Should Equine Photographers Charge a Session Fee?

Yes, I believe an equine photography client should make a financial commitment before their session is officially booked.

But that doesn't mean every equine photographer needs to charge the same type of session fee, call it the same thing or include the same things with it.

A session fee isn't just a random number you stick on your website because you're pretty sure professional photographers are supposed to have one.

It needs to have a job.

A Session Fee and a Booking Payment Aren't Necessarily the Same Thing

Equine photographers structure this in all kinds of ways.

You might charge a session fee or creative fee that covers the photography experience, with products purchased separately.

You might charge a reservation payment that includes a credit toward artwork.

You might include digital images with your session.

You might sell collections that bundle the session and finished products together.

There isn't one model every equine photographer needs to follow.

What I do think matters is that your client makes some kind of financial commitment before you reserve space on your calendar and start doing the work.

Because the work starts long before you show up at the barn with a camera.

What Is Your Session Fee Supposed to Do?

This is the question I want you to answer before you decide how much to charge.

What is this money actually paying for?

• Is it compensating you for your time?

• Does it need to cover your travel and gas?

• Is it paying for the consultation, session planning and the photography itself?

• Is some or all of it going toward artwork?

• Does it include digital images?

• Is it one part of a larger collection your client is purchasing?

• Or are you charging a session fee because every other photographer you looked at has one?

If it's that last one, we need a better reason.

Your session fee should make sense within the rest of your pricing instead of being a completely separate number you came up with one Tuesday afternoon.

And if you're still trying to determine what your overall pricing needs to look like, start with How Much Should an Equine Photographer Charge? Your session fee is only one piece of that bigger equation.

Remember, You're Doing Work Before the Session

Let's say someone contacts you about photographing her and her horse.

Before you ever press the shutter, you may have answered the inquiry, talked through what she wants, explained your process, sent information, completed paperwork, helped with clothing choices, discussed locations, planned around the horse and coordinated schedules.

And because we're photographing horses, there's always the possibility that you've also discussed weather, mud, shedding, questionable equine life choices and whether someone's horse will actually stand where we'd like him to stand.

All before session day.

Depending on where you live and how you photograph, you may also be blocking more than one date on your calendar for that client.

If most of your sessions happen outdoors and your weather likes to change its mind every 15 minutes, you may need a rain date. Now you're potentially protecting two spaces on your calendar for one session.

That's time you can't necessarily offer to someone else.

Once you've officially reserved those dates, you're committing time and business resources to that client.

That's one of the reasons I don't believe “booked” should mean, "She said yes in a Facebook message".

There should be an actual booking process, and payment should be part of it.

What Should Your Session Fee Include?

That depends on your business model.

I know. There's that answer again.

But an equine photographer who sells digital collections is running a different business from someone whose clients purchase finished artwork after the session.

If your session fee includes 30 digital images, that needs to be reflected in the price.

If the fee covers the photography experience and everything else is purchased separately, that's a different calculation.

If part of the payment becomes a product credit, that's another model.

None of those is automatically right or wrong.

The important thing is knowing what the client receives for that payment and what is supposed to happen financially after the session.

Don't Choose Your Session Fee by Looking at Someone Else's

We just talked about this with equine photography pricing, and the same rule applies here.

Another photographer charging a $500 session fee tells you exactly one thing:

She charges a $500 session fee.

You don't know whether it includes digitals. You don't know whether it includes product credit. You don't know what her average client ultimately spends. You don't know her expenses or how much time she spends with each client.

And for all you know, she pulled that number out of thin air, too.

Your session fee has to work with your numbers and your business model.

If you're building or reworking the financial side of your photography business, you'll find more resources in Photography Business for Photographers.

What I Do in My Own Equine Photography Business

In my own equine portrait business, I use a reservation retainer with a portion of that payment applied as a product credit.

I chose that structure because I want clients to have a financial commitment before I reserve their session, while also giving them money to put toward the artwork they'll choose later.

That's how it fits into my sales process.

I'm not telling you to copy my number or structure your pricing exactly the way I do.

Actually, please don't.

That's the entire point of this article.

I want you to understand why you're charging what you're charging so you can build a structure that makes sense for the way you sell photography.

The Bottom Line

Yes, I believe equine photographers should require a financial commitment before a session is officially booked.

Whether you structure that as a session fee, creative fee, reservation payment or as part of a larger collection depends on your business.

First decide what that payment needs to accomplish.

Then decide what it should include.

Then do the math and determine what it needs to be.

Because “that's what everyone else charges” isn't a business model.

Need help figuring out how your pricing fits into the bigger picture of your photography business? If you're trying to sort through pricing, profitability, offers or how all the pieces work together, that's something we can dig into through one-on-one mentoring.