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 Post subject: Fair or Not Fair?
PostPosted: Wed Oct 26, 2016 12:30 pm 
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OK. So I'm in a bit of a debate with myself here. I have a colleague who's doing full time weddings. He's also a friend...acquaintance is probably closer but we've known each other for a while that we do consider each other as friends. Anyway, from time to time, he gives me leads because he's already booked for the day the couple is going to get married. I don't ask a lot of these leads because I have a much, much smaller quota of clients to take in per year as I have a day job. However, I'm very appreciative of them because it's extra income.

Now, his conditions are:

- I run as his associate under his banner name
- he takes 20% off my sales for leads he passes on to me
- my prices are based off his except that they're reduced by 10% (because I'm an associate)
- I do all the negotiating, admin and the photography work
- he gets the images to post as his own his website and blogs about it. I can't. If I do, I have to give him credit. I cannot "equally" blog this client even if I did all the work and the client has given me full recognition and recommendation apart from the banner name they originally contacted.

Now, taking what I've said above, it seems rather fair that he does get the credit as I am operating under his banner. Normally, I'd let this go. But here's where it started turning sour for me:

I run a separate business apart from my own wedding photography business. It's a photobooth. Other than the software, it was completely planned, designed, wired, and programmed by me. I literally built it in my garage a couple of years ago. It's newer now, lighter and fabricated but it's still my design. So here are some details:

- it's usually manned by my wife
- all materials such as props, backdrops, maintenance, consumables like ink/paper are all on me
- fees to certain things like internet connectivity is on me
- any costs pertaining to it is on me
- labour is all me and my wife

So my colleague packages my photobooth with his wedding packages. I recently just found out (within the last 2 weeks) that he charges his customers twice the amount of my pricing. On top of that, he already gets 25% off my package sales for "selling my booth" to his clients. So basically, I'm making less than half than what he charges. Not to mention, he'll book my photobooth without consulting me and not realizing that some days that he books my service is on a weekday. My wife and I both have day jobs. It's not so much a problem for me because I save up vacations but it's a little harder on my wife.

This past weekend, I shot a wedding which was one of his leads. I had to hire a second photographer as that is what the client wanted. It also had the photobooth. Good news, "I" sold the photobooth. Not him, so all the sales from that comes to me. I know I gotta pay him the 20% for getting the lead, but what I don't appreciate is getting a call the next morning asking me where the pics will be uploaded so he can blog "his wedding".

So yeah, I'm starting to think I'm being used here. Is it just me?


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 Post subject: Re: Fair or Not Fair?
PostPosted: Sat Oct 29, 2016 7:10 pm 
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If it were me, I'd move on. Too many hassles and drama from this guy it seems for the amount of wedding work you do. Market yourself and be in control of your destiny.


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 Post subject: Re: Fair or Not Fair?
PostPosted: Mon Oct 31, 2016 3:57 pm 
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Speaking of drama, after this weekend...I am considering cutting off completely from him as an associate and will only do business as an outsourced vendor for my photobooth to him if he requires it.

I do run my own wedding photography business with the photobooth line so am "out there". I just extended so much of myself and my company to him because we both started out great with what he was doing and how my services appropriately supplemented his.


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 Post subject: Re: Fair or Not Fair?
PostPosted: Mon Oct 31, 2016 3:59 pm 
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I just think its time to move on.
In today's world you can market yourself and get ahead.
I wish you good luck


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 Post subject: Re: Fair or Not Fair?
PostPosted: Tue Nov 01, 2016 10:49 am 
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Thanks guys.


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 Post subject: Re: Fair or Not Fair?
PostPosted: Tue Nov 01, 2016 5:19 pm 
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I would not have agreed to the original terms to begin with. At most I would have paid him a finder's fee. All work done by me is under my credits. If he did all the prep and negotiations and all you did was shoot, then you would be an associate.


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 Post subject: Re: Fair or Not Fair?
PostPosted: Wed Nov 02, 2016 10:23 am 
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Riceburner wrote:
I would not have agreed to the original terms to begin with. At most I would have paid him a finder's fee. All work done by me is under my credits. If he did all the prep and negotiations and all you did was shoot, then you would be an associate.


Yeah. I know. Normally, that's what I would've done but because we started off on the right foot and became friends and have been doing to for the last couple of years, it didn't seem to matter. It's only been within the year that he's been increasingly difficult to deal with. With all that, it's been really awkward having to really voice out anything, plus I'm a very passive person.


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 Post subject: Re: Fair or Not Fair?
PostPosted: Sun Jul 16, 2017 9:37 pm 
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So tell him your situation has changed. If he asks how, say you don't want to discuss it. You will pay a finder's fee for any leads and work your own deals. As for the photobooth, what he charges is up to him. If you want to give him a break on renting to him, it's up to you. One isn't related to the other. He should confirm with you on bookings though....or just not be available on one he books that is not convenient to you. When he let's down his client, maybe he'll learn.


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 Post subject: Re: Fair or Not Fair?
PostPosted: Sun Jul 16, 2017 10:13 pm 
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I would advise to revisit the terms of deal like finders fee instead of 20%. Depending on the number of weddings your doing maybe a partnership so you can use your name. Also photo booth should be seperate from as outsource service by you. Meaning you set the rate to charge him and availability as part of your own business.


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