I'm not really a message poster sort of person typically, and since I am new here and I don't know the 'culture' I may get flamed to hell for this! But oh well!
I'm leaving Pictage - after 4 years! Just as an experiment, I went to my pictage account page and ran a report for the entire last 12 months. I am so shocked! I knew they were gouging, but this is incredible.
With over 17K in revenue, I actually made a LOSS of 52.76 WOW
I would be really interested to know how others yearly report look.. Hey maybe it's just me (since of course I'm special

My revenue was over $12k and I only made a little more than $1800. I'm now officially using PickPic. Cancellation is in process, though I've heard that can take a while.

However, their account statements are so confusing, who knows what to make of it?

It's not just you. Our numbers actually might be worse than that, I'm just scared to look. My wife did this report once and go really mad.

As Matt has pointed out the benefits are huge. The marketing (spamming often but still marketing), the incredible backup of your work offsite and other stuff, does make it worth it. BUT! The bottom line kills me often. I'm way, WAY cheaper than other peoples prices and my sales are in the toilet so it's totally not worth it for me. And even way cheaper than everyone else, I still get clients complaining about prices. We're dealing with a Costco society and it makes it difficult to sell quality any more. There are so many good points brought up by others but the one they seem to never get right that my wife is just sick over, is their accounting pages around tax time. Seriously, can anyone make heads or tails out of it? Or is Pictage just make "tails" out of us? And are we getting double taxed? Has anyone every addressed that? Oy! Anyway, I hear ya.

I would never be able to have worked it out from their statements. But if you go to reports and run one for the whole year ...... now I understand why their statements are so obscure. They don't want you to know that you're being ripped off. I am also changing to picpick but did not want to seem like I'm advertising or something. I'm simply not allowing any further charges through my cc -

What products did you use Pictage for?

Most of them are money suckers. No way could I make money off of Pictage albums/hi res CDs/etc. I just use it for online proofing and the P3 processing. I tell my couples that if they are going to spend over a certain amount, then it is more financially beneficial to get the hi-res file release, so I'm guaranteed at least a few hundred $$ per event.

I just did my taxes and Pictage didn't seem that gouge-er-ific. But then maybe I need to go back and do another report.....

Actually it's the spamming of my clients that was the last resort as it happens. I'm in DC and do several high profile events. Well one was a wedding and included the head of the Supreme Court + who all else knows. Anyway - NOTHING I could do worked to stop pictage from spamming the s***t out of these guests. So that was it for me. Made me look like a total amatuer because I couldn't control all the emails and re-releases and stupid offers. I even deleted the event and come Christmas time they manage to dig it up and annoy everyone one more time.

YET another reason I'm SO happy that I will NEVER EVER use pictage. I'm sorry to hear about this guys, for your sake. However, I'm happy that the truth can be told here. Thank you for sharing. I'd be interested to see how many people step up and uncover more of these rip-offs.

I just ran the report, and it made me happy!

I think that's great if it's working for you..
I used Survey Monkey last year to get a some feedback on a range of things. Pictage's constant spamming was mentioned more than I thought it would be. I surveyed two years of brides and in that time shot around 145 weddings. - that's a decent cross section to get feedback from.
Although you are happy with the ROI - maybe your clients aren't as wild about the constant emails. Just a thought.
After all- people say the don't like negative political ads but they do work.

I use Photoshelter's Personal Archive. You can start at Free and work up to $100/month.

Off site storage of full rez files
Customizable shopping cart
no spam marketing
Professionals that address your questions personally

Over 85% profit margin last year. yep - for Every $1,000 I made, Photoshelter got $150. I kept $850. A little of that went to WHCC, but still my margins are way positive.

*reality check, Aisle 9*






*moving to Photocart asap*

I know you are upset (I would too) But they are not ripping you off, if by that you mean stealing.

You just had a RUDE AWAKENING! a very painful one at that.You should have known go in that services like Pictage, Collage.net etc are expensive.

When you out source you need to consider the real cost. The truth is that you, like many of us, were bewitched by the tales of outsourcing as the key to prosperity, but never stopped to really consider if it was a sound business decision.

You were told that by outsourcing all that "laborious", "tedious" work of fulfilling orders your were freeing yourself to spend time with family and friends...All that is good but it has a cost, and in this case a very high cost. If we just do the math before spending money we would save a lot of money by avoiding these pitfalls .

