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Pricing Structure

I'm gonna talk about pricing structure I was trying to figure out the best way to talk about pricing because it's so in some ways it's it's, so difficult because somebody in my position in the building and all the overhead you know we have is different what I need to charge to make money than somebody in their home and, you know, so it makes me I just can't bear out the best way to approach it. So what I decided is I need to look at the bigger picture and the concept of how we've priced things because it's been the same for eight years, regardless of what that number is, regardless of if we've raised prices change things around, we've had the exact same pricing structure for almost eight years um and that pricing structure, what that looks like and then I'm actually going to share with you what my price list, I'm actually changing my price list this year um um, to be in a different version than this that I'm really excited about, and I explained that at the end. So while portrait's are...

all apart and they're all by the longest side, so all that means when you look at my price list there is not a by town eleven by fourteen sixteen by twenty twenty by twenty four, twenty four, thirty twenty four, twenty four because what I realized is I wanted to sell all these custom sizes but how in the heck do you have a priceless with all these custom sizes? So if you just go up the longest side I made my priceless based on the most expensive thing like whatever my my uh most expensive product as I could sell in there so for example canvas museum print a forty inch campus museum print all the same price that literally means a forty, forty, thirty, forty, twenty, forty, fifteen and a half by forty all the same price there's no ah well, that is two inches shorter. So crosses do I pay different prices to the lab yet? But you know what? It all comes out in the wash. Some people you know might cost me a little bit last. Some people might cost me a lot more, but I have to have my pricing priced knowing I'm making the money I need to make having the right cost of sales which should technically it used to be when things were film I think it was like twenty five over thirty percent. Now I think it's actually like twenty percent or even less now with digital your cost of sales should be beyond literally all that is is what does it cost you to get that good in hand? You know you're actually the printing the mounting the packaging the retouching that how much does it cost you to create a product? So that means twenty percent of that should go into actual production because then there's, all the other things your money is going to need to go to to be able to make to have a successful studio, and those numbers are actually all, like shift and khun change. If you're out of your home, that number could actually hire because you've lost overhead so that's not like I'm not tryingto say everybody needs to be right here, but there's actually a survey through p p a, and we've used people management services, but through people have actually do a survey that give helps give you all those numbers and has the comparison survey of what studios are doing so anyway, um, that was just a side note, but back to the wall, portrait's, um, sell by the longest side and eliminates it creates some confusion initially, so when we first switch to this, absolutely create some confusion, because if your clients are used to seeing just all the standard sizes, they get a little confused when they just see forty inch print. What does that mean? So that's, where educating the client comes in? If you're doing your job and you're doing pre consult, or you're talking to them at the sea during their session or just you know, in the sales room you're you're explaining all of this when they have those questions, the beautiful thing is as your clients become repeat clients and you're in business longer, I don't have to ever go over it because I've had the same structure for eight years, even if the pricing changes its exact same concept so I can direct people to their wall. Portrait's it's pretty simple we do have a bonus structure that if they buy three or more wall portrait's they will get a ten percent price break on all their prints and frames, not other products in books but prince and frame so their wall portrait's and that could be gallery wrapped that could be a campus that could be whatever then, eh? So what about the next thing we would goto and talk about and we would try to sell would be gift prince classic difference all the classic different is it's a name we made up to call everything a pretend smaller um we wanted to charge the same price because honestly, I didn't want all these packages I don't want to sound units to five by sevens really don't equal an eight by ten and really, if I'm selling, if I think of myself like an artist, I am not selling the piece of paper and what it costs I'm selling the art that's on it so I don't really care if it's an eight by ten or five by seven or a four by five in my price and my cost isn't really all that different for what I'm charging so uh it's just all one price your choice eight by ten or smaller for five ninety nine I mean it's pretty straightforward and so I do offer a collection that is such a great value now hasta you have to have a very high and I guess again that's relevant but you need a high um ala carte classic different price to make that collection be a value correct but rather than one hundred fifteen dollars that makes him like seventy four dollars apiece so and you could buy that as many times as you want so I have some clients they might spend two thousand dollars on classic gift prints they just buy that package four times so it's bill value into those those smaller the smaller prints but we calm give prince because that's what I want them to think of them as this is for grandma this is for your desk. This is for the office so that was that was done on purpose