Starting a Photography Business 101 - Step 3: Establish an Account With a Professional Lab
Sure you can take your flash card of images to Sam's Club and get "proofs" made - and so can your clients
. Truth be told so too can your clients establish an account with a professional portrait lab-the "pro" labs just aren't too particular anymore.However, a professional portrait lab can give you helpful guidance with respect to getting good color, retouching, competitive prices and offer you products your clients won't find at Target.
"Back in the day" professional color labs had "lab reps" - an actual salesman who called on your studio and offered helpful advice - sometimes even offered to help with big jobs. Not today. Like so many other businesses color labs have gone the way of the impersonal internet - client contact is a thing of the past.
On the other hand, years ago we were paying $4.95 and up (our cost) for an eight by ten. Add $3.00 for mounting and spraying and $7.50 for retouching (one head) and your cost for one eight by ten was over $15.00! While lower lab prices allow us to be more competitive and profitable it does come at the price of less one on one service from the lab.
Choose a professional lab - and I don't mean Walmart
Yes, you can get decent prints from Walmart. Last I knew Sam's and Walmart were using Fugi Frontier printers - the same as many pro labs. The difference comes with the pro labs color calibration system. Because the professional lab is dealing primarily with professional photographers they are going to calibrate their printers more frequently - probably daily. The benefit to you is when your client places a reorder that new print is going to look - with respect to color and density - exactly the same as the one they received in their original order.
In addition your pro lab is going to offer a wide range of products you and your clients won't find at a big box store lab. Something as simple as custom print sizes can really set you apart from the crowd. Take for instance a 5" x 30" print size we call a "skinny". We create a collage with five or six square images - perfect for the client that says they have no wall space.
You'll also find inexpensive proofing options - they'll even bind your proofs into a book if you like. They offer folded pre-printed greeting cards, business cards, stickers and bookmarks. Most labs also have press-printed custom albums in a variety of sizes and at very reasonable prices. They also offer special pricing for sports/memory mate photography should you ever get involved in that line.
Free advice and guidance
While few labs have actual traveling sales reps anymore they do have customer service departments that are very helpful. You can find free information on their sites on how to calibrate your monitor to match their color and most labs will give you a free order or two to help make sure your calibration is correct.
Labs realize the importance of education and offer resources from leading photographers around the country, special marketing programs and customized products you can purchase and offer to your clients.
Retouching if you need it
Chances are if you are not already proficient with Photoshop and doing your own retouching you will want to be in the future. However, do NOT let your lack of retouching experience hold you back from getting your portrait business started. Before digital none of us (well relatively very few of us) did our own retouching - it truly was an art form.
Besides labs that offer retouching, there are also several independent services out there that do retouching. I have used http://www.retouchup.com in the past when I've had especially challenging braces (teeth) to remove. You simply open an account and upload you images. They do the retouching and send the file back to you which you then upload to your lab. And their prices are reasonable as well.
The pro lab's work is guaranteed - BUT
We are pretty particular about the product that leaves our studio. We carefully inspect each and every print we receive from the lab and if there is the slightest scratch or imperfection we call and have it redone.
Labs will gladly remake prints for mistakes they made; i.e. scratches, missed mounting or spraying instructions, bent corners from bad packaging, etc... However, one of the reasons they can offer the prices they do is because you're responsible for the color. They print what they get and there are no remakes for bad color; hence the importance of having a calibrated monitor.
Get started now
It won't cost you a dime to set up an account and then you'll have access to the labs pricing and helpful information. As I said they'll also probably give you some free prints to make sure your calibration is correct.
I recommend both White House Custom Color (WHCC) and Northwest Professional Color (NPC) - both easy to find with a simple Google search.
Starting a Photography Business 101 - Step 3: Establish an Account With a Professional Lab
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