I'm probably the last person who should say this, but....


COWBELL anyone???

Hold up Matt...I have an MBA...which means nothing more than I had $35,000 that I didn't know what to do with (okay, yeah, most of that was my FTE's money...) at the time. (true also that I was childless when I started the program... and my household actually had two full time wage earners...gosh, those were the daze...)

The hardest class I had during my MBA daze (in fact, same for my undergrad daze), was Financial Management. And one of the most important lessons taught in that class is that the average investor cannot consistently beat the market over time (yeah, we actually had formulas that supported a lot of that crap). If Brady is making a lot of money on the market right now (most of us in mutual funds have done well over the last 2 years)...it probably means he hasn't been in the market long enough to experience some of the downturns (no disrespect Brady...).

Typical photographers who play the market are likely to earn typical returns. But it's not a place for the casual artist who knows little about P/E ratios to jump in and make millions.

Just my 2¢ (adjusted for inflation)...




Outlier (no 'n').

And if you want to be an outlier in any business...you don't just hang out a shingle with the highest price in town. Better have some skillz too...

Well, unless you want to be an outlier on the low end of the spectrum.

Ya know...John might be a curmudgeon (quite often I can relate)...but experience tells me that much of the time he knows what he is talking about.

Price, quality and speed is often referred to as the law of the unattainable triad...and typical successful companies can achieve two of three. VERY successful companies will lead in two areas and give the feeling to their customers that they have done well in all three. Sure, Southwest Airlines is a value airline...they have fabulous on-time ratings and their prices are extremely competitive. But their safety record and other factors are indicators that their quality (on in their case "value") is superior to high end airlines (which may be a bad example...is their such thing as a high end airline anymore? Okay, yeah, buy your own plane!)

If you are trying to compete in a highly saturated industry like wedding photography, generally speaking you are gonna have to compete in most of those areas he mentioned. If you don't believe this...try sacrificing (majorly) in any area and see how your customers respond.



Those people need to deliver speed to keep up with demand...else, they fail too...

(I don't just make this stuff up to be entertaining...)

I agree and I agree. However, if doing stocks *does* make Brady or whoever some money, why not? As I've said elsewhere I did this stock game for about 3 years and beat the market for 3 years pretty hands down. At any rate you are totally right it's not something for everyone. However, if you can make money at it, why *not* do it? Because there's a chance it'll collapse or you will suck at it? Set limits. There's a chance we'll get run over by a truck tomorrow too but most of us go outside. We just don't cross the road in front of trucks we can see coming.

Well, if they REALLY want to be an outlier, they can fail miserably on all points.

You've consistently bagged on me and my friends (Gary, Mike and more) to try and cause a stir and to be honest it's lame. I do not go around telling people their wrong. I certainly have said things I regret but I think most will agree that the majority of my communication is done positively and is encouraging to people.

I only intend to share my experience and other things that I've come to realize. It's fine for you to disagree with me but I'm not interested in debating with you and I didn't write you back because I'm not interested in doing a workshop with you which is what you were pitching.

Cheers,
DJ

Actually I think Pictage is doing just that.

(sorry...I'm laughing so hard I'm about to asphyxiate right now...)

Death to Dan Watkins.

at least put a smiley in there or something...i'm holding a 2 year old with croup as i'm typing this...

grrrrrr.....

No disrespect taken

When is your newsletter coming out?

hahahaha, that is not my family down there

price, quantity, artistry, speed, and quality

Name one photographer in the top 50 in our industry that is competitive in all 5 areas.

It's not DJ, Buissink, Yervant, Marcus Bell, Gino, Huy, Jeff Woods, Jeff Hawkins, Gary Fong (as a photog), Denis Reggie, Todd Johnson, Mike Colon, John Michael Cooper, Jessica Claire, Becker, Liana, Julia Bailey, Jose Villa, Bambi Cantrell, Jerry Ghionis, Kevin Kubota, Fuzzy Duenkel....who'm I missing?

I agree with what you said "compete in most of those areas" but I also think you have to focus your marketing & your business on one thing that you do better than almost anyone. Now THAT you can sell. All those above people are selling quality but probably none of them are competing on quantity. They're all trying to compete on artistry to a point but most probably don't compete on speed at all and NONE of them compete on price.

I think what you're saying is "we should have no gaping holes - we have to be adequate or better at everything" - and I agree 100%. But to be better than average you're also going to have to focus on one thing and do it really well - whether that's speed or quality. That's what I'm saying.

(and yes I was trying to create the most google-able post on osp. lol)

Wow, how is everything getting so heated here lately?

Anyway, I think everyone has some good points. Every business is a little different and should be. But I always love listening to people who have been successful. I may not take every piece of advice, but I think it never hurts to keep an open mind. I'll never outsource my editing. I'll never batch process. But I'm going to outsource my albums because I'm not great at it. I'm way more interested in being a good photographer. And I'm OK with that.

