all. Im after a bit of advice please and hoping someone maybe able to help.

Ive been asked to price for a local school charity event taking photos of all couples attending. Later they will be given the option to buy an 8x10 print. Now last year my friend did the event, who is a professional photographer, took the photo's, rushed home and later came back with all the prints. He used his home printer and they have sort of complained that the prints are not of great quality and have gone orange. He charged £15 per print with £5 of that going to the school charity.

Last year about 90 people bought photo's.

This year i am going to do them, but show the photo's on my laptop at the end of the night, take orders and get them professionally printed.

My questions are:

1) How much do you think i should charge for the prints bearing in mind that £5 will go to the school charity?

2) Can anyone recommend a cheapish, fast turn around printers with good quality prints. Fast turn around, i mean about 7 days?

3) Should i also include some kind of frame or wallet? If so, where to get these from?

4) What finish on the photo should i ideally be looking for?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated as I've only got a few days to get this together and put forward the details.

Thank you for taking the time to read

 

[EOS_JD]

Hi all. Im after a bit of advice please and hoping someone maybe able to help.

Ive been asked to price for a local school charity event taking photos of all couples attending. Later they will be given the option to buy an 8x10 print. Now last year my friend did the event, who is a professional photographer, took the photo's, rushed home and later came back with all the prints. He used his home printer and they have sort of complained that the prints are not of great quality and have gone orange. He charged £15 per print with £5 of that going to the school charity.

Last year about 90 people bought photo's.

This year i am going to do them, but show the photo's on my laptop at the end of the night, take orders and get them professionally printed.

My questions are:

1) How much do you think i should charge for the prints bearing in mind that £5 will go to the school charity?

£15 is reasonable although only you can value your work . If you are charging on top of that then you could reduce the price a little - up to you how much you want to make and the fact that your friend produced poor results the last time you may find that most people may not want to buy an image!!

2) Can anyone recommend a cheapish, fast turn around printers with good quality prints. Fast turn around, i mean about 7 days?

Send them to a LAB! Somewhere like DSCL will turn that around in a couple of days.

3) Should i also include some kind of frame or wallet? If so, where to get these from?

www.photovalue.com - Get a folder of some sort.

4) What finish on the photo should i ideally be looking for?

Matt looks better than gloss and is more professional. Gloss can suit some images but Matt is a better option.

Make sure you know what you are taking on though. Printing on a cheap home printer will usually end up as you have seen with disappointing resultys and if I was them I'd be going back to him chasing a proper print!

 

[Scottie68]

Thanks for your time to reply and for the advice Jim

Yes i was going to send them to a lab, just didn't know who or where you guys might recommend. I was aiming to match last years price of £15, that way it would leave me with £10 per photo less the costs for the print and a folder of some sort.

Yes i am worried that his poor prints will put a lot of people off, but i am happy to stand in as the organisers are good friends of mine and i know i can do a good job for them. Its more about getting my name out there instead of making a few quid. But fingers crossed, hopefully could still be a good little earner.

Thank you once again Jim, taken your advice on board

 

[RichHobson]

Or do it right and use a dye sub printer to print on the night. There may be event photographers around near you who can help out if you don't have access to one.

 

[EOS_JD]

Or do it right and use a dye sub printer to print on the night. There may be event photographers around near you who can help out if you don't have access to one.

Rich
I'm 100% in agreement that for an event getting a print there and then is a great asset but for 90 printgs I'm not sure it's worth going down that route. You can hire a dye sub too for not that much money but in this instance I'm not sure it's the best way to go.

 

[RichHobson]

I'm not so sure. 90 pre-paid prints at £15 each. Take into account the fact you take them away on the night you may sell more. There's enough there to work with someone and still earn for the cause and photographer as well as a great customer experience.
If I was closer I'd join up in a shot.

 

[Scottie68]

Thanks for all your advice guys, but im not so sure on a sub dye printer. My plan is to display all the photos later in the night on my laptop, then take orders and a £5 deposit. Then get them sent off and hopefully the customers will have them back in about a week. This way, i would be over ordering on folders etc because i really dont know how many people will purchase out of the 200+. Im hoping the last photographer hasnt put too many people off !!

Im estimating about 60p per print and about £1.50 for the folder. Is this about right?