And I say this because this "outsourcing" model is spreading like wildfire in the photog community. Now everybody is creating web based "solutions" for everything we do. Even for simple tasks... But because is the fad we jump in it eyes close and then, thousand of dollars later we have a rude awakening.

Pictage charges $99 a month (just the online storage for backup purposes is worth that if you stop and consider how many gigabytes you have with them. Then it charges a 10% (which is the lowest in the market) plus they charge you for the print (at a higher prices than most labs). (compare the cost to Collage.net which is more expensive yet) So, where is the rip off here? No where. There is none. Pictage is just a premium priced service. And you just realized that the COS is higher that you wanted.

Now if you have evidence of hidden cost or that they are actually stealing your money, that another matter and I suggest you go to the proper forum for that.

By the way, I do not use Pictage... I did for a while (not a four year experiment, just few months) and quickly realize that it wasn't for me... Too expensive for my level of online sales.

But beware, there are many "services" been offered to photographers under the guise of making our job easier and really is a way to make money from us.

I dare to say that for most of us Pictage is the wrong solution and that many are there for the networking, and if it works for them and they understand is money well spent, great!

I hate to sound rude, but I am concerned of what I am seeing... and a true friend tells it like it is. I really wish you all well.



Welcome to the Photocart world!!!I been using it since I left Pictage... Work flawless, great price, and awesome support.

Hey believe me, I'm a grown up - totally my own responsibility. Not gasping for your sympanthy either.
I would argue with your definition of a ripoff - I did not mention stealing nor would I.
Of course 'services' are going to make money out of us - I have no problem with that actually. What I have an issue with is taking the whole pie -

As far as premium service ........ nothing about Pictage is particularly premium. I'm not knocking them on tech stuff or accounting - or sending their entire tech support team to Vegas to party (no they did not do that) - just giving some head's up info that others might want to just check into as far as their own needs are concerned.

What's sad is this post won't do much to sway people from using them. Our industry will continue to attract newbies by the droves. Their will always be new people to sell Pictage too.

People have complained about Pictage on here for years and no one will listen. The info is out there on Pictage In fact, if you Google Pictage, you will find more negative then positive.

OK, maybe I'm a little slow but how did they take $17,000 of your $17,000 in revenue? Where did it go? I'm not a Pictage user but I thought it was commission-based. So how did they have a 100% commission and you didn't know about it?

Am I missing something?

I suspect you are right - but hey it's up to each individual.!

Hey Karen -

No offense at all, but are you sure you know what you're looking at when you run those reports? If you're running a 12 month report on "all transactions", then that is factoring in all of your P3 payments AND your royalty checks. Here's what I mean - an example:

Let's say you have the following for March:

P3 Payment $3000
Online consumer order $200
Online consumer order expense $100
Online consumer order net earnings of $100
Royalty check for $3100

This is a very simple example (if only our account statements could look like that - haha!) but you will see my point below:

Pictage will then show the account record as:

March 2008

Revenue: $3200
Expenses: $3100
Net earnings: $100

So, as you can see, when you think "I made a revenue of $3200 and all I got was a measly $100?!" it does sound REALLY bad. However, when you consider that they do not count your P3 earnings that they send you royalty checks for in your Net Earnings, but they DO count it in your overall Revenue, it makes more sense.

Does that help or did you already know that?!

Oh, PS - It also counts any of YOUR orders in expenses when you run "all transactions", which would explain your loss if you didn't make up for your own orders with your print sales. Make sense??

interesting topic. I am very unbiased on this. i have been using Pictage for 3 years but in now way am defending them. it has to make sense profit wise, in ease of use and in quality to be worth it. If it is not profitable or easier than doing it a different way, then by all means do something else.

It is tough to figure out clear numbers but it is very significant to consider what goes into the revenue vs. profit details.

when it shows what a consumer pays, it includes: total selling price of prints, any rush charges, tax and shipping (and potential retouching charges if you have that offered). The the expenses taken out of that include: cost of prints, pictage commission, tax, shipping, and rush charges.

so as an example:

(4) 4x6 @ $5.00=20.00
Rush Fee: $1.95ea=7.80
Tax @ 8.75%=2.40
Shipping=13.90
Total Customer Paid: $44.10

Expenses:
cost of prints=10.00
Rush fee=7.80
tax=2.40
shipping=13.90
Commission @10% of regular order =2.00

Total Photographer Paid: $36.10

Actual Profit on (4) 4x6 @$5.00 ea: $8.00

So if you look at the report: (given this pricing and this average order) you make 40% of orders. This is almost worst case scenario.

a. most people charge more than that for prints
b. not everyone rushes prints
c. hopefully you sell more than 4x6 prints

You just have to look at only the selling price minus the cost of prints and commission to evaluate your profit margin.

