Why EZ Prints?

DodgeV83

Costco prices:

Size Price

4x6 0.16
5x7 0.39
8x10 1.49
11x14 2.99
12x18 2.99

EZ Print prices (as we get them here)

4x6 0.25
5x7 0.99
8x10 2.99
9x12 5.49
11x14 5.49

I believe Costco uses high-quality printers, but unfortunately the print quality is variable depending on the technician. How can COSTCO get their prices SOO LOW, but EZ Print can't?

The closest size we have to Costco's freaking rediculous $2.99 12x18 price, is our 11x14...but an 11x14 costs us $5.49? They cost $3.95 on EzPrints.com. All of the other markups that Smugmug puts on EzPrint's prices are fair I'd say (a $3 markup on 16x20's and a $4 markup on 20x30's seems like alot though), but whats up with $3.95 to $5.49? Its almost as if EZPrints dramatically lowered their 11x14 price and Smugmug didn't notice?

Khaos

You get what you pay for

I'd rather pay more for consistency than go for dirt cheap. I've ordered anywhere in size from 4x6 to 16x24 and I've been very happy with all of them.

DodgeV83

Khaos wrote:

You get what you pay for

I'd rather pay more for consistency than go for dirt cheap. I've ordered anywhere in size from 4x6 to 16x24 and I've been very happy with all of them.

Yea I'm sure EzPrint's quality is way more consistent, but I still think EzPrints could be cheaper. I guess I'm mostly complaining about Smugmug's markup on the 11x14 prints. Wouldn't it be cool if Smugmug could handle the credit card ordering for us, then we could complete the order ourselves? It'd be great to have the OPTION of bringing all my orders down to Costco and mailing them out myself for the extra profit .

Andy

lots of reasons why i won't schlep to costco and take my chances. sure, they're cheap. but i, and my clients, prefer consistently good, over cheap.

reason one

reason two

reason three

reason four

reason five

reason six

and service is critical. despite all the above, people still mess up orders. i like and value the smugmug guarantee. it's no questions asked! not many companies will stand up and say that.

DavidTO

I guess that's why there are choices.

Andy

DodgeV83 wrote:

I believe Costco uses high-quality printers, but unfortunately the print quality is variable depending on the technician. How can COSTCO get their prices SOO LOW, but EZ Print can't?

hiya dodge

please examine this statement, the answer to your question lies within

DodgeV83

andy wrote:

hiya dodge

please examine this statement, the answer to your question lies within

te he, yea I was thinking "maybe cause they pay their technicians more than $6 an hour", but I still wanted to get my word in. If, for example, I personally KNEW that my local Costcos had talented technicians, I could DOUBLE my profits by filling the orders myself. I know a photographer that does something similar, but her site doesn't allow credit cards. You have to print out a form, fill it out, and MAIL it to her to complete your order!

Eh, I just want the best of both worlds :soapbox

Honestly...I complain alot about Smugmug, but it is the BEST SERVICE I have ever used! I complain more here because I have confidence that someone is actually listening, and I know Smugmug has the potential to be better. I understand why they don't allow users to fill out their own orders though...some pics would come out bad, the user wouldn't notice/care, and the client would complain to SMUGMUG!

So, in short, its very understandable why you wouldn't let us fill out our own orders...but maybe you can scale back the markup on 11x14 prints so its closer to the competition's prices?

jfriend

It's all in the smugmug guarantee

andy wrote:

i like and value the smugmug guarantee. it's no questions asked! not many companies will stand up and say that.

Good answer Andy - lots of good points. I'd boil it down to the real reason it costs more through Smugmug is the smugmug guarantee. It costs real money to take support calls, coordinate things with the printer, deal with returns or reprints, process payments, deal with complaints on prints made from lousy originals, deal with credit card problems and just plain answer all the other questions that might come up.

If you don't want those services, then don't use them for those services and provide your own way of doing all that. It's a bit of a cop out to say you just want them to take the credit card transaction because the $$ transaction is always right in the middle of all support issues or questions of service delivery, so taking the money means that they will incur a fair amount of the support burden.

There are sites on Smugmug that do their own order taking and fulfillment and don't use Smugmug's facilities for that. You could do it that way.