um oh, one other little thing this little you see this this is actually a file that was from a wallet and our websites on the side of it that's something they actually have done for years we just come art wallets and the clients don't know they're getting on, which of course now with repeat clients they dio I don't do this for specials like limited editions and things, but our normal clients we just pick one of their images and dio eight wallets that have our web site on it so it's free, they don't pick the image, some of the repeat clients know they're getting him, they'll pick an image and that's fine, and they're usually black and wider cps. So I think of it and I tell him things when they pick up is like, oh, here's, just a little gift that, you know, we wanted to give you that, you know, it's kind of like our business card with your kids name on it, so these would be really cute you could actually do emma's rep cards or business cards and make him double sided. Uh, but then you're talking about a bigger volume, but we've just done it with a set of eight wallets um then if you talk about framing, I get really excited with the way we priced are framing because my experience, when I initially starting my studio, I did not offer framing, and I knew I was really missing out by doing that, but I was really overwhelmed and not sure how how to do that just physically how to offer that and and what that would look like and just assembly numb I just didn't know um and so I started small and started offering some frames and then I actually even worked with other framing companies and uh actually local like farming companies and helping pick up frames it got really confusing because if you go to a frame shop typically they're set up that there is no structure and how they're priced so like I might think I'm trying to save money and pick a little thin gold frame and it's the most expensive frame because there's real gold on it so the more confusing it is for your clients it starts to kill the sale, so I decided to take all my frame vendors and sit down it was a total pain to dio, but again I would actually recommend someone if you don't offer framing frames just offer like five or six like you don't have to offer a million we used offer a whole room of framing and we're down to just one little section on the wall it's still a lot of friends it's private seventy frames but literally we used to private like four hundred on dso it's from larson jule jw molding or organic bloom wild sorbet roma so we have a lot of vendors we sat down, we figured out what does it cost us to get this frame completed ready to pop in image into because we get all of our frames ready for that so we don't frame as faras we don't get the long sticks of the frames and we're assembling and chopping, and we're joining it's like, oh, they have a sixteen twenty it comes ready to nail down the sixteen by twenty and put paper wire done. So what does it cost us to get that sixteen by twenty? So I came up with ranges of if it cost between this and this it's an apron that's what most of your skin here brings it that cost between this anne this is a beef ring that cost between this and this it's a c for him all the way up to f after being like the really expensive chunky moldings made in italy, you know it's probably got some of the hand gilded gold, some beautiful things to those frames and it's very obvious you look at the frame all we've column a b, c d e f g you can basically see you could guess those were the more expensive ones. It's really cool because then with our pricing structure, a twenty inch g frame all the same uh sixteen inch see frame all the same, now you have to price it off the most expensive one for that same reason is that there is going to be some variance and they're like, you have to if you're going to do this there's going to be arranged, so don't get in trouble and price stuff the lower end, and then, you know, somebody orders the more expensive frame and you're in your range that you gave and now you're not making your money, but most of our friends who try to make mark up two and a half to three times and so that has been really, really, really awesome with their framing, we actually do frame most of our wall portrait's we've gotten away from framing our smaller prints, but we do frame most of our wall portrait's. The other thing is, we try to keep on hand some of our top selling frames in the most standard sizes, the reason being everything's by appointment at our studio. Even when you pick up, you make an appointment to pick up. We have all your images on display on a table, the small print's all opened up in their packaging, and then we will put your big print in a frame if we have one which hopefully ifit's. You know, odd panoramic we pride don't but if we have a frame and stock that we can actually temporarily have it popped in there with just one little nail or nail gun so when you walk in your initial impression is this framed portrait ready to go home on your wall it opened up that door people are either like ooh, I want that one or let's start talking about framing and what's great is it's very self service in a good way people people can actually look at the frame wall even if I'm like running off in the other room and they're just browsing I can tell him mcgee frame cost this much a c frame cost us much like they can kind of be like okay, I know I want to be in this price range and they can see what's available to them for that so it's very comfortable for them rather than just having taken every frame off the wall teo be able to say how much it is so that's really simplified our process the frame on the right I did show yesterday that's when we collage frames we'll do that through white house custom color we send the prince we picked out the brains it comes ready to hang on the wall and then these two others are actually we do a lot of collage jing jet actually we have ah um collage template inaction combos we sell but basically like that we sell