I do think it's pretty lame that people continually point out that DJ is making money off other photographers. I mean, aren't we all trying to make a living off selling stuff??? If someone comes up with something that makes my life a little easier, I'm going to buy it. I've spent money on worse things. (Probably way too much on Natural Ice in college). It seems like whenever anyone wants to go for the throat around here, they make a snide comment about someone making money. Kevin gets hell for spending time making a cool InDesign tutorial and charging $35 bucks. I spend more on toilet paper in a week. Talk about feeling ripped... ouch.

I'm here all night, folks.

shane...what brand of tp?? brady and I have some stock we want to buy tomorrow...

how have i bagged on anyone? the only "bagging" that i could see anyone making a point on is with the gary fong post of probably a year ago, but i think even that is pushing it. how the heck do i bag on mike? i assume you mean mike colon? the guy who i always says is the shizzle dizzle and the guy i always say was the one who gave me the inspiration for the new site and new studio? that's the guy i bag on all the time? you have to do better than that DJ, the entire boards knows i have serious man love for mike colon. id say him and becker were probably my biggest inspirations.



then dont debate, leave it alone instead of flaming me.



classy post. real classy. another true DJ moment. actually what happened is i emailed DJ, garrett, and liana and asked them what they thought of a OSP-university like they have over at DWF. i even offered to not be included in it, but i thought it would be a great opportunity to get people together while also providing a learning experience.

and from that you post on OSP that i was trying to pitch a workshop to you. yet another example of the DJ that i know.

Which brand... I'm buying their stock tonight, who needs p/e and bollinger bands when you've got a power-user

EDIT: Oh Dan, you beat me by just a few seconds with that smart remark!

as soon as i get my sponsors all lined up...

just kidding!

i've been working on albums the last few weekends...so the newsletter will be out in a few weeks...but it'll still be free...(first issue, anyway! )

I'm not a curmudgeon (yet) - I just try to keep reminding people to have a balanced view about things. Regarding service and deliverables, half the time, all you hear about is how important it is to "delight" your customers, while the other half of the time, all you hear about is how important it is to streamline your workflow. The problem is that "delighting" your customers seems to mostly mean having a really fancy business card and a 50" plasma screen in your studio - while streamlining your workflow means sacrificing your product so that you can have more free time (and figuring that the client will never notice because they have no other experience to compare it with).

If "managing customer expectations" is the ideal, then the big national companies that are coming will be able to do it cheaper, faster, and better - and with a national brand name and a multi-million dollar advertising campaign they will be able to let everybody know that they are. The independents that are left will be the ones who don't cut corners anywhere.

beat 'ya to it brady...and i'm holding a sleeping child and typing w/ one hand!!!

I'm a Charmin man. Hey, didn't The Smiths write a song about that. Oh, wait, that was "This Charming Man." Nevermind.

Thanks Shane... time to look up who makes Charmin

Had to stop using Scotts. Too many breakthroughs.

Proctor & Gamble...

and their P/E is a healthy 22.95 (blue chip)

for some reason i doubt you mean innovations...

speaking of healthy stocks...don't you wish you would have bought Sandisk stock 4 years ago...I mean...along with those 64 mb cf cards...maybe 1000 shares of their stock?

No kidding... i'll email you one of my top speculative stocks for 2007 if you are interested. it could very well be like lexar or sandisk is now... or it could go bankrupt

You were pitching a workshop to me and asking for my endorsement...by not responding I was saying no....again...I'm sorry you continue to cause these little fights on OSP. It's not my kind of interaction. I really don't have an interest in continuing going back and forth with you.

Best of luck,
DJ

whatever man, i can barely even read your responses without either being blown away or laughing. the DJ that i used to know no longer exsists and hasnt for a while.

whenever you come back feel free to pick up the phone and call a bunch of the people you have either hurt, blasted on the forum, or lost friendships with.

ps - i guess the time you blasted chris humphreys or dane or the time you posted the email from a photographer on your blog and blasted him (and then tried justifying it because it was for his own good).... i guess those weren't your type of interactions either.

okay boys...how much coercion from somebody much older than both of you will it take to get you to both delete these silly posts?

you're both great photographers...but this forum bickering brings us all down...

i say this (as a parent) all the time...

"i don't care who started it, i just want it to stop."

remember...the first post on this topic...



love to ya both...
big brother

OK who else here has been drinking other than me????

It was the whole "double roll" idea. Brilliant.

Man. Someone woke up on the wrong side of the studio this morning. So, uh, you'll be one of the only independents around after all the national companies eat the rest of our lunches? The only way to delight a customer is with a nice biz card an a big screen? The only way to streamline a workflow is to sacrifice product?

I guess I'm doing everything the wrong way, then.