There are even sites that give the customer a choice. Take the full service route through Smugmug or email the photographer an order form and negotiate a paypal transaction with them in order to save some money. You could give your customers a choice.

The one thing Smugmug could do to enable/support this would be to allow a site owner to configure the shopping cart to NOT go the EZPrints and not take a credit card, but to just email the order to the site owners email address for manual fullfillment and billing. I personally am not sure how many people would actually use that so it may not be a wise prioritization of Smugmug's workload to invest in it.

--John

DodgeV83

Ahhhhhhhhh, ok. Believe it or not, I've been on Smugmug for a while and never knew about this guarantee.

"It's a bit of a cop out to say you just want them to take the credit card transaction because the $$ transaction is always right in the middle of all support issues or questions of service delivery, so taking the money means that they will incur a fair amount of the support burden."

They would still take their % from the credit card transation, the only difference is the order would come from ME instead of EzPrints. I guess this still works against Smugmug because their revenue also comes from slightly marking up the EzPrints prices...and they'd lose that if I did the order myself.


"The one thing Smugmug could do to enable/support this would be to allow a site owner to configure the shopping cart to NOT go the EZPrints and not take a credit card, but to just email the order to the site owners email address for manual fullfillment and billing. I personally am not sure how many people would actually use that so it may not be a wise prioritization of Smugmug's workload to invest in it."

It would have to be behind the scenes. The user configures the account to either "Let EzPrints do it" or "Let me do it".

I know this will never be implemented...One user would completely fail to mail out the prints, and the client would complain to Smugmug, bringing their reputation down. This whole idea will never work...I'm just talking out of my butt trying to figure out a way to double my profits . jose:crazy

jfriend wrote:

Good answer Andy - lots of good points. I'd boil it down to the real reason it costs more through Smugmug is the smugmug guarantee. It costs real money to take support calls, coordinate things with the printer, deal with returns or reprints, process payments, deal with complaints on prints made from lousy originals, deal with credit card problems and just plain answer all the other questions that might come up.

If you don't want those services, then don't use them for those services and provide your own way of doing all that. It's a bit of a cop out to say you just want them to take the credit card transaction because the $$ transaction is always right in the middle of all support issues or questions of service delivery, so taking the money means that they will incur a fair amount of the support burden.

There are sites on Smugmug that do their own order taking and fulfillment and don't use Smugmug's facilities for that. You could do it that way.

There are even sites that give the customer a choice. Take the full service route through Smugmug or email the photographer an order form and negotiate a paypal transaction with them in order to save some money. You could give your customers a choice.

The one thing Smugmug could do to enable/support this would be to allow a site owner to configure the shopping cart to NOT go the EZPrints and not take a credit card, but to just email the order to the site owners email address for manual fullfillment and billing. I personally am not sure how many people would actually use that so it may not be a wise prioritization of Smugmug's workload to invest in it.

--John

awfulsara

This whole idea will never work...I'm just talking out of my butt trying to figure out a way to double my profits . jose:crazy

I don't agree. This is the single most important thing to me, and the one thing that is keeping me from selling my prints here through Smugmug.

Check out www.photoreflect.com. If I could marry the best of these two services, I'd be happy cat indeed. The reason I don't print through smugmug directly is that I have no personal quality control and I am unable to sell things like matted/mounted prints, signed prints, framed prints, etc. I can't give preset volume discounts, apply account credits towards an order, or sell packages.

With photoreflect, you can do all those things and more, but the interface is lousy and you can't customize it nearly as well. Furthermore, the display quality of the images isn't up to snuff, so it cannot be used as a gallery, forcing people to find the shot they want, then go find it again if they want to buy it. But what you can do is choose your own print partner (ezprints is one of several options) so you can choose to have prints sent directly to the client, sent to you so you can add your marketing inserts, gift certificates, whatever, or just have an email sent to you so you can fulfill the order yourself. Rather than paying a markup on the prints, you pay a percentage of your total sales (15% I think) for them to take the credit card payments, do all the money stuff, and either forward the order to your printer of choice or back to you for fulfillment.

For me, I don't want to fulfill it for cheaper at Costco, I want to fulfull it better at my local print lab who knows me and my profiles and who can do large prints with a quality I have yet to see from EZPrints. Proofs for weddings I want to get done cheaply, fine art prints I want to get done the best I can do, and I want to look at it with my own eyes before I ship to the client with a personal, handwritten note and signature.