I just actually did a fifty by fifty for a client in their home a couple weeks sco and did the installation for him uh but this one on the left it's a nine opening with the image faded in the back we've actually created an action you just open up the nine images hit play and it does it all for you and it designs it as I think of thirty thirty or you khun size it down but anyway with the framing with all of this I want to tell you kind of my new pricing concept that I'm going to be moving forward with I didn't put it in here because it's really just a scratch paper right now but I'm really excited about it and so um I I'm telling you this and that this isn't tried and true like there could be some things in here that don't work but I think it's going to actually work really wonderful because my client already used to this process I'm just taking it one step further so basically I'm gonna instead of offering from the longest side um because that's still a lot of stuff twenty twenty four thirty, thirty six and I was just looking at the price is what that really costs me like my cost for my re touching the same the cost between the prince it's not all that much for what I'm charging I've gotta marked up enough so why don't I do the range thing with that and just call him okay with that sofa sized couch size desktop size whatever and on lee offer like four categories it's no different than my it's basically taking what I do with my gift prints into my way all portraits because really they're paying for the art and they're not necessarily painful I want him to get what looks good on the wall if a thirty six inch print looks best in their home I want him to get that and if it cost the same as a thirty inch maybe they will and I don't know I haven't worked out all the logistics but like if I haven't priced right like I'm okay with that and it's no different people say well doesn't everybody just get by tens no if they want to fight by seven to get a five by seven like I think if a thirty inch print is what looks best on their home I think people will be okay and still do a thirty inch print so that's kind of I'm trying to simplify even more part of my reason for doing that is also because the onslaught of new products that we can get we can offer meddles in acrylics and gallery raps and you know we do our collages and then we have our signature which is pebble on masonite and then we have our museum, which is canvas on masonite, and so that starts to kill my sale when I have too many options, so I actually decided to simplify it even more. I'm going to take three categories like urban chic I'm just making this up right now, but like, you know, urban chic and standard, I don't know like and multiple finishes will be in that category, so if you want urban, that might be acrylics, medals and gallery wrath. Now I again logistically need to go through and figure out what my cost really isn't all of those so that I don't get into a situation where I'm losing money, but I actually think it's going to simplify the sale on dh just be really clean and and have a really nice clean pricing menu, which I was really cold white house has the's folios there, eight by ten folios of that air, just the really nice they just fold and print up there crying menus, but that I'm going to be transitioning into just having one of those with this new price list at the studio. So there's just I'll have some owes money has put it up sitting there, the people and just look at while they're there, and then I will produce obviously some printed copies that my clients can take home you had a question and I'm sorry I know it's okay I like the news the new thoughts on what you're going to do that's exciting on the framing nail when I run into is that oh no I'm just going to take it to the local you know x y z store and have them do the framing and for awhile I was thinking I'm just gonna have framing be part of it it's just not going to leave without it but in my market that's pretty high and so but what happens is then I'll see that person or it'll be a family member and also well where is where's thie image not well I have a framed it yet and this will be eight nine months later and so I feel like that's a disservice to them because then you know it's sitting in a big box under their bed or whatever they decided to do with how do you handle them now and I've gone through some of the same thought process is here I'm making a new priceless and there's every year I make a new price let every year I have made a new priceless I go through the thought process up should I just include framing just to simplify it but I always run into that same thing where that makes the cost so initially high that there's a bird in the studio that it makes the cost initially so high it almost goes against what I purposely try to do, which is I purposely try to separate them in my sail like if I'm spent an hour and a half of somebody selling prince, I really I put the seed in about about the frame like we offer framing this would look great in this frame if you want take this frame corner home or when it comes in, you know we can we can talk about frames because money spends money for gotten I actually think I get higher averages to separate it out spend this much on your prints, and then when someone comes in, they're not gonna feel as like buyer's remorse, spending money on an effort jean frame so that's, what I always run into, and I think about clinics, if I included, I'd have to include a middle of the range frame, and I'm then would be afraid that people would just, well, it comes with it and not be buying the nicer, more expensive frames. So I think that showing them if you're willing to invest in your most popular sizes on just one or two molding and have that literally present to them in a frame, I don't know are you doing that it corners are a lot harder, it's a lot harder to order off the corners like just me personally, like saying a whole frame vs versus with the corner that if you were willing