Hi Guys,

One of my friends and I have been shooting for a few years and are thinking about getting a little more serious than the occasional wedding for a friend. We're not at the level where most people call "professionals," but we're not bad either. As a start, we wanted to start shooting for nearby business on a "pro bono" basis. We want to offer free services for the mom and pop business in our area.

My question is, has anyone gone through this phase during their professional career? I'm trying to come up with standardized letter to offer free services to nearby businesses, but I'm not much of a writer. Anyone have some sort of template they used? A big kudos if you can help =)

Sinerely,
K

First thing you have to ask yourself is giving away services a good business model? The answer is usually no.

Second, Pro Bono is usually for charity. If your going to give your work away, find a good cause that needs photography.

If you really want to get "a little more serious" then why would you offer your services for free? I only do pro bono work for a very select group of charitable organizations, usually organizations that promote athletics for disabled children, but even then it's not ALL free. I usually offer some free services and they also agree to pay for others. Other than that it's payment up front or no services rendered.

Offering your services for free will not in most cases lead to bigger, better paying gigs. Many years ago photography was a hobby for me. As soon as I started providing services to professional organizations I set up my business and started charging for my time. Why would anyone suddenly start to pay you for something that you were previously offering for free. If you suddenly start charging your "clients" will simply look for someone else that will do it for free.

I really don't think that the Pro forum is the place to ask about providing free services. Professional means getting paid. And getting paid for services rendered is the only business model that works in my book. You either continue to do this as a hobby and continue to provide free services or you actually do get serious and charge for services rendered.

If any service type of person (lawn care, home renovations, accounting, etc., etc.,) contacted me and offered their services for free, that flyer would end up in the recycling can along with all the credit card offers, mortgage refinance offers, and what have you that burgeon my mail box. If they're offering it for free, the public perception would be that it is a scam. If it was a legitimate service of good quality, then they would be charging for it.



Brent Ward wrote:
...Pro Bono is usually for charity. If your going to give your work away, find a good cause that needs photography...

We all have out pet projects and favorite causes. However, I am careful and quite selective in this regard, as the staff at many charities have better benefit packages than I have, and many directors of local charities have salaries in excess of $100K. If it is a true grass roots operation with a shoestring budget, I try to create a win-win by making sure I get exposure and by doing a project with full creative control.

Brent Ward wrote:
First thing you have to ask yourself is giving away services a good business model? The answer is usually no.

Second, Pro Bono is usually for charity. If your going to give your work away, find a good cause that needs photography.


^^ This.

Some ideas:

Infant Bereavement Photography

(personally, I couldn't do this more than a few times without dying inside)

Are you active in your church? Do they do anything like a Daddy / Daughter dance, or any other events? Volunteer some type of service for that.

Personally I believe anyone that would make money for profit off your services deserves to pay you. Giving them anything free is a waste of your time. There are other areas though where you can do a lot for someone. Find those.

Hi All,

So sorry, I think I've used the wrong terminology. My definition of pro bono was doing work for free, not necessarily for charity. The main reason for doing work for free is to develope a business portfolio and a "client" list. Our current portfolio is a combination of artsy and event pictures, which in my opinion, does not use the same technique as, ie. food photography.

We really want to get out there and get more experience to a professional level with the mindset based on what businesses want, rather than what we think they want. We figured, free is a "good price."

Again, I'm sorry to have portrayed the wrong definition.

no-one misunderstood you. the only pro bono work that promotes your business is charity work for which you can take a tax deduction. anything else signals that your work isn't worth paying for.

Herb...

Ditto what Herb said.

I think you misunderstood all of us...


Working for free will get you more free or very low paying work.

SlowDalPangEe wrote:
...My definition of pro bono was doing work for free, not necessarily for charity...

Pro Bono means free.

We figured, free is a "good price."

Again, no legitimate business will touch you. "Free" gives the impression of a scam. A bon-a-fide going concern will have normal overhead, liability insurance, proper record keeping (IE, pays taxes) and as a result, and is not in a position to do anything for "free".


HerbChong wrote:
... the only pro bono work that promotes your business is charity work for which you can take a tax deduction...

If you are in the business of photography, there is no tax deduction for doing work for charities. All that happens is that you do do a job, but not collect a payment. Any raw materials consumed like ink, ink jet paper, etc, are already deducted as part of your normal operating expenses. No extra deduction for time or an arbitrary value assigned to the work unfortunately.

SlowDalPangEe wrote:
The main reason for doing work for free is to develope a business portfolio and a "client" list. Our current portfolio is a combination of artsy and event pictures, which in my opinion, does not use the same technique as, ie. food photography.

They're not reasonably clients if they aren't paying you. Moreover, I suspect most businesses would object to being represented on your client list if the work you did for them wasn't part of a standard screening, review and hiring process, as you're essentially using your client list to imply an endorsement that they haven't given you.