If you take orders and order yourself through pictage, you can get proof prints (exactly the same prints without the more in depth auto color correction) for $.40 ea. I think that is very competitive.

I don't know if it is kosher to share numbers on here but for a real world example)

In my 12mo report, I had $19,500 in sales with a $8900 profit. So it is a little higher (46%) than the scenario above. If I charged what I should for 4x6 (maybe $7-10) it would be much higher.

so, is Pictage expensive? that can definitely be argued. But it looks a lot worse than it is if you don't realize what goes into the report.

Wow! I don't know what possessed me to write all that but hopefully it helps. It was good for me to check in on my report again. Thanks for the motivation.

The one big factor as far as feasibility is what it would cost you in time, resources etc to fulfill those orders yourself. My numbers are ONLY based on orders I do not touch. I could never fulfill those orders myself. I would have to do a lot of figuring to find out if hiring someone pay attention to orders, correct images, and order them from a lab would be any more cost effective. Then as some have mentioned there are a lot of other benefits from Pictage.

just my take...I will definitely keep up with this though and would be happy to hear about a workable way to make it happen for less.

one major benefit...(as was mentioned)
Free Credit Card Processing:

Package Prices
Print Order Totals

What is the average % cost for cc processing?

For my package prices + print orders, it was over $85K. From what I know, that would have cost me over $2500 + fees. Well worth the $1200/ yr fee.

Not to mention:

1) not having the headache of having to deal with money coming in from different sources in different forms. We just tell people we take CC now. We don't even say check unless they ask (which is almost never).
2) I feel that P3 gives my clients a very professional appearance for their CC processing - makes them feel secure and like we're running a legit biz. If only they knew -muahahahaha! Just kidding, of course!!

Bingo. Their statements are confusing, but unless you are selling your prints at cost, then you will definitely make money on $17k in revenue. Add all of the checks you have gotten from them over the past year, then come back and let us know. It might be more worthwhile than you thought.

Gerald

did you run your report to show only "Consumer Orders"

It would be impossible to lose money on that. (i think)

i don't use pictage...i use instaproofs.

there are no fees other than the normal 15% from the order total. yes, i have to take the time to process the orders myself but the sheer volume of orders and money i ACTUALLY got in my pocket, i'd gladly process the orders...

last years sales total...

$109,919.03 (500 orders total)
of which, $2,401.87 was tax, $2,725.15 was shipping (wow that seems low)...,

I was paid a total of $98456.55
my fee to instaproofs, $11462.38

you can totally verify it yourself if you have an instaproofs account as you yourself can go under "order stats".

i freaking love instapoofs.

so do my kids college funds.

pictage, no thanks.

HUH?

I'm confused!

1) Where do you live that your tax is less than 2% - wow!
2) If instaproofs charges you 15% of total order cost for their services, you would be paying them $16,487.85 by my calculations. ???
3) If you had used Pictage, you would have made more money. Pictage takes 10% plus tax and shipping from client.

Maybe I'm missing something.

out of state orders = no tax
some of the orders were invoices = 4%
tax in ut is 6.45% and almost ALL of my orders are from clients out of state.

pictage charges per event am i correct? then there are monthly fees, yadda yadda yadda. instaproofs you can put as many events online as you want for free, no hosting fees, no fees what so ever other than the 15% of any order received...plus i don't like the idea of having them print for me. i process orders, burn to dvd and my lab couriers to my front door mon-fri. no problem with prints that look like crap going out without me knowing it...

Okay, that makes more sense.

No per-event fee - just $99 per month and 10% of print sales.
+ free Credit Card processing for me
+ online, off-site back up of all of my events forever
+ I don't ever have to think about prints, shipping, or any of that other nasty stuff.
I really do love Pictage. But I am also really glad you love what's working for you! Keep rockin everyone!

(Pictage should be paying me for this, but they're not, BTW. )

Pictage
Hosting and full res storage - $1,200 a year
Commission - 10% of each sales (lowest of any of them)
cost of prints - (prints at Picatge are more expensive than any lab in the US... Much more expensive)
Shipping & Handling - expensive compare to WHCC for drop shipment

Juan, Pictage do not charge per event. Just a monthly fee of $99. And Juan, for the volume you are doing you have to factor in your labor.