I think you probably spend way too much time on your images and are looking for ways to make yourself feel better about it. JK!

After the whole [b] thing, I've been trying to lay off the drinkey drink... with varying degrees of success.

NO NO NO, you do the opposite for croup. Trust me. Take her outside and let her breath the cold air , thats what she needs.
Sorry, its the paramedic in me. Steam is a huge misconception. You want to constrict, thats where the cold air comes in. Steam will only make it worse.


Sorry Joy, I have learned from extensive experience on this one.
But that was really sweet.

Okay, I feel really stupid! I wasn't even thinking this correctly, I even stopped myself before posting thinking this was wrong...why did I even bother, right? Thanks for that, you are so smart! Good thing I don't practice anymore!

funny...i remember the ER doctor (two years ago) telling us that either one would work...but that the cold air is probably better...

sadly, with 3 premies (who for some reason are more susceptible)...croup is pretty much a regular thing around our house. first time it happened it was a big deal...but since then it's been like "oh, it's just croup, get the vaporizer out..."

btw...katia and jonah are both sick right now...but jonah was the one i was holding earlier when i posted about the 2 year old...so it was "he" not "she"

Oh quit it. We all get our remedies confused. Shoot ,Im surprised as many kids make it through childhood with all the contradictory"expert" information we get bombarded with everyday.

Georgia had croup all the time. I learned from trial and error.

Here ya go Dan...boy...this is a HUGE threadjack!

http://www.healthy.net/scr/article.asp?ID=1528

Self-Care Tips (for Croup)
Try not to panic. While wheezing and barking sounds are frightening, remaining calm will lessen your child's fear and anxiety.
Hold your child to comfort him or her. Helping your child to relax may help stop the windpipe from constricting and make breathing easier.
Use a hot bath or shower to help relieve the congestion:
Take your child to the bathroom and close the door.
Turn on the hot water in the sink and shower to fill the room with steam.
Do not put your child in the shower. Instead, sit your child on the toilet or a chair, but not on the floor. Try reading a book to your child to pass the time and ease any fears.
Open the window to let in cool air. This helps to create more steam.
Allow a good 15 minutes for the steam to ease the symptoms. If the symptoms continue, carry your child out-of-doors to breathe the cold night air. If this doesn't ease the breathing difficulties, seek emergency care.
Use a vaporizer in your child's room. Cold-mist vaporizers are preferred because they give off cool air and avoid the risk of scalding with hot water.
Clean the vaporizer after each use.
Make a "croup tent" by placing the vaporizer under the crib or bed. Drape a blanket over the crib near the child's head, or over an umbrella if your child now sleeps in a bed, to trap the steam. Never leave your child alone while he or she is in a croup tent. Stay awake to monitor your child.
Crying is a good sign. It means that your child's symptoms are subsiding. A crying child is able to breathe.

EDIT: Um, not sure where my original post went...
Sheesh, Dan you DO know all this! BIG DUH! Hugs to the kids

Is Croup like Asthma?

hey i do appreciate all the for the kiddies. i'm probably one of the most hospital-phobic / doctor phobic / all things medical phobic around (used to be, anyway)...but 3 kiddos (2 nicu babies) later and some doctors and nurses have told me that i converse and ask questions like i have a health care background. i'm like gaaaaaaaaaaaaaawd no...but when it's your own kids, you tend to get yourself educated real fast!!!

See what I mean about all the "contradictory" info.
Maybe Im the one thats got it all wrong. My ER doc used to say the opposite, but it seemed to work so I went with it.
So many choices.... Oh look, a mystery thumbnail. Maybe its a photo of the croup virus.

<-------------Ex Biochemist

Photo courtesy of Google

How about you ask Dane and Chris how they feel about our relationship and how much I've poured into them...and how much they've poured into me. We're all great friends. You're way out of line and you're stepping in areas you don't know. As I said I've done things I've regretted and to pick out 3 incidents over the course of my career and pin me to them is again very sad.

GUYS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

stop pls.

almost as sad as you pinning me to the gary fong situation, which you brought up. it goes both way dude.

anyway end the posting between us, if you want to continue it feel free to PM.

Im sayin'. All that threadjacking was really a premeditated plot executed with unparalled precision to get some LOVE back where it belongs!!.
Nah-Nah each other in private.
D.J. you are the founder of this forum and with that title comes the responsibility to remain restrained and diplomatic no matter what is posted. Youve had several weeks of hard travel that shurly has physically and mentally taken its toll. You are wholly admired by everyone here adores and respects you. You are an amazing person. Turn your computer off and get some rest.
Luke. Kiss that pretty girl your in love with and let this settle. Greet each other with a hug tommorow and be friends. Talk through it like brothers.
Life is hard and we all need each other to get through it. Each and every one.

Edit: I so aplogize that I am an agonizingly bad speller.

Is Croup like Asthma?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Croup