If you need to develop a portfolio of imagery that isn't happening organically through the business you're already doing, then be selective in how you do it. Writing out a bunch of unsolicited letters only serves to make you look foolish, or worse, raise peoples' suspicion. If you want to create a portfolio of food photography, then go approach the chefs or owners of one or two restaurants that you hand-select. Tell them what you're doing, offer to do a food shoot on their premises and around their schedule that will have no other cost to them other than materials and prep labor...if they like the images they can use them on their own website and marketing materials. Two shoots like that should give you a reasonable portfolio, if you already have the chops.

Sending out letters, even if you end up getting the cooperation to do a few shoots, only serves to brand you as the guy who was running around town offering his services for free. People are going to look at you like the offers for free weekend vacations...that are meant to try and sell you a timeshare.

jjlphoto wrote:
If you are in the business of photography, there is no tax deduction for doing work for charities. All that happens is that you do do a job, but not collect a payment. Any raw materials consumed like ink, ink jet paper, etc, are already deducted as part of your normal operating expenses. No extra deduction for time or an arbitrary value assigned to the work unfortunately.

Are you 100% sure about that? I was under the impression that a service that carried an established market value to could be donated to a charity and a deduction claimed at that value, as long as the donation was documented.

shatterkiss wrote:
jjlphoto wrote:
If you are in the business of photography, there is no tax deduction for doing work for charities. All that happens is that you do do a job, but not collect a payment. Any raw materials consumed like ink, ink jet paper, etc, are already deducted as part of your normal operating expenses. No extra deduction for time or an arbitrary value assigned to the work unfortunately.

Are you 100% sure about that? I was under the impression that a service that carried an established market value to could be donated to a charity and a deduction claimed at that value, as long as the donation was documented.

According to my Accountant I can only deduct the actual amount of the materials used to produce the project.

I will take a slightly different approach here. It is not unusual for any business, large or small, to offer free or nearly free product when just starting out. However, you need to develop a business plan that quickly moves you beyond that and into generating some revenue. Even if you consider it only a hobby, there are some good reasons for charging for your work.

1. A hobby that pays for itself is much better than one that does not.
2. You will actually get more business if you charge. People expect to pay for a good service. Free services are often assumed to be inferior.
3. Long term free services will really piss of the pros in the area. You don't want that.

shatterkiss wrote:
jjlphoto wrote:
If you are in the business of photography, there is no tax deduction for doing work for charities. All that happens is that you do do a job, but not collect a payment. Any raw materials consumed like ink, ink jet paper, etc, are already deducted as part of your normal operating expenses. No extra deduction for time or an arbitrary value assigned to the work unfortunately.

Are you 100% sure about that? I was under the impression that a service that carried an established market value to could be donated to a charity and a deduction claimed at that value, as long as the donation was documented.


I think that is partiall correct. An individual is not allowed to take a deduction for services, but I think a business may.

http://www.junewalkeronline.com/index.asp?sPG=50

http://www.justgive.org/html/don_info/tax.html#9

he's not in the business yet.

Herb...

jjlphoto wrote:
If you are in the business of photography, there is no tax deduction for doing work for charities. All that happens is that you do do a job, but not collect a payment. Any raw materials consumed like ink, ink jet paper, etc, are already deducted as part of your normal operating expenses. No extra deduction for time or an arbitrary value assigned to the work unfortunately.

shatterkiss wrote:
Are you 100% sure about that? I was under the impression that a service that carried an established market value to could be donated to a charity and a deduction claimed at that value, as long as the donation was documented.

nathanlake wrote:
I think that is partiall correct. An individual is not allowed to take a deduction for services, but I think a business may.

According to my CPA, no. However, it is entirely possible that some states vary in how this is treated on just your state's income tax form.

BTW Shatterkiss, I think your suggestion about how to pursue the food photography is an excellent one!


tcphoto wrote:
According to my Accountant I can only deduct the actual amount of the materials used to produce the project.

Correct. If you are using materials from your inventory, that already is deducted as part of your cost-of-goods-sold anyway so you can just leave it as is, or manually take it out of your "COGS" and slip it into "Charitable Contribution". Any mileage used is subject to a lower rate however.

If you're going to give your services for free find a deserving cause.
Last year I was contacted by an area co-ordinator for Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep or NILMDTS https://www.nowilaymedowntosleep.org/
I instantly said yes, scheduled a meeting, joined their boards, attended trainings, and, now, a year later I wonder why I did not do this sooner ... there is no greater "free" shoot than an NILMDTS session, for this cause, I give my services for free

last night, I drove 20+ miles to the hospital, did a session, edited one image for the service, uploaded it to my lab, drove 10+ miles to my lab today, picked up the image, drove 20 miles in the other direction to deliver the print in time for the infants service ... this is what charity is all about ... finding a cause with meaning, something that affects others in a positive way

giving a business free photography only devalues yourself & our profession & makes it harder for the pro's to make a living wage as these businessess think they don't have to pay for our product!!!