Self-fulfilment option (using photocart)
Initial investment - $279.00 (period... free upgrades for life)
2.9% transaction fee or lower.
hosting - $79.00 a year
Cost of print - way lower than ictage thru WHCC or any similar quality lab
Shipping and handling - WHCC does the drop shipment for you for $7.00 per order

Just do the math and you will see that doing it your self (be it Pickpic or Photocart) you will keep more money in your pocket than with any online solution. ANY! does not matter the name.

What benefits you get by using Pictage? Why would you use Pictage?

- If you do tons of online sales, I mean tons, you save on labor.
- Maybe you hate fulfilling clients print orders... and you are willing to pay others to do it for you.
- You love to share your money with others (I am serious).
- Great networking
- They do some marketing for you (the more you sell, the more they make)
- They have many products under one roof.
- The album designer is nice.
- You don't want to bother taking clients orders.
- You love the relationship you have with them.
- You feel you have people working for you.
- You need an online backup storage for your full res images.

So, there are many valid reasons for using Pictage. It is a matter if is convenient and cost effective for you. It does work great for many people. But for me it wasn't. But because it wasn't right for me I am not going to bash them. We are adults, professionals and we are suppose to think through all our decision. If we screed up, we did, but do not blame Pictage for a bad decision you made.

And Stacy is correct, you make more money and you get more benefits from being with Pictage than with Instanproof. They charge 15% and you still have to do it yourself. Still better to run your own cart.

If you honestly do the number you will find out that Pictage is the best deal for that kind of service. But unless you answered yes to any of the above, if you want to keep more of your money in your pocket... only one choice... do it yourself!

Thanks for the breakdown. I don't use P3, so that's not part of the equation for me.
I don't use Pictage for anything other than on line viewing, orders that clients place on line, and art proofs. It does include the cost of listing with them etc.

Does that not 'Tie you at the hip' to Pictage ?

If you shop around for cc processing companies their charges need not be that high.
On 270K of charges I paid less than 4K in cc charges. I'm not being rude, I just don't understand tying yourself in so closely with one vendor - especially in terms of where your revenue comes in.

Hi Juan,

Seems to me you would be better off with a hosted solution like PickPic et al. Then you would pay 2.5%ish for credit card processing and keep the rest of that 11462.38 for yourself.

-TM

you forgot to subtract your monthly fee - are they still charging that?

edit
i have a merchant account for cc and it costs me $15/month and a nominal discount rate of at the MOST 2%.

if i run cc's through paypal, which is what my cart does, there is no monthly fee, and it's like 2.5%.

if you are using pictage for the cc capability, wow... paying a $50 monthly fee (at least) for 'free' credit card processing? do some math.

as far as reports, paypal and my photocart create all the reports i need and more!!

YES!!! i do have to fill the orders myself. i'm just not that busy that i can't do that, and i LOVE my lab WHCC, who has NEVER let me down on either quality or service.

i love my photocart - and i only paid for it once. totally customizable and full featured.
you will have to fill your orders yourself. so, if you aren't into that it's not for you...
photocart
here's my gallery if you want to see how it looks.

there are more than just comissions to consider with pictage, so the forst statement is not quite adequate.

remember, if you charge more, they take more in comission. so if you charged more it would be more, but not 'much' higher, unless the comission is a flat rate. of course, they are in biz to make money too, so they earn a percentage.

math, math, math.

Hi Karen,

I just sent you an email with some numbers I'd like you to look at. I'd be glad to discuss it all with you once you receive the email.

Sincerely,

Michael Caro
Senior Manager
Pro Consulting Group
Pictage, Inc.

Ummm. so is there a good reason this can't be discussed here? You come on the forum, Michael, to publicly ask the OP to talk with you in private, which is cool, but do you have nothing else to add to the conversation?

Hi Bruce,

The reason I didn't get into specifics is that I'd like to first discuss it with Karen, the original poster. I don't think it's right of me to post any kind of financial information about her account without first speaking with her.

I can tell you that I ran some numbers, the amount we've charged to her credit card and the amount we've paid her in Royalty checks since she started with us, and that showed we paid her a lot more than she paid us over the years.

I will share more if Karen says it's OK for me to.

Michael Caro
Senior Manager
Pro Consulting Group
Pictage, Inc.

Well, that's fine, Michael, but you could have then contacted Karen by phone or email and kept it all private before posting here, for all to see, your attempt to work with her. Get my point?

In other words, posting just to let us all know you would like to work with Karen in private seems more a publicity stunt than anything even approaching helpful and relevant to all the other posters in this thread ... all who would like to know what's really up!

