I’ve tried offering portrait services a few different ways throughout my photography journey.

In the beginning, I just wanted to get people in front of my camera. At the time, all I really knew was how to make a proper exposure, and I just wanted to get as much practice as possible to build a portfolio, start “marketing”, yadda, yadda.

And I did.

And eventually, I felt good enough to charge (a whole other story for another day), and suddenly, I had a photography business. As most new photographers, my session fee included all the images from the session in some type of digital format (new business experiments and such) and I had products I tried to sell, but I had no clue what I was doing–  it was just a hot mess.

TMP’s business experiments continued, testing what various industry leaders had to say about ISP (in-Person Sales), online sales, selling products, ditching digitals, only selling this, and only selling that…

Obviously, there is more than one way to run a photography business. But, naturally, I started to refine exactly how I wanted to run my business.

Low-Volume, High-Touch

I didn’t want a high-volume studio; I wanted to have personal encounters with my clients. I wanted them to feel like they were coming to see an old friend when they booked their session.

Stylized Shoots

I wanted clients to feel like they were models in a magazine shoot; stylized hair, makeup, and wardrobe were a must. I wanted clients to be able to just show up, play dress-up, and have an amazing photoshoot.

Ready-to-Hang Products

I wanted to sell beautiful products because I LOVE those products, and I can’t wait to buy a house and fill my walls up with portraits of our family. I felt if I could show other moms how beautiful these products were, they’d understand why they needed them. What mom doesn’t love seeing big adorable photos of their babies all over the place?

I wanted to do all of this while being a mom to my baby (now, babies). Which further validated my low-volume preference =]

So, that’s how I made the decision to revamp into a full-service custom portrait studio. Of course, there’s a lot more depth to it all, but, you get the picture.

Pun intended =]

I didn’t want to give a mediocre experience, I wanted to give my clients something they would always remember. And maybe, they can relive all the love and joy that went into making those portraits each time they walk past it, or look through their album, or open up the folio box. And maybe, just maybe, they’ll find stories to share as they look at the portraits with loved ones, eventually passing the stories down for generations.

I want it to be special. As special as the love they have for the people they created their images for.

So, if you’re looking for more than just some pictures, maybe you and I should chat =]