I'd double the subscription price without a peep if smugmug offered that kind of flexibility with the customization options that photoreflect has. Paying a yearly fee for the storage + a percentage sounds like the perfect solution for those who want what I do. I can't be the only one who wants more control and more options than one online printer.

mercphoto

DodgeV83 wrote:

If, for example, I personally KNEW that my local Costcos had talented technicians, I could DOUBLE my profits by filling the orders myself.

My first thought was immediately "if this guy can DOUBLE his profits by removing a relatively small mark-up from Smugmug, then his price to customers is too low". Seriously dude, at the prices I have set if Smugmug was to drop prices to Cost Co's prices I would NOT double my profits.

Me thinks, without knowing any other details (which makes my conclusion risky, granted), is that your profit delima is not in what Smugmug charges you, but rather what you are charging your customers.

As per CostCo, the reason they charge so little for photo printing is rather simple: they are not trying to make a profit on the photo center. It is a loss-leader.

DodgeV83

mercphoto wrote:

My first thought was immediately "if this guy can DOUBLE his profits by removing a relatively small mark-up from Smugmug, then his price to customers is too low". Seriously dude, at the prices I have set if Smugmug was to drop prices to Cost Co's prices I would NOT double my profits.

Me thinks, without knowing any other details (which makes my conclusion risky, granted), is that your profit delima is not in what Smugmug charges you, but rather what you are charging your customers.

As per CostCo, the reason they charge so little for photo printing is rather simple: they are not trying to make a profit on the photo center. It is a loss-leader.

Yea I know why Costco charges almost nothing. And your right...its not doubling lol I overstated.

mercphoto

DodgeV83 wrote:

And your right...its not doubling lol I overstated.

Whew!

flyingpylon

awfulsara wrote:

I don't agree. This is the single most important thing to me, and the one thing that is keeping me from selling my prints here through Smugmug.

Check out www.photoreflect.com. If I could marry the best of these two services, I'd be happy cat indeed. The reason I don't print through smugmug directly is that I have no personal quality control and I am unable to sell things like matted/mounted prints, signed prints, framed prints, etc. I can't give preset volume discounts, apply account credits towards an order, or sell packages.

With photoreflect, you can do all those things and more, but the interface is lousy and you can't customize it nearly as well. Furthermore, the display quality of the images isn't up to snuff, so it cannot be used as a gallery, forcing people to find the shot they want, then go find it again if they want to buy it. But what you can do is choose your own print partner (ezprints is one of several options) so you can choose to have prints sent directly to the client, sent to you so you can add your marketing inserts, gift certificates, whatever, or just have an email sent to you so you can fulfill the order yourself. Rather than paying a markup on the prints, you pay a percentage of your total sales (15% I think) for them to take the credit card payments, do all the money stuff, and either forward the order to your printer of choice or back to you for fulfillment.

For me, I don't want to fulfill it for cheaper at Costco, I want to fulfull it better at my local print lab who knows me and my profiles and who can do large prints with a quality I have yet to see from EZPrints. Proofs for weddings I want to get done cheaply, fine art prints I want to get done the best I can do, and I want to look at it with my own eyes before I ship to the client with a personal, handwritten note and signature.

I'd double the subscription price without a peep if smugmug offered that kind of flexibility with the customization options that photoreflect has. Paying a yearly fee for the storage + a percentage sounds like the perfect solution for those who want what I do. I can't be the only one who wants more control and more options than one online printer.

This is a great post.

As I've said before in other threads, I think it's best to think of Smugmug as a big consignment store where you as a vendor stock your shelves and everything else is handled by them. If you prefer to run your own gallery/boutique/whatever where you retain control of the complete transaction and customer experience, then you need to make other arrangements. There are advantages and disadvantages to both models, depending on your needs.

Baldy

awfulsara wrote:

I don't agree. This is the single most important thing to me, and the one thing that is keeping me from selling my prints here through Smugmug.

Check out www.photoreflect.com. If I could marry the best of these two services, I'd be happy cat indeed. The reason I don't print through smugmug directly is that I have no personal quality control and I am unable to sell things like matted/mounted prints, signed prints, framed prints, etc. I can't give preset volume discounts, apply account credits towards an order, or sell packages.