To answer the OP: Yes, many professionals go through this phase. Give Denis Reggie a call and he will tell about the few he did for free at the beginning of his career; a career which has done everything but devalue the profession.

JJ, Shatter, et al

My CPA (and good friend) of many years says you cannot deduct for pro bono work if you don't charge anything

HOWEVER, if you countersign a payment (effectively, they pay you xx dollars for a job, but then you sign it back to them as a donation), you CAN deduct, as you now have effectively charged for your services.

I actually had my CPA write about this on my blog, because a lot of people believe that an invoice that charges xxx dollars as a fee, but then offers a courtesy or pro bono discount, will allow you to deduct expenses. This is incorrect.

More on this on my blog. Link below!


Max Simbron
PShizzy: The Blog, is Alive! at www.PShizzy.com

PShizzy wrote:
JJ, Shatter, et al

My CPA (and good friend) of many years says you cannot deduct for pro bono work if you don't charge anything

HOWEVER, if you countersign a payment (effectively, they pay you xx dollars for a job, but then you sign it back to them as a donation), you CAN deduct, as you now have effectively charged for your services.

I actually had my CPA write about this on my blog, because a lot of people believe that an invoice that charges xxx dollars as a fee, but then offers a courtesy or pro bono discount, will allow you to deduct expenses. This is incorrect.

More on this on my blog. Link below!


Max Simbron
PShizzy: The Blog, is Alive! at www.PShizzy.com


I'll have to bring this up with my CPA when I see her next week, but the last time we discussed something like this, my impression was that this is a wash:

1) You receive a payment - which increases your taxable income by $X.
2) You receive a deduction - which decreases your taxable income by $X.

The net difference in your taxable income is $0.

I'd sure like to know what I'm missing on this...

Cheers,
Ken

From my accountant:

For simplicity sake, it is a wash. We won't go into the charitable contributions made by self-employed persons, limited liability companies, and S-Corporations (all which handle the contribution differently.)

If you can get the non-profit to pay for your services, then this method does not apply to you. Get your check and give back 10% if you want.

The point being made is that if you were going to do it for free (or donate your services) anyway, you might as well get the tax deduction for your time.

Max

KABeach wrote:
....my impression was that this is a wash:

1) You receive a payment - which increases your taxable income by $X.
2) You receive a deduction - which decreases your taxable income by $X.

The net difference in your taxable income is $0.

I'd sure like to know what I'm missing on this...

That's the way I interpreted is also


I'm guessing people do this if the charity simply has no cash in their checking account to pay any invoice at all. But now the risk is on you as you have this "thing" on your return that may red flag you to the IRS.



PShizzy wrote:
The point being made is that if you were going to do it for free (or donate your services) anyway, you might as well get the tax deduction for your time.

But if you are doing it for free, and choose not to do it this way, you still come out the same, but without this potential IRS red flag.

And when you are done free, then look over your shoulder. There will be three guys offering the same thing ... cutting your legs out from underneath you. What will you say to you prospective client about why she should not go for a "free" wedding and pay you instead?

Have you thought of it in a responsible way towards the client? I mean, I know you (and everyone else with an SLR ) want to start this up (probably because you see easy money to get more gear with) but a wedding is not like a family picnic. This is a very important one time (sometimes ) occasion. What level of service are you able to provide? Do you have two of everything? Two flashes, two bodies and appropriate f 2.8 lenses?
What if you completely ruin their day? What if their mother in law ( I don't know why its always the in-laws but it seems to be) decide to sue you?

I don't mean to be grim ( and especially rude) but these things are really something that you should consider. The tried and true way to get experience enough to merit the title "wedding photographer" is to apprentice first. Get the right level of experience and equipment. Get good contracts. Get insurance.

Then you will have no impulse, I suspect, to give your service away for nothing. Digital has made wedding photographers sprout up like mushrooms - most wanting to do "just a few for free". Its the bane of wedding photography.

The only thing I do for free personally are dog charities. I won't do a wedding for free for a friend. It devalues it. Its getting to the point that couples don't mind paying $3000 for flowers, $4500 for catering ... but want the photographer to do it for $800 ... or free. Then they have pro results in mind. Funny how that works.

And word travels. Do one for free .... and five other couples will be told how smart they were and got the photographer for free. Or ... how they can't believe it how bad their pictures turned out. Wedding photographers seem to slowly be seen in a worse and worse light ... I've noticed.