to, like, pick just a couple of your top selling sizes and one or two moldings, just seeing the image framed, I really think will open that door to more framing, but I totally agree with you. I think you could have said it better. I've taught that way before, which is like part of the experience, I think I'm doing them a disservice if they're just leaving with the box and I don't know when it's going to get framed and is it going to be framed, you know, appropriately and I actually sell it and I say I actually offer, like five different companies frames here, and it could be so overwhelming to go to a frame shop. I have actually narrowed it down to the frames that look best with my photography in my art, so I've really simplify it for you and then having the simple pricing structure really helps people, too, to be able to just say, I can tell in a second, you know what? And and we're competitive, I mean, really, I have gone unless they're going to a place that's having some big crazy sale. And they're going with the real standard molding I've gone to some other places I could spend a ton of money in some of those places on framing so so and I tell people that I'm like it's not they're going to spending a lot more by doing with me, but I could just give you a finished product so I think it's just how you sell it and we're done talking and it's not it's, not one hundred percent I have yes, I have clients that they leave without framing their prints. Okay, good yeah, because they don't say, oh, I've got to keep on, I've got the iast I'll do it and then it's sad you don't enjoy the image and honestly have done that take keep on and by the time you walk out of there it's way more than you thought it was gonna be anyway so yeah, I totally agree with you, so yeah, we just have a couple sides and I think that we're going to do some questions and go to breaks. We have lots of puppies to photograph today. So the next thing I would talk about products which actually I feel like we've already talked about, so uh, you know, whether it's many koreans, jewelry cards, framed prints that that would be the final thing I would talk to clients about purchasing um and I actually one end just with a little I think it's a one minute slideshow, but I just want to talk about an emoto because we do love him and use them all the time and the way that we use them for our clients, we do offer a dvd that a client could purchase of the image is not credible it's a and motive slideshow that we do in a white house has a beautiful cd case that's got the images on it that's how we would sell that product to our clients, but what we actually dio is part of our work flow, not for limited editions or dog days normal pain sessions would be during the order process I kind of kept referring to we have the facebook image, and then we do the santa motor show all the animal to show does show is I'm going to show you an actual example that was a client's all it is is their ordered him and just and anything that was retouched cause I don't want to put it in the an emoto show, I shouldn't say retouched, they're just, um they look nicer than just the regular proof and so it's really just like a teaser and it's something they can share a family and friends, so if a client orders eight images, it's taken eight image little teeny movie trailer of their images if they ordered twenty images it's going to be a little bit longer but it's all part of that workflow that it's done so quickly and an emotive new interface like it just keeps getting faster and better like I made two shows this morning and ten minutes while he's getting ready to come here you know on dh just up so anyway I'll just show you this image or this slideshow really quick this would be an example of what we give our clients that they can kind of help promote our studio and they don't know they're getting it actually it's kind of a little gifting um surprise for them so that would be the example of the way wait those are images they paid me for us a boom pop him into a slide show done so with that I I opened the questions from the audience here or live or you guys want to take over I'm not sure but nikki that was an amazing wealth of information of the chat rooms were blowing up with questions and like we want more, we want more information and the one that kept coming up over and over was if you could talk a little bit more about the templates that you were using on where to get those yeah, well we have basically on our website for creative live it's vey gallery haven dot com we actually just launched a new website for products for photographers and if you use the promo codes c l fifty you actually get fifty percent off anything on the site and so included with that like the main thing that's kind of like the steal of the century his far as I'm concerned I think ends up being like eight gigs you get it's for one hundred fifty dollars and it's in something like five downloads it's our prime business it's everything I'm talking about business and template form prime workflow which you won't know a lot about till tomorrow with jed but that's going to be all of our workflow actions templates on dh then unleashed, which is r I did that just for creative lives since we're talking about pets so ii's called prime business and work flow our studio in a box but this is like studio box plus pets because you get you get unleashed and actually the audience members you guys are getting that from me so so don't I'm telling you so you don't buy it you guys are getting that yeah so it'll take you a while to down though there's a lot of information in there and then we have lots of stuff broken up all the car and leave things on there for five dollars we have stuff on there for free like we have some free temple it's a free action pack um, and ten percent of everything on the site, not just for creative, live. But when we change aside, over ten percent of all that money that we sell ever will go to our fund. That helps kids and families in need.