With photoreflect, you can do all those things and more, but the interface is lousy and you can't customize it nearly as well. Furthermore, the display quality of the images isn't up to snuff, so it cannot be used as a gallery, forcing people to find the shot they want, then go find it again if they want to buy it. But what you can do is choose your own print partner (ezprints is one of several options) so you can choose to have prints sent directly to the client, sent to you so you can add your marketing inserts, gift certificates, whatever, or just have an email sent to you so you can fulfill the order yourself. Rather than paying a markup on the prints, you pay a percentage of your total sales (15% I think) for them to take the credit card payments, do all the money stuff, and either forward the order to your printer of choice or back to you for fulfillment.

For me, I don't want to fulfill it for cheaper at Costco, I want to fulfull it better at my local print lab who knows me and my profiles and who can do large prints with a quality I have yet to see from EZPrints. Proofs for weddings I want to get done cheaply, fine art prints I want to get done the best I can do, and I want to look at it with my own eyes before I ship to the client with a personal, handwritten note and signature.

I'd double the subscription price without a peep if smugmug offered that kind of flexibility with the customization options that photoreflect has. Paying a yearly fee for the storage + a percentage sounds like the perfect solution for those who want what I do. I can't be the only one who wants more control and more options than one online printer.

That is a great post. Thanks for taking the time to write it.

(Not saying we will do it, not saying we won't; but we will give it the thought it deserves.)

Thanks,
Chris

MarkLamble

Baldy wrote:

That is a great post. Thanks for taking the time to write it.

(Not saying we will do it, not saying we won't; but we will give it the thought it deserves.)

Thanks,
Chris

Chris,

Another vote for this, but from a slightly different perspective......

While you're looking at supporting more printing shops can I add www.photobox.com here in the UK for consideration - they use exactly the same gear as EZPrint so hopefully there wouldn't be any issues with print quality (what I've seen so far has been very good) but it would mean that I could charge in local currency (GBP or EUR) and have the order shipped locally. None of my clients are prepared to pay in USD and pay for transatlantic shipping costs so I've reluctantly turned the shopping feature off and have to process everything manually by email or phone.


Cheers,
Mark

Mac Write

I like the idea of smugmug inserting coupons, notes and other things we can send to them to help personalize the orders.

I also like the idea of framing, but for that…Smugmug needs to find a quality matter and framer and to offer that service. I disagree with the smugmug shopping cart e-mailing us the order, sincepeople have stuff from multiple Smugmug sites in their shopping cart. Dealing with that would mean multiple shipments for the user placing the order etc.

NaturalEye

MarkLamble wrote:

Chris,

Another vote for this, but from a slightly different perspective......

While you're looking at supporting more printing shops can I add www.photobox.com here in the UK for consideration - they use exactly the same gear as EZPrint so hopefully there wouldn't be any issues with print quality (what I've seen so far has been very good) but it would mean that I could charge in local currency (GBP or EUR) and have the order shipped locally. None of my clients are prepared to pay in USD and pay for transatlantic shipping costs so I've reluctantly turned the shopping feature off and have to process everything manually by email or phone.


Cheers,
Mark

Another vote for UK based printing!

Gary

{JT}

This is basically the largest obstacle in our way. Some people think our cart is confusing now (even though it is because we offer more choices), but what if they had to chose who they wanted to shop from before adding to their cart? Or why their order now will come from 3 different places - since the items they chose are not offered by a single vendor.

Again, I am not saying that it won't some day happen - but we will want to make sure it is seamless and easy to understand what is happening when you check out.

Mac Write wrote:

I like the idea of smugmug inserting coupons, notes and other things we can send to them to help personalize the orders.

I also like the idea of framing, but for that…Smugmug needs to find a quality matter and framer and to offer that service. I disagree with the smugmug shopping cart e-mailing us the order, sincepeople have stuff from multiple Smugmug sites in their shopping cart. Dealing with that would mean multiple shipments for the user placing the order etc.

flyingpylon

I think that Smugmug should explore the possibility of offering a new service designed for people who want to outsource the print selling process but still want to retain maximum control. This would be a more expensive service that would fit the private gallery/boutique model. Customers would only shop in one "store" and Smugmug's involvement would be completely transparent.

