Cost of Running a Business | Roselle Photography

When you ask, “What should I charge for my photography?” I want to challenge you to think like a business. Pricing shouldn’t be some arbitrary number you decide on, and say “Yeah! I think people would pay this for my service!” or even “Well this is what so-and-so charges and I’m better/worse than them, so I’ll charge more/less.”

If you go into a grocery store and pick up a box of cereal, there is a reason it costs what it does. The General Mills corporate office didn’t just say “I think we’ll charge $4 a box and see if people pay it”. The price of the cereal is number is carefully calculated to cover their cost of producing it, marketing it, and delivering it, along with enough mark up to make it profitable.

I know I am guilty of not thinking like a business, because as a shoot and share photographer, I’m not making a product that has a lot of overhead. Sticking with my cereal example, I don’t have a product that requires a factory, and a crew of workers. I don’t have to pay for packaging and production in the same way that General Mills does. Because photography doesn’t look exactly like other products, doesn’t mean that I don’t have overhead and costs that I need to take into account.

I would like to challenge you, right now, to make a list of everything that you need to run your business, and run it well. My list might look something like this:

– Equipment Upgrades – Need a lens to do your job better? How are you saving for it?
– Equipment Upkeep – Body and Lens Cleanings, Calibrations
– Gallery / USB Cost– How are you returning your images? What is costing you?
– Storage – Do you back up online? Do you back up to a hard drive? Both?
– Client gifts – Do you send a welcome packet, or a few prints after the wedding?
– Subcontracted Services – How much do you pay your second shooters? Do you outsource editing? Do you pay an accountant? Graphic Designer? Consider all of the people that you pay to make your business everything it is.
– Website / Hosting – What does it cost to have your website up and running?
– Software – There is a lot of software I have purchased to make my workflow simpler. From Blog Stomp, to Photo Mechanic, and not excluding Photoshop, Lightroom and the rest of the Adobe Suite.
-Advertising – Are you paying for facebook ads? The Knot? Wedding Wire? How are new people discovering you?
– Insurance – There are many different policies available that make a lot of sense for a small business owner, and they add up quickly!

This is just to get you started, and your list is probably a lot longer than this. When you have calculated a rough estimate of what it is costing you to be in business, you can factor in the amount of money that you want to be making per year. I encourage you to be realistic in this. Maybe make a similar list of your costs that you need to live. Mortgage / Rent? Food?

Here is the fun part! How many weddings do you want to take on in a year? This number is totally personal – There is no right or wrong answer. I know of photographers that want to shoot 50 weddings per year, and I know photographers who want to shoot 10. For me personally, I have found that 25 is a good number. I think it is a good balance for me because more than that, and I would be overwhelmed, and less than that, I might be bored. I also know that it is a manageable client load. I want to give my very best to each of my clients and 25 is a good number for me to give them the best service they deserve.

Once you have your cost to be in business, and the amount of money you need to survive, add those two together. Divide that number by the number of weddings you feel comfortable committing too, and you have a price for your service! Doing this has helped me to feel confident in my pricing, and taught me respect for my own craft.