IN THE KNOW: RUNNING A STUDIO

PROFESSIONAL

portrait photographer Barrie Spence, who also runs Pavilion Photographic Studio in West Lothian, shares his top tips for starting and running a successful photo studio. You can see Barrie’s images atwww. spence photography. co.uk or find out about hiring the photo studio, tuition and workshops atwww.pavi lion photographic studio. co.uk 1 Business ability (especially marketing and sales) is more important than photography skills. If you’re not good at something, get help in that area. Most of us starting out will be one-man-band operations – you’ll be very lucky to use a camera for 20 per cent of your working time. You have to do everything, and that includes cleaning the studio. 2

Your marketing/advertising budget almost certainly needs to be more than you currently spend – business rarely lands in your lap from web searches. 3

If you are worrying about saving pennies on the cost price of products then your prices are too low. If 50p is important to you on the profit margin of a sale, your pricing is all wrong. 4

Develop a relationship with suppliers such as your print lab. Make life easy by having as limited a range of products from as few suppliers as possible. 5

Don’t compete on price – you’ll always find someone foolish enough to offer more for less. 6 The money you earn with your camera needs to sustain all the work that isn’t directly billable. 7

It can take a long time (years) to become established and break even – that’s a fact of business. Many businesses fail because they can’t afford to sustain a longer-thanplanned start-up period. 8

Don’t buy equipment you don’t need. In the end you’ll value the little things that make life easy: good light stands, reliable radio triggers, casters on equipment, and so on. 9 All the mundane, less artistic work (head shots, pack shots, and the like) pays the bills. Shooting models and being artistic might attract attention, but it doesn’t pay your mortgage. 10

Don’t judge your failure based on the apparent success of others – the business is full of illusionists.