bkyser Loc: Fly over country in Indiana

First, who is your preferred supplier for wedding albums?

Second, this is bugging me. No matter how much I try to move to the "lay flat" type books, nobody around my area (we're a very low cost of living area which is good, but also low salaries, so people freak out at the costs of albums as it is)

Have any/all of you made the transition to the lay flat books? I love them, and people I show them to, love them, when I show them the cost, they just want the "standard" albums. The few times I just showed lay flat, and didn't give them the standard option, people just didn't want albums.

This bugs me, because I still think the album is actually the best thing for clients. They don't usually keep things hung on the wall forever, but the albums sit on coffee tables forever. People just look at the short term.

fotodon Loc: Oberlin, OH

Just for clarification, when you say "lay flat" are you referring to "coffee table books" as opposed to the old style or traditional style with pages with mattes, which is what you may mean by "standard" albums. Boy, it has gotten crazy for us old timers. Trying to keep up with all the "album" products is, well, trying. It used to be "library, post or hinge bound and then which mattes to get. Now its photo paper printed or press printed? Which coating and/or finish? Thick or thin? Seamless gutters? Faux matte pages or not? Hard or soft cover and "how many material options did they say are available for the hard cover"? Sheesh!!!

As you know Bob, we don't do shoot and burn so albums are an integral part of our packages. Terri has always used Renaissance brand "traditional style" albums, either library or hinged style. These make up most of our sample albums and probably effect our branding. So, most of our customers expect to get this instead of a coffee table book.
About 7 or 8 years ago we contemplated adding coffee table books to our line when Albums Inc. started selling the Album Epoca line. These were the only ones that seemed to be high enough quality to fit our brand. But the price was just too high to make it viable.

Now, fast forward. Today, the wide range of coffee table books in pricing and quality is staggering. However, the price of these has gone down and the general quality up. Although, I am not sure about the quality since I have been hearing a lot of complaints and none of them have been on the market long enough to know the real archival value. I believe that Album Epoca is still the very best.

I now think that a quality coffee table book can be purchased for about the same price as a quality traditional style album. Given the labor intensiveness of putting together a traditional album it may be that the coffee table style is better for the business. Lord knows, it is what the brides are seeing all the time now. Maybe selling traditional is what is helping us old timers stand out from the crowd.

I have an item very high on my "to do" list called "research albums". If I ever get to it I will share what I find with you and the other UHHers on the Wedding section. In the meantime, maybe there are some UHHers on here that have some recommendations. Sorry, you already asked that.

I can add that we have supplied a couple of economy minded people with a coffee table style book. I was very impressed with the build quality of these. Nothing terribly impressive but very competitive in price. I got them from Adorama Pix. Other than that, our wedding and event print business goes to H & R.

Beercat Loc: Central Coast of California

Photo albums really comes down to price ........... another words, what does what charge, what is your niche.

I think there are 3 major categories of wedding snappers.

1. Shoot and burn (the bottom feeders - weekend snappers)

2. The high end pro snapper who gets his price based on quality and reputation

3. Somewhere in the middle, I'm one of those. Our bread and butter packages range from $1800 - $2300. We do not provide albums for this price. We will snap 400 - 600 pictures during the day and after tossing out the duds and repeats we end up delivering 300 - 450 enhanced high res stills with a 2 person team. We end up making about $35 - $40 per man hour. Out of that we need to pay for equipment, advertising, taxes, insurance ......... gets real thin fast.

Fortunately we primarily shoot combos which brings up the price point considerably but we still make about $35 - $40 per man hour.

When your in the middle ground most clients are not expecting albums. In our neck of the woods young couples seem to be gravitating more toward video and less emphasis on stills, thus the combos work well. Our combos go out for $3000 - $3500 but still no album, nor engagement shots.

