It has been six months since I decided to step back from my photography business, catch a breath and focus on what it really means to run a business. The last six months have been sobering and have forced me to hone not only my technical camera skills and my editing technique, but my overall workflow and approach to business. I have had to decide what kind of photographer I want to be, what services I want to be able to provide to my clients and how to price those services.

I have changed everything about the way I do business from top to bottom in the last six months. And it has not been easy.

There are a few things I have realized and decided:

• How much time a typical session takes me and how much time I can realistically take on per week with school. Along with this goes the fact that I am not a high volume photographer. Not now, and likely not ever. I prefer to spend a great deal of time with and on each of my client’s photos and products.
• That I don’t like having my product focus be digital files. You can read more in depth about my philosophy and reasonings for this, but simply put it boils down to the fact that I believe that these images should be used, should be visible. And it’s my experience that if you are simply handed a CD of images, they rarely get used and instead lie on a disc. I want to help you use these images.

And in my research on pricing, I have learned something valuable that has helped me to assess pricing for services I am interested in investing in. A lot of number crunching goes into setting the cost on anything, but particularly for small business owners in service based industries. First, we must calculate both the Cost of Business (which can be much more than you might expect), and then our Cost of Living (no frills here — this is just what it costs to have a place to live and food to eat). Once you find that number and divide it by the number of weeks you need / want to work a year, and then again by then by the hours you can work per week, you have an hourly rate that just covers cost. No profit. Just costs.

Then, you add to that the amount you want to put into long-term savings per year and additional profits, and do the calculation again to find your new hourly rate with profits. But you’re not done yet, because you have to add 35-40% on top of that to cover your taxes as a business owner.

So how does that help me assess pricing on other services? I have to keep in mind that roughly 30-40% of the price is going to that particular person’s expenses alone. Then, after that, another 35-40% to federal taxes, and finally, what is left over is their actual profit. It is what it is. And it’s what small business owners have to consider in order to stay in business and avoid burn out and running themselves ragged.

And at the end of the day, my prices are the result of number crunching. And this is where my first realization comes into play. I could be a high volume photographer and bring my prices down. But that’s not me and that’s not what I believe in. I believe that when you invest in custom photography, you should be given a high priority at all times. I believe that all your images should be perfect. I believe that you should be able to use me as an aid to help you use your art. And all that requires that I work with only one client at a time, and working with only one client at a time means that photography with me will cost a bit more. But I strongly believe that my art and my service is worth it.

I have three levels of sessions: Simplicity, Elegance and Extravagance, which range from a $775 – $3,500 minimum total investment from you, and a 7 – 50 hour minimum investment from me. There’s a fairly broad range there, and I’d love to help you love the look of your love in the coming months.