Interior Design Photography Pricing
This article will layout how to come up with competitive interior design photography pricing. Interior design photography pricing all comes down to knowing your market, understanding how the photos will be used, and properly valuing your skill set.
If you can account for these three factors, you’ll be able to price your services competitively and land interior design photography jobs with ease.
Table of Contents
Interior Design Photography Pricing
Introduction to Interior Design Photograhy Pricing
Unlike real estate photography where it’s better to use packages to create a pricing structure, interior design photography pricing works better if you charge by the hour or by the image.
Additionally, interior design photos are likely to be used for different reason than your classic real estate photos.
Hourly/Per Image Vs Packages
There are several reasons that an hourly or per image rate makes more sense for interior design photography pricing:
- You many only be delivering a small number of photos
- Interior deisgn photoshoots tend to last longer than real estate photography shoots
- Many times you’ll be working with the designer on site in a collaborative type process
Real estate photography is more of a run-and-gun type photography where you don’t have to collaborate with anyone. Interior design photography tends to be more of a team effort though.
You’ll likely be working directly with the designer themselves or a member of their team. This means they’re likely to have an idea of how they want the photos to look.
All of this leads to more time spent on site for a smaller amount of photos that are probably going to be more difficult to capture. This all means your interior design photography pricing structure needs to be hourly or per image based.
Photo Usages
Interior design photography pricing needs to reflect value that the photos are going to be used to create.
This means that if you’re photographing a new boutique hotel and the images are going to be used to market the hotel, you’re going to charge more than if they’ll simply be portfolio images for the designer.
If your photography is going to appear in an outlet like Architectural Digest or Dezeen, the designer stands to get some serious publicity. Additionally, your photo is going to be printed thousands and thousands of times. You want to make sure you’re paid accordingly.
During the beginning of the quote process you’ll have the opportunity to ask questions about how the client plans to use the photos. You’ll then be able to include what you think is a fair rate into your quote, which will be discussed later in this article.
Understanding Your Market
The first step in figuring out what your interior design photography pricing should be is researching your market. The amount of money charged per hour in San Fransisco, California is going to be quite a bit more than an hour in Rochester, New York.
You need an understanding of your market which you can learn with these 2 easy tips:
- Research your competition
- Ask any interior design professionals you might know
Research Your Competition
A quick Google search for “interior design photographers near me” can help to get you started. It’s likely that a lot of the competition in your area will have a “contact for a quote” type answer on their site, but some may have their prices listed.
If you can find a few interior design photographers that have their prices listed, then take note of the prices and judge their skill level. You’ll need both in order to properly create your own pricing model.
If you can’t find photographers in your area, then expand your search to include a nearby city or town of a similar size. You only need a handful of prices and corresponding skill levels to start to get a good idea of the going rate in your market.
Ask Industry Professionals
If you happen to know any interior designers, people that work for an interior design firm, or even a fellow photographer that has had a few interior design jobs, it doesn’t hurt to ask them about interior design photography pricing.
Be careful though and make sure you know this person well enough to ask the question. If you reach out to someone in the interior design industry that you don’t know well, it could come off as intrusive and backfire.
Between these two research tactics, you should be able to figure out a relative interior design photography pricing range. If you can’t seem to find any information at all, then it’s probably safe to assume an hourly rate of between $100 – $500, depending on how large your market is and the quality of your images.
The hourly rate is only the cost of having you come out for photography. You can still add additional charges for the type of photo usage, an editing fee, or any other licensing fees that might come with the job.
Provide A Competitive Quote
Providing an accurate and competitive quote is just as important as understanding your market. You’ll need to send quotes out to prospective clients whether they are reaching out to you or you’re actively searching for jobs.
Before you name a price and send a quote it’s a good idea to figure out exactly what the prospective client needs from the interior design photoshoot. You can figure this out by asking the following questions:
- Do you have an idea of how many photos you would like delivered?
- What do you plan to use the images for?
The answers to these questions will help you put together a more accurate quote and give you a better shot at landing the job. The more specific to the exact needs of the client your quote is, the more likely you are to landing the job.
It’s common to send multiple quotes with different services provided. For example, you can send one quote that is just for photography and another that includes video as well. This gives the prospective client a better idea of your services as opposed to if you included everything on one quote.
Finally, check out our article Free Quote Template for Photography which not only provides a free downloadable quote template, but also explains how to fill it out properly.
Additional Resources
Be sure to check out our Beginners Guide. It’s full of articles with helpful ideas and tips exactly like this one. Our Business Resources page has all the resources you’ll need to get your Real Estate or Architectural Photography business started on the right path.
Finally, go check out our Gear page to get up-to-date reviews and recommendations on todays best gear for Real Estate and Architectural Photography.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much do you charge for interior photography?
The general pricing is anywhere between $100 – $500 based on a number of different factors including market size and your skill level.
How much should I charge for my photography?
It’s important to figure out what you can charge in your specific market. Once you have an idea of the going market prices, you should should charge in the bottom 25% if you’re a beginner and raise them as your business grows.
How do you price photography structures?
You can charge per hour, per day, per image, or you can offer packages. The pricing structure you choose will be dependent on which photography genre it is.