Then the current service (which I consider more of a consignment model) could be refined in ways that fit it best, rather than trying to be all things to all people.

I realize that even exploring the possibility of separating the two would take lots of time and effort, and I wouldn't expect Smugmug to drop everything and do it right now. But until then, I think the two models will always be at odds to a certain extent and there will always be some level of confusion about what Smugmug "is".

jfriend

Good thinking

flyingpylon wrote:

I think that Smugmug should explore the possibility of offering a new service designed for people who want to outsource the print selling process but still want to retain maximum control. This would be a more expensive service that would fit the private gallery/boutique model. Customers would only shop in one "store" and Smugmug's involvement would be completely transparent.

Then the current service (which I consider more of a consignment model) could be refined in ways that fit it best, rather than trying to be all things to all people.

I realize that even exploring the possibility of separating the two would take lots of time and effort, and I wouldn't expect Smugmug to drop everything and do it right now. But until then, I think the two models will always be at odds to a certain extent and there will always be some level of confusion about what Smugmug "is".

This is a very intelligent way to think of this. It's a different offering for a different segment of pros and it would need to be different than today's consignment model where smugmug takes responsibility for everything. It might behave more like Yahoo or Amazon storefronts where they offers a web presence, a bunch of web tools and a payment mechanism, but the vendor does their own fullfillment, customer support, etc...

--John

trs-tracy

awfulsara wrote:

I don't agree. This is the single most important thing to me, and the one thing that is keeping me from selling my prints here through Smugmug.

Check out www.photoreflect.com. If I could marry the best of these two services, I'd be happy cat indeed. The reason I don't print through smugmug directly is that I have no personal quality control and I am unable to sell things like matted/mounted prints, signed prints, framed prints, etc. I can't give preset volume discounts, apply account credits towards an order, or sell packages.

With photoreflect, you can do all those things and more, but the interface is lousy and you can't customize it nearly as well. Furthermore, the display quality of the images isn't up to snuff, so it cannot be used as a gallery, forcing people to find the shot they want, then go find it again if they want to buy it. But what you can do is choose your own print partner (ezprints is one of several options) so you can choose to have prints sent directly to the client, sent to you so you can add your marketing inserts, gift certificates, whatever, or just have an email sent to you so you can fulfill the order yourself. Rather than paying a markup on the prints, you pay a percentage of your total sales (15% I think) for them to take the credit card payments, do all the money stuff, and either forward the order to your printer of choice or back to you for fulfillment.

For me, I don't want to fulfill it for cheaper at Costco, I want to fulfull it better at my local print lab who knows me and my profiles and who can do large prints with a quality I have yet to see from EZPrints. Proofs for weddings I want to get done cheaply, fine art prints I want to get done the best I can do, and I want to look at it with my own eyes before I ship to the client with a personal, handwritten note and signature.

I'd double the subscription price without a peep if smugmug offered that kind of flexibility with the customization options that photoreflect has. Paying a yearly fee for the storage + a percentage sounds like the perfect solution for those who want what I do. I can't be the only one who wants more control and more options than one online printer.

Ditto! I could not have said it better myself. I also do not sell through smugmug because of this. I also want 100% control. I also am an event photographer that does not have the time to perfect a few hundred photos for printing directly. Please consider a self-fulfillment feature. Thanks.

DodgeV83

Ok, I just got my first print from my local Costco and it came out BEAUTIFUL! I uploaded a pic at night, 12x18, and picked it up at Costco the next day. Seriously, if you turn the auto-corrections off they'd have to be idiots to mess up your picture. For $3 on Lustre paper it was a steal! I used one of my track pictures to test it out, it was so cheap I just gave it away to the person in the picture. I'm sure she will buy from me in the future!

I didn't even realize that they sell 16x20 and 20x30 prints both for $9.99 each! Here we are charged $18 for a 16x20 and $22 for a 20x30.

Unfortunately, its still not worth it for general use once you factor in shipping prices and Paypal prices. I will DEFINATELY use it for my local customers though!