And being in the position you are in, you should have plenty of helpful, useful, relevant information that can be discussed aside from Karen's personal issue.

It's funny because if you look at a simple scenario, you'd see how just the credit card processing alone would not only PAY your monthly fee on Pictage, you'd be making more money.

Paypal (or similar) $15/month merchant acct, 2.5% per transaction: Cost on $100,000 in revenue: $2,680.00

Pictage $100/month, 0% per transaction: Cost on $100,000 in revenue: $1,200.00

So, your way of doing things actually cost you $1,480 more than it cost me. I'm not talking about the commissions on orders, which is 10%, I'm talking about strictly credit card processing. All my brides pay my shooting fee / packages with credit card.

In looking at it this way, I essentially have a service that MORE than pays for itself financially, takes a ton off my plate with not having to process anything, which even the easiest carts make you do, and I make money without doing anything. I woke up this morning to find that two orders were placed last night, and I didn't have to do a thing.

Math, math, math, right?

Hi Michael.
I have not had an email from you.....
If you show me I am wrong - then within reason I don't mind sharing that info with others if it's helpful to others, but not until we have discussed this first. I'm not here to blacken Pictage, just pointing out that looking at what you are paying adds up to a whole lot more than 10% commision, and it's a good idea for everyone to be a lot more aware of their cost for this type of service than I was.

That statement kind of sucks. I didn't realize Pictage was only for newbies...

I am one of those Pictage members that rides the love/hate line. I have had many problems with them, but Michael Caro himself actually fixed one of the issues for me when I really needed it done.

I am going to switch labs because it just doesn't fit for where my business is at NOW. It was great a couple of years ago for me, but the market here has changed so much that most of my clients would rather pay alot more to purchase the files of the pictures, and have them printed on thier own. my printing rights sales have gone WAY up but my print sales have gone WAY down, so I need to evolve, and Pictage just doesn't seem finacially responsible right now.

I paid Pictage $1400 last month, but I did my research for what I ordered, and I could have ordered better products for Half of what I paid Pictage, and I wasn't paying for the "hands off" treatment, because I had some album orders that were supposed to go to binding, and they ended up sending the prints to me instead, so I spent ALOT of time trying to figure out how to get the pictures back to Pictage, and to binding and still get the albums back in the time that I promised the client they would be back in. I still haven't figured that one out.

Hi Jeff,

Yes, your math is correct, but then Pictage adds 10% (I think) for print orders, so the total cost via Pictage would be $11,200.

-TM

Michael from Pictage called and we discussed some numbers. It was not really clear to either of us, so he is sending over everything to their account section who will try and spreadsheet it for me to see if it makes more sense that way. Stay tuned.

<bolding mine>

Wow, spam-o-lot plus accounting that even they don't get. Sign me up... oh.. wait, please don't.

Heading back to my seat in the peanut gallery.

~Bill

PS. I just bought the same cart Robin has because it fits where my business is going this year. To each there own...

Hey TM!

I think all that Jeff was arguing here was the benefit of the P3 Payment Processing. The $100,000 in revenue that he was using as an example was "revenue" processed through P3 (not print orders).

What it comes down to (at least in my mind:) ) is this:

1) If you receive a large amount of your monthly income through client credit card transactions, do the math and figure out if paying $99 per month for Pictage is worth the FREE CC Processing they offer through P3.

Here's an example of how to figure it out:

how much would I be charged for "X" other merchant service to accept credit cards. For paypal, it's somewhere around 2.5%. Just for the sake of simple math, if 100% of my clients pay by credit card and I have a monthly CC income of $10,000, I owe Paypal $250 in merchant fees. However, if I am with Pictage, I owe $99 every month for ALL of their services, not just CC processing. For me, the math more than adds up for me to use Pictage.

2) if you like the idea of off-site storage of your events forever, then go ahead and add more mental value points to Pictage. For me, this is worth a LOT because I am super paranoid about backing up my pictures!!

3) if you like the idea of never having to process an order on your own and having that arm of your business completely outsourced, more value points.

4) if you feel confident that your clients are email-savy enough to "opt out" of Pictage's emails if they don't want to receive them, but you like the idea of someone else doing your print marketing for you, then add more value points. A lot of people argue that you could make SOOO much more money using a cart system and you wouldn't have to bug your clients. I'm sorry, but, as much as it stinks, my print sales went WAAAAY up once I had Pictage start bugging my clients on my behalf. If your pics are out of sight, they're out of mind. If your clients (and their families and friends) are reminded of your pictures, they're more likely to buy. OR maybe some of them are more likely NOT to buy. You just have to figure out which way it works for your clients. For me. I get way more sales this way.

