Many photographers, including me, run their photo businesses from home. It's a lot cheaper than running the business of photographer from an office. What about a studio? That will depend on your needs and your photo business volume. It's not always easy. I have doing it for decades, centuries and millenniums. The main problem is where will you meet your clients?

  • In your house?
  • At a rented office/photo studio
  • A the customer's location/place/house

Once you've answered that question and have decided on using an home office:

  1. Separate the office from the home. Have a room only for running the business1, or even just a desk. Nobody else uses it, and it's not used for anything else. Only for business!
  2. Your office, your desk is your place of work. This means that you will need to treat it as a work place, with designated hours, 8 to 4 or..., with a designated lunch time and designated work days.
  3. A business telephone line, that's only used for business. Whether it's a land line2 or a cell phone. This means that children do not answer the phone, and that if somebody else answers the phone, she will have to answer it in a professional manner.
  4. Your computers, your printers are used for business only! Playing games, or other stuffs3 on these computers will bring viruses, spywares... that will put you out of business if you loose your customer list, your photo archive4.
  5. Filing cabinets. Good ones are not cheap. You will need to keep all of your financial records for years5.
  6. Parking regulation: are you allowed to park trucks, to receive deliveries...6
  7. Get your own internet domain name, don't use Yahoo mail, MSN mail or gmail7.
  8. Be professional when dealing with not only customers but also suppliers.
  • The most difficult part of running your photo business from your house is treating it as business. You are home but you are working. This means discipline.
  • It's difficult to work 8 hours/day with all the distractions, from kids to dishes...
 

1 Then it's a business expense if you use the a room only for business ↑

2 It's illegal, in Canada, to use a "home" land line for business, I had to buy a "business" land line, i.e.: more expensive ↑

3 Especially shady websites ↑

4 Backups don't really help! You will have backed up these viruses and spywares by the time you will have found out about them ↑

5 In Canada, I have to keep paper copies of all my invoices, receipts, financial statements for 6 years. That's the law. ↑

6 I am not allowed, that's why I use an addressed mailbox place, UPS. This means that nobody knows that the delivery or business address is a mailbox ↑

7 You can get your own domain for only $20 and forward all your emails to your Yahoo mail, MSN mail or gmail ↑

Tags: Biz101 | Rants