DodgeV83 wrote:

Costco prices:

Size Price

4x6 0.16
5x7 0.39
8x10 1.49
11x14 2.99
12x18 2.99

EZ Print prices (as we get them here)

4x6 0.25
5x7 0.99
8x10 2.99
9x12 5.49
11x14 5.49

I believe Costco uses high-quality printers, but unfortunately the print quality is variable depending on the technician. How can COSTCO get their prices SOO LOW, but EZ Print can't?

The closest size we have to Costco's freaking rediculous $2.99 12x18 price, is our 11x14...but an 11x14 costs us $5.49? They cost $3.95 on EzPrints.com. All of the other markups that Smugmug puts on EzPrint's prices are fair I'd say (a $3 markup on 16x20's and a $4 markup on 20x30's seems like alot though), but whats up with $3.95 to $5.49? Its almost as if EZPrints dramatically lowered their 11x14 price and Smugmug didn't notice?

Andy

DodgeV83 wrote:

Here we are charged $18 for a 16x20 and $22 for a 20x30.

Unfortunately, its still not worth it for general use once you factor in shipping prices and Paypal prices. I will DEFINATELY use it for my local customers though!

Hello Dodge,

I think you answered your own question... in surveying many many smugmug photographers, they appreciate the unconditional guarantee and the world-class customer service that smugmug provides to them, and to their clients. It's all part of the service.

DodgeV83

Yea I understand all of that now. Just giving an update after receiving my first print from them. I mean comon, if I see the people often and they can hand me cash for the prints, its better for everyone. I can charge $13 for a 12x18 and make $10 profit. I think I'd get alot of buyers at $13 for a 12x18!

If I charged $13 for an 11x14 (Lustre) on Smugmug, I'd make $5.74 profit, but they would have to pay for shipping costs and get a smaller picture.

Hey, I'm not knocking Smugmug, just wanna share my findings

andy wrote:

Hello Dodge,

I think you answered your own question... in surveying many many smugmug photographers, they appreciate the unconditional guarantee and the world-class customer service that smugmug provides to them, and to their clients. It's all part of the service.

bigsmiles

i've been printing through costco because of price and convenience of local pickup. unfortunately my first smugmug orders weren't the best. here's my complaints:

1. turn around time to california takes about a week.
2. shipping seems high for large orders. i just filled my basket with 200+ pics and the shipping total came to $15? there should be a price break on shipping for larger orders, not the reverse.
3. i still get to pay sales tax even though they are printed far away from cali which makes waiting for the order that much more annoying.
4. if i want to put an album together and some of the pics don't print right, it's another week to wait for new prints.

on the downside in using costco, i have to reload everything onto costco.com unliess i go to costco directly with a bunch of cards or discs. but i've been happy with most of the prints and i don't mind a few bad prints because they are cheap and can sometimes be re-ordered for pickup the same day.

Andy

bigsmiles wrote:

i've been printing through costco because of price and convenience of local pickup. unfortunately my first smugmug orders weren't the best. here's my complaints:

Hi bigsmiles, thanks so much for posting! I'll do my best to reply inline here:

1. turn around time to california takes about a week.

If you selected Economy shipping that's done by US Postal Service First Class Mail. It is inexpensive but not trackable and it can take up to two weeks to reach you. I wish we could hurry up the Post Office but we really have no control over them! There are other options for more expedited service, 2nd day, and even next day. I know that they cost more, yes, but at least they are there

2. shipping seems high for large orders. i just filled my basket with 200+ pics and the shipping total came to $15? there should be a price break on shipping for larger orders, not the reverse.

I wish we had control over that, and that I had a better answer for you - we don't have any control on the shipping rates as they come from the USPS and or the other carriers that you may choose.

3. i still get to pay sales tax even though they are printed far away from cali which makes waiting for the order that much more annoying.

Because it is an online sale that technically takes place in California, we charge sales taxes on any California purchase.
It is up to the customer to declare taxes themselves according to their own state regulations. Sales taxes on Internet purchases are only required to be charged by the seller on purchases in states where the seller has a physical presence. Since we collect the credit card information, we are considered to be the seller.

4. if i want to put an album together and some of the pics don't print right, it's another week to wait for new prints.

have you seen the smugmug guarantee?

on the downside in using costco, i have to reload everything onto costco.com unliess i go to costco directly with a bunch of cards or discs. but i've been happy with most of the prints and i don't mind a few bad prints because they are cheap and can sometimes be re-ordered for pickup the same day.