Before you back east snappers have a cow remember what it cost to live out in California in one of the nicer areas. We struggle, but as I say we tread water better than most.

bkyser Loc: Fly over country in Indiana

Sorry, lay flat is "hinged style" The traditional ones that people DO buy from us are the less expensive library type "press printed" bound books, where, when you open them, the pages hump in the middle. The thing I love about lay flat is that you can do a huge panorama across both pages, and insert smaller photos. Just doesn't work with the "old library style bindings"

bkyser Loc: Fly over country in Indiana

We sound pretty much in the same ballpark. The album is available, but not included. Our home here (mine is 2400 square feet, 5 bedrooms, 3.5 bathrooms, and a above the garage "in law" apartment with it's own kitchen and plumbing....roughly 25 years old...) about $120,000 So, imagine what you would pay for that same house in the east, west, or south. Unfortunately, with the low cost of living, it is also low wages, so it evens out. (when I tell people what we charge in a forum, they think we are shoot and burn, it is all relative)

When you do sell albums, who do you use, and what "style" do people want? (lay flat, or standard "library" binding?) I really feel that the quality of the lay flat (hinged) is worth the extra, but people in this neck of the woods, just won't see the long term view. Frankly, I'd rather have a really nice wedding album, than prints for the walls, but that's still what people want here. I have actually tried to put together a package choice that included no prints, but did include 1 main album and 2 "parent" albums, but have never had a taker. Albums, and what people "think" they are worth here, would almost be a money losing proposition if I charged what people want to pay.

My main goal for this line of questioning is that I want to do a really spectacular lay flat album, and do the exact same thing at Wal-Mart, and let people really see the difference. It is one thing to explain it, another thing to show it. I would like to find out who some of the people I respect here use. I'm not necessarily going for the least expensive, but can't go with top of the line, because our Midwest economy and the mindset in a small community just won't support it. I need middle of the road, with the best quality you can expect for less than the top dollar.

I hope that makes sense? I'm not expecting the best book in the business for the least amount of money. I want the best book available in the moderate price range.

It is just so sad, because I think people tend to look at albums over the years, with grandkids, on anniversaries, etc. , and the pictures on the wall get replaced in a few years.

Beercat Loc: Central Coast of California

That same house in the town I live in would be $550K - $600K ..... care to exchange package fees and mortgage payment?

You made my point, thanks ;-)

If someone wants a wedding book they can order it directly from my on-line gallery, I take no cut and the prices are good, plus they can put it together themselves.

fotodon Loc: Oberlin, OH

I see. So we are not talking at all about the "traditional" type album where you slide or stick prints into matted pages. I would love to get away from those but has proven to be difficult. I have wondered if some of our business comes to us because we are in a minority of pros that still offer this.

Generally, we do not do press printed books. I acknowledge that press printing has advanced greatly in quality and color rendition in the past few years but Terri is a huge fan of photo paper printing. She is fine with press printed for soft cover "memory" books like birthday or christening and such. And maybe budget parents or bridal party books.

To more directly answer your original post...branding is directly driven by what you are offering, both service and product. Once your brand is established it is hard to change it. Just ask Coke. LOL Service and product offered is often driven by your business model. Your basic business model may be high volume, low margin or low volume, high margin or something in between.

Terri, because she never liked the idea of having employees thus never had any, was somewhere in that in between area. Thankfully, high quality product and service was always part of her branding. This has made it easier to transition from in between to low volume, high margin in our semi-retired days. Of course, state of the economy and changing consumer expectations has muddied the waters.

So, Bob, in your case, I would suggest that your difficulty in up selling to lay flat books may be due to your branding. All those "library" bound books that you have sold probably have your name on them and are a huge form of advertising driving referral type potential customers. When those B&Gs come to you they have seen and supposedly liked those books and probably have an idea of the cost of your packages. Up selling at that point is difficult if you are not a slick salesman, and most of us are not.

At this point, you have probably surmised that we are experiencing a similar situation as you. We want to transition from traditional albums to quality lay flat coffee table books. You, I think, would like to transition from press printed "library" books to quality lay flat books. BTW...For what ever it is worth, I think this is a very logical and sound business move. I think, for both of us, this requires a change in branding.

