Increased Income: Working Longer Hours
All photographers [like everybody else] want to raise their income. There are two basic ways:
- Work longer hours
- Raise your rates
Photo District News did a survey of more than 1,000 wedding photographers at PDN Survey and they found:
The more hours you work, the higher your gross billings and income tends to be, but only within limits, according to our survey. Abnormally long hours are counterproductive: average gross billings and average personal income decline beyond a 60-hour work week.
- This was a self registering survey.
- No audit was done to verify the income figures such as the one provided by the U.S. Department of Labor.
- Their findings compares photographers that work different number of hours.
- Their findings do not compare the type the client types based on the number of hours. What kind of customers do the longer working photographers have? "Cheapskates" or ...
- You need to examine your practice and your customers.
- Analyze your customers: how many will leave you if you raise your prices.
- A spike of longer hours is OK if it's temporary, but how many hours a week can you work and still have a "life" (family or otherwise).