Wedding Photography 2012: Is A Photo Booth In Your Future?

Add a photo booth to your 2012 weddings – go into detail about what they do, what the cost, how to promote etc

What do brides of 2012 want?

If you are targeting wedding clients, it’s the first place to start when deciding how to market your photography to newly engaged couples.

In too many cases photographers are creating packages that have been around for decades, offering services that are more than familiar, and not giving a newly engaged couple any more options than couples had 10, 20 or even 30 years ago.

And because more photographers are out there than ever, it’s a tough road to head down.

Head back in time 20 years and people were spending lavishly on weddings. But now that’s just not the case.

I found a great article that describes the new generation of wedding professionals in detail.

• People are getting married later in life, and in many cases have a variety of commitments, such as houses and children, already in place.

• The middle class is being eroded, meaning they don’t have the resources they once had. Borrowing against equity on a house or using credit cards is no longer the norm.

• More players are in the industry thanks to the huge amounts of job losses over the past few years. They don’t have the experience or the investment that the pros do – but they do leave the consumer puzzled and uneducated about what high quality really means.

You simply can’t ignore what is happening in the industry.

Which means the smart business people are looking for other options, and looking at what brides and grooms of today really want.

Is A Photo Booth The Answer?

People today love quick snapshots. Its what they take every day. Its what they are growing used to.

There is nothing elegant, beautiful or even unique about a handheld shot taken with a phone at arms length, with a few friends leaning in smiling. Yet that’s the new norm.

Which feeds into the concept of a photo booth.

A group of friends pile in, ham it up for the camera, and walk away with quick results.

But the photo booths of today can offer more. Not only can friends walk in for quickie pictures and walk away with a strip of photos, the photos can also be stored and given to the host after the event is over either in hard copy form, or on a flash drive or DVD.

Customized photo booths don’t provide simple black and white strips. You can customize the backgrounds to include the event names and dates. Or try adding graphics such as wedding bells or love birds. Whatever the couple desires and has used as a theme can be incorporated into the final images.

Set up a photo booth in a corner of the reception room and let the fun begin. While you’re out taking more personalized images, direct the guests over to the photo booth. Once you get a handful using it, it will sell itself. People will be running over with many different groupings to join in the fun.

Sell it to the bride

While there are a few companies out there today selling the photo booth concept, most are providing it as their only service. Which means they have the process of educating a client on why they need it in addition to a wedding photographer, and justifying the extra cost coming out of the already stretched budget.

If you as a photographer add it into your existing service, you’ll be able to add more to your bottom line, and give your clients even more options. It won’t become an either/or debate. It will simply become an addition to something they were already purchasing.

While you can rent out just the photo booth, where your real opportunity lies is in combining it with your wedding photography. Take your best selling package and add in a photo booth. Don’t offer it at lower prices; instead make it an incentive to move up to a higher priced package. Create larger packages that offer the photo booth rental and your photography, thus increasing your average package price without increasing your work load.

To offer a photo booth, you will have to invest in a quality photo booth and in the resources it takes to operate it (paper, ink, etc) Do a quick Google search and you’ll quickly find a variety of photo booth options at wholesale prices. Make sure you invest in one that provides you with the options you are looking for.