So, how do we do that? I think, removing the product that we don't want to sell from our line is the starting point. How and how fast to do that is up for grabs. It takes a smarter marketing person than me to figure that out. Next is to really fine tune our sales pitch for the new product. For those of us weak in salesmanship, pricing can be a worthy tool. Gradual up selling helps also. In other words, displaying an "old" product next to the "new" product for about the same price will self sell the new product. Needless to say, the new product must be of sufficient quality so as not to come back and haunt us later. (Hurt our brand) Depending on what you are charging for the old product, you may have to start with a new product as a "loss leader". This is a common marketing tool used to drive a customer to a new product and the loss is always short term and often absorbed by price increases elsewhere.

I don't know if this will help you, but Adorama Pix offers a nice selection of albums. I don't know who actually does the work for them but I would not be surprised if they were done by a reputable well known lab/printer. You can look up the details but here are the basics. They are photo paper printed on heavy stock. (Does not bend under it's own weight) IMO, well built. They are lay flat with a fairly seamless joint. Not the best but acceptable for panoramas. Lots of options, including free online customer review. Pricing very competitive, example: Faux leather (nice) cover, 12 x12, 26 sides, $126.00. The hard cover (photo print) cover is 33% less. To me, this is a good point to start with and you can gradually transition up to something super upscale like Albums Epoca (Italian made) if you wish. And, IMO, Adorama Pix is a good source for those Parents books and other event memory books. There may be other acceptable sources for the same thing but almost everything in the same price range, that I have observed at trade shows have been unacceptable to me.

Not to get long winded, (oops, already have), I hope this helps. Again, thanks Bob for starting this Wedding Photography subject on UHH. What a relief from the sometimes tiresome posts on the General Discussion board. LOL And, no, I do not work for Adorama!

bkyser Loc: Fly over country in Indiana

All very good information, thanks. I've never used Adoramapix for anything, but have used Adorama. Of course, different divisions don't always mean the same quality and service. Good to hear that you've actually seen them. I may try them out as my "sample" I'm thinking of going to Walgreens and getting the cheapest one they have, so I can show people the difference. If they want Walgreens quality, well, there isn't much I can do about that, but they'll be paying me for the digital copies of the images for the book, so I guess I'll make my money in a much easier way. :-)

bkyser Loc: Fly over country in Indiana

Absolutely not, because my annual salary for my day job, wouldn't get me a cardboard box in your neighborhood.

Actually, what service do you use where your clients can make their own books and keep me out of the loop. I think I'd be happy with letting them do that. Since I can't mark up an album in this market, and make it even worth my time, I wouldn't mind just adding it as a service, where they get to do the work, but avoid the mark ups.

Thanks for the ideas
bk

greg vescuso Loc: Ozark,Mo.

My daughter works a Blackriverimaging and their lay flat books are some of the best out there. They are pricey but the quality is worth it. I have used some of their lower priced ones for senior albums and they sell but the top end wedding lay flat are out of the price range of the relatives I shoot wedding for.

Beercat Loc: Central Coast of California

They can do it right from the gallery on Smugmug

bkyser Loc: Fly over country in Indiana

Well, if it comes to that, I may be setting up a smugmug account after all.

Thanks

Beercat Loc: Central Coast of California

The reality is brides can do their own books from the gallery or on the cheap at Costco ........ Costco even provides the templates and tools to make it custom, all for about $30.

Is it a top end book, nope, but it meets the needs of many brides. Is someone really looking at a friends book going to say it looks like garbage, nope, your looking at pictures ......

bkyser Loc: Fly over country in Indiana

I guess the deciding factor is that we don't give all images to the client, only the candid shots, and shots that they either purchase prints, or the digital images of the prints they purchase in their package. The reason I even include those is because I found out years ago, that if they have the print, they'll scan it and have a digital copy anyway, so I just give it to them, and "act" like it is a great service to them. :-)

Beercat Loc: Central Coast of California

There is no right or wrong on this issue, some of us attract a different client. My client is one that is willing to pay for good photos and have someone with expertise do the PP. We are the compromise between the shoot and burn, who charge less than us and the high end photographer who charges more but usually has more years of experience, superior equipment and offers more personal service such as included engagement session, consultation and high end add-ons.

If we shoot 500 photos at a wedding we will end up with 300 enhanced high resolution stills after we toss out the duplicates, mistakes and people with eyes closed. We give them all the enhanced stills but the duds we trash.