For years I have been doing photography and wondering about selling prints - but it has always seemed like too much hassle taking orders, getting the prints done and then posting them, safely, to the buyer. And then what if someone in another country wants to buy prints - after all many tourists don’t get the pictures they want on their visit but later they would like a reminder of their visit, and being in the country often allows us to choose the best lighting.
Recently I was thinking about setting up a website and maybe letting my wife arrange prints and postage etc. as she works part time - but then I discovered Queensberry Albums. If you click on the link and scroll down to this part, where you can choose a website format, upload pictures and start selling with a two week free trial - they do all the work! AND: The Support is REALLY good!
This is the [simple] website I created. springbokphotography.queensberryworkspace.
Without saying too much about actual cost it is possible to go into “settings” in your workspace and select a ‘blanket’ pricing across the range, the default is about 5X cost but I have set mine to 2X cost and as an example a 12X18 framed canvas would cost someone $189.15 including tax and your profit would be $92.98. If you were to select one of my images as an example you could check the pricing options for that image and get an idea of cost. For example “deer 005” [I know, I still need to name them properly]
When it comes to smaller prints you can set a “minimum profit” which defaults at $4, while with a canvas the default is $20. You will need to have either a Paypal account or a Stripe account set up for payments to be received Paypal vs Stripe [Queensberry support told me that Stripe means instant payments rather than waiting for up to a month with Paypal] - but basically once you have uploaded your images and set up your pricing you have to do absolutely nothing else - they take the orders and send the prints, you just sit back and wait for your share to be paid into your account. I made my first sale a few days after it being set up and received an email with all the details of what was sold and how much was due to me - it doesn’t get much easier than that!
Why am I promoting their website? For one thing it is exactly what I have been looking for all these years and for another I was very impressed with the support, same day replies to my support requests and besides giving me advice on how to do what I was asking the support team went as far as actually changing things on my website for me to demonstrate how to do it.
What is the cost? I chose the Pro plan for US$135 which is a once off for a total of 10GB of images. You can choose monthly plans for other prices ranging from $10 a month but at the moment I’m only using 0.54GB of the 10GB my plan allows though I still have quite a few images to sort through. If sales took off really well I’d think of upgrading but for now it’s all I need especially for the occasional person who may see a photo and say “oooh, I visited that spot, can I buy a print?”. Now I no longer need to say, “Sorry, it’s too much hassle”, I can just upload the image and send them a link.
What about if you do weddings and your plan isn’t big enough for all the extra photos? You simply create a temporary “Client gallery” with a password to share with the couple and their guests. It doesn’t affect your plan in any way, guests from the wedding can order prints and Queensberry benefits from the deal as well, supplying the prints.
Once again, I don’t promote products or companies unless I’m impressed with them or their service. I’ve always heard good about Queensberry albums and so far my experience with them has been a pleasure - I’m quite happy to share the information for other photographers to take advantage of.