SmugMug's Price Increase - DPChallenge Forums

09/01/2012 10:06:25 AM · #1

Thoughts?

For the first time in 7 years, weâ��re raising the price of SmugMug Pro subscriptions, something we tried hard not to do.

We know $100/year is a lot and personally, if I were asked to pay more for a service, I'd want to hear from the person responsible for the decision. That's me, so I placed my dSLR on a tripod, and looked it right in the lens, imagining it was you. I tried to offer a peek inside SmugMug and our thinking:

Because storage, engineering and support costs are so much higher for pros who sell at a markup, we split pro accounts in two: Portfolio and Business.

1. Portfolio is still $150/year (or $20/month) and still provides access to our pro labs for both you and your visitors, plus pro features like watermarking.

2. Business lets you set prices and earn profit. It will be $300/year (or $35/month) for new customers, but existing subscribers who set prices will be asked to renew at $250/year (or $30/month) beginning October 15, 2012.

Message edited by author 2012-09-01 10:07:48.

Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L USM

09/01/2012 10:08:02 AM · #2

I'm leaving them!!!

Ken

Canon EOS-7D

09/01/2012 11:38:25 AM · #3

Mine is set to renew in a couple days at the old price, then I'm out of there in a year.

GeneralE

Canon PowerShot S3 IS

Canon 12x IS USM (S3 IS built-in Lens) -- 36-432mm (35mm EQ)

09/01/2012 12:58:57 PM · #4

You know, our public print galleries here (i.e. DPC Prints) are completely free -- maybe some of us members can take it upon ourselves to generate some traffic/potential sales, since it's not logical to expect Langdon to do that too ... maybe if we create some more activity there will be an incentive to make some overdue improvements.

09/01/2012 07:09:09 PM · #5

Originally posted by GeneralE:

I would Paul if it was more customer friendly. I know the idea behind DPC prints was to sell prints to people but it's not really geared towards photographers setting up multiple galleries and selling them to their clients... And I'm not sure about it now but the last time I checked DPC was taking something like 45%-50% of the sell price so the seller wasn't making much of a profit.

Canon 12x IS USM (S3 IS built-in Lens) -- 36-432mm (35mm EQ)

09/01/2012 07:12:00 PM · #6

Yeah, here you go...

How does the pricing work?

Each print size you make available will have a base cost that you may mark up as you decide. We split the difference between your sell price and the base price (the profit) with you, 50 / 50. You can make an additional 25% of your sales (totalling 75%) by referring your sale.

That's just not a good enough profit for me to send clients too. I know everyone wants to make money and I'm not greedy with it but at the same time I wouldn't be able to build my business or make enough money to pay all my bills.

GeneralE

Canon PowerShot S3 IS

09/01/2012 07:25:34 PM · #7

Originally posted by Dirt_Diver:

... it's not really geared towards photographers setting up multiple galleries and selling them to their clients...

Yes, that's one of the major improvements long overdue.

FWIW, I've just been checking out Shutterfly again after the Kodak Gallery closed and migrated their customer files there, and they seem to have a "Pro" account for $100 or $150 or so/year, but I have not checked out the features closely.