Topic: Con Artists are among us!

[Francois]

Has any of you ever received a call from the photo studio of a large department store chain offering you a free 8x10 portrait?

This happened to my mom's hair dresser... and she almost fell for it. I must admit that when I heard about this trick, I couldn't believe my ears (and almost couldn't stop laughing!).

Here's the story: She gets the call from the studio and thinks it would be a great idea to have a portrait of her daughter. Not having much money, the word "free" is too good to pass up so she makes an appointment.

The studio is located at the back of the store in a space more akin to a storage room than a professional studio. Since she doesn't know anything about photography, I can only guess that the large banks of lights we usually see weren't there... neither was a high end camera.

Once at the studio, the old photographer (who she says obviously needed a haircut... she is a hairdresser) has her select a backdrop (well... not really since there was only an old curtain and a chair). He poses his daughter and takes a few pictures. Then he goes to his desk and tells the customer that they have to make a second appointment to come and pick up the picture. That a good portrait takes a long time and great care to get processed and that he will hand pick what he considers to be the best picture in the lot according to his long (cough) experience as a portrait photographer.

Clients don't know that he packs everybody to come at the studio at the same time to give the impression that his work is "in demand".

Now this is where the con happens. He always selects the worse picture of the set, prints it off as 8x10 and gives it to the customer. This is the free picture offer.

He also shows the customer a contact sheet of every print he took during the session (contact sheet he keeps for his own "archives" so the client can't clip out the images). The store know that looking at the contact sheet, the client will order other "better looking" prints, thus selling crappy pictures at a premium.

Well... when she discovered the workings of the trick, she decided to keep the free print and not order any of the others.

I guess there is a morale to this story... but I just can't find it right now  

[Heather]

the moral is, if it's too good to be true, it is?

or if you're not soliciting a service, you shouldn't take it...

To be honest, I suspect quite a lot of more professional photo studios do a similar thing! Luckily my parents never did the whole trooping of the kids to the nearest cheesy photo studio for christmas family photos so I wouldn't know.

[original_ann]

Such a shame to say, but I wouldn't be surprised if this wasn't a common practice, albeit at a much more discreet level.    And I suppose that there is a fine line between creative marketing practices vs. con job thievery. 

 One can only hope that people will look and listen to any warning signs that things seem 'off' and steer clear of the criminals who potentially leave a stain on legitimate photographers that try to make an honest living.

[Pete_R]

I'm not sure there's really anything wrong as this is no different than a supermarket selling something at a loss to get people through the door in the hope they will buy other things which make the store a profit. Would you call these stores criminals or con artists?

The practice of giving away a free print is widespread. There's nothing wrong in that. No one is forcing the customer to buy anything. The photographer may use his best selling skills to try to get the customer to buy other prints, but he can't make them. As for the photographer giving away his worst print, well, you could say it's a matter of opinion, but he isn't going to give away the best one any more than the supermarket is going to give away their best champagne in the hope the customer will also buy a tin of beans.

Some years ago, I was heavily into portraits and went to a number of seminars on the subject, all of which included a large section on selling and marketing. I can't remember specifics but there were a number of 'schemes' to get customers to book a sitting. Giving a free print was often part of the deal. Ultimately, it's a numbers game. There will always be a percentage of customers who take the free print and leave but many will buy extra ones. One of the ideas I used was to run a competition. The prize was a free sitting and some pictures. Runners up (that means every one else) got a free sitting. I had people literally knocking on my door to make sure I received their entry - they were that keen. Ultimately, the winner got their free prints and everyone else got to pay for theirs. I only had one person complain and, if I remember, one other who didn't buy anything. Am I a con artist? I don't think so...

Here's a piccy I took around that time (probably 15+ years ago).

[Francois]

the moral is, if it's too good to be true, it is?

Or better yet, it's better to have friends who are photographers

[CarlRadford]

Can I nominate Peter R as my friend or doesn't work like that

[Pete_R]

Can I nominate Peter R as my friend or doesn't work like that

Er.. ahem.. OK. Works for me. Shall we book the ceremony now or shall we get to know each other a bit first?