5) Notice I put this dead LAST: making money from print orders. I have structured my business in a way to not expect or depend on print orders, as have most of you. ANY print orders I receive are a fun bonus in my mind of using Pictage. To me, this is the last in the order of important services Pictage provides. However, having said that, I have been very lucky to have made a little extra money (without lifting a finger) by using Pictage to fulfill my prints.

I've gotten a few PMs from people as a result of this topic. That's fun - I love hearing from you! But here's what I want to say now: I am not saying that Pictage is the best solution for everyone. However, I do think it's the best solution for the outsourcing of your Credit Card processing AND print fulfillment that's out there.

If you don't care about outsourcing, then you should never ever ever ever waste your time arguing about how much Pictage sucks - why do you care????? You're not trying to outsource!! For what it is supposed to be (an OUTSOURCED print fulfillment solution) it is really really good. No, not perfect, but really good.

As for all the talk of bad customer service, angry clients who are tired of the emails, poor print quality, etc., well, I have NEVER had any of those problems. However, I do not discount that there are consumers out there (remember, I have a grandma, too!) that will be angry about being bugged, and if you are having more of those than happy, satisfied customers, than maybe Pictage is not right for your demographic of client. OR maybe it would be good for you to include "opt out" instructions when you release your events to your clients. That's always another option.

Anyway, I do love Pictage, but I was very hesitant to love them at the beginning. Pictage is something that I am now very satisfied with, but they will need to continue to earn my business, just like all of my other vendors. I really do think that Pictage is something you have to give some time to figure out if it's right for you, but if you do figure out it's not right for you, fine. But it IS right for a LOT of people who can attribute a lot of their own business's success to the help they've received from Pictage's services.

Hi Stacy,

OK, I didn't understand that Pictage will process "generic" charges for you. You're saying that you can direct Pictage to charge a client, for example, $5000 for a coverage fee?

If so, I might still want to pay more to have my studio name appear on their statement as opposed to Pictage.

-TM

Yes, everything you said was right. I am not sure what the Statement ends up saying, but obviously, if that is a priority to you, then you would want to investigate that and maybe choose another solution. When the link directs the client to purchase their package, it says "Stacy Cross" on the email and on the page where they pay. I've never had an issue with my clients being confused at all - and my business is 99.9% CC!

The following is just my opinion...

I am in HUGE agreement with this point. With large scale businesses like Costco and Wal-Mart offering prints at 19 cents a piece (and consumers learning to expect that as a standard price), prints have become a commodity. The only way to compete in a commodities business is high volume on low margins. Yes, prints from a professional photography studio are in a different class. But how many of you enjoy repeatedly educating your clients on that matter?

Ask yourself if you provide a product or a service. The answer for myself is that I provide a service, and for that, all of my financial decisions (costs, prices, revenues, investment...everything with a dollar sign) are based primarily on TIME. I've assigned myself a professional hourly rate which should be between $75-$100 an hour if you respect yourself. So if I'm busy placing orders, that time has to be included in the cost of the prints, and at that rate, it'll eat up my profit so fast. My time is better invested (NOT spent...very big difference) on developing relationships and doing other things that solidify that service aspect face to face with other people. That's where my revenue will come from later. I take a kind of 'reverse psychology' approach to defining costs and investments in determining what activity will produce my largest ROI.

I didn't mean it was just for newbies. I was trying to say there would always be a brand new crop of newbies coming in that would be unaware of negatives of Pictage. Plenty of succesful photographers that make a lot of money use Pictage. Frankly my business received too many complaints about the print quality, poor customer service, and amount of time it took to get prints out from our clients. As far as Pictage saving you time, I spent more time on the phone with Pictage dealing with issues than I do now fulfilling my own orders! This is a fact.

The big thing that stands out to me is that between the 10% comission and the extremely high print prices, I was sharing 50% of the entire order with Pictage. With the way I am fulfilling on my own now, my print cost is less than 10%! When I did the math, I realized that I would be saving $700.00 a month from self fulfilling print orders on my own. I literally could hire someone part time to do this without me having to touch any of and still come out cheaper than Pictage. Plus, I'm delivering a lot better product.

Oh, I'm using Photocart for my online ordering now if you were wondering.