Thanks again for posting! All the best,

bigsmiles

thanks for the response. i want smugmug to do well, but my experience and feedback from family members trying to order haven't been as happy as when i used ofoto. i love hosting my pics on smugmug. i just wish ordering prints were easier. some responses . . .

andy wrote:

If you selected Economy shipping that's done by US Postal Service First Class Mail. It is inexpensive but not trackable and it can take up to two weeks to reach you. I wish we could hurry up the Post Office but we really have no control over them! There are other options for more expedited service, 2nd day, and even next day. I know that they cost more, yes, but at least they are there

I wish we had control over that, and that I had a better answer for you - we don't have any control on the shipping rates as they come from the USPS and or the other carriers that you may choose.

see, to me $15 for economy shipping sounds high for about 200 pics. maybe i'm underestimating how large that shipment is is but the US postal service offers pretty big flat rate PRIORITY mail boxes for $7.70. it would be nice to have priority mail as an option. that's where smugmug has control. priority mail is relatively fast and inexpensive. it would also be nice to have incentive to place larger orders. instead my $66 order requires $15 to ship.

andy wrote:

Because it is an online sale that technically takes place in California, we charge sales taxes on any California purchase.
It is up to the customer to declare taxes themselves according to their own state regulations. Sales taxes on Internet purchases are only required to be charged by the seller on purchases in states where the seller has a physical presence. Since we collect the credit card information, we are considered to be the seller.

totally understand but after paying $15 for shipping on a $66 that can take up to two weeks to deliver from the middle of the country, it's simply annoying to pay sales tax. i can't be the only one from california that buys stuff from ny to take advantage of free shipping and no sales tax (that i report later ).

andy wrote:

have you seen the smugmug guarantee?

that is a very nice guarantee. i should have reprinted some from my last couple orders. unfortunately, unless i pay for overnight air, reprints can take some time to receive.

i know this is a pretty negative post. i had brought it up on another forum in the past and i was told by a smugmug person that they were working on it. so after a couple months i thought i'd try another order but the shipping thing seems to be the same issue. i can understand that smugmug offers a service that offers value to some people but i really think for some, they really have to search hard to find the value. i'm still trying!!

DodgeV83

Funny that this thread comes up again, on the very day I order 2 more 12x18's from Costco!

$6 for 2 12x18's is heaven

marlinspike

On the smugmug guarantee: does this also cover my customers? Like if I inadvertently upload a photo with a blue cast, and a customer orders a 20x30, do I foot the bill of a replacement 20x30 since the uploaded photo had the cast and therefore it wasn't a printing problem, or will smugmug take care of it? Are customers of pro members made aware of the guarantee in some sort of included literature?

For me there are reasons to avoid Costco btw. One is it's easier to just have smugmug handle everything, the other is that Costco's are known to be inconsistent, and another is I don't like supporting the Costco organization and stores like them (Walmart, Target, Costco, KMart, what have you, my principles are worth more to me than money).

Andy

marlinspike wrote:

On the smugmug guarantee: does this also cover my customers? Like if I inadvertently upload a photo with a blue cast, and a customer orders a 20x30, do I foot the bill of a replacement 20x30 since the uploaded photo had the cast and therefore it wasn't a printing problem, or will smugmug take care of it? Are customers of pro members made aware of the guarantee in some sort of included literature?

For me there are reasons to avoid Costco btw. One is it's easier to just have smugmug handle everything, the other is that Costco's are known to be inconsistent, and another is I don't like supporting the Costco organization and stores like them (Walmart, Target, Costco, KMart, what have you, my principles are worth more to me than money).

The guarantee is on our website. I've had it prominently listed on my website for a loooong time. I recommend it to pros all the time

We routinely redo orders for our pros' customers. If it becomes an issue with a pro, we'll contact that pro directly and suggest workflow changes. In fact, I'm doing a new batch of sixty prints right now for a pro, who really could use some help in color management - and so we'll get the reprint done asap (for the client) and then "teach the pro to fish" as well - so that this doesn't happen again.

Does this help?

All the best,

Andy