Customer Orders - How to Track?

Techman1

Hello all you Pro Smugmuggers out there! I have a few customers that are asking about when their orders should come in. Unfortunately, I don't know how to check on this through either Smugmug or through EZPrints directly. Can someone tell me how this is done?

I can see where the prints were ordered, when & the customers email address, but that's all I know.

Also, what is the typical turnaround for small prints & small print orders (8x10 & smaller; less than 10 prints)? I ran a small test print order initially and it came back to me fairly quick. But, having had several customers ask and since I just turned on my site to clients recently, I'm concerned.

I did a search on this and really didn't find an exact hit, so that's why I'm posting a new thread.

Thanks in advance to all that have experience and advice in this area!

Fred

Techman1

I guess I'll try customer service at Smugmug. If anyone does happen to have any advice on this subject, I would still appreciate hearing from you.

Thanks in advance!

Fred

tony larcombe

Techman1 wrote:

I guess I'll try customer service at Smugmug. If anyone does happen to have any advice on this subject, I would still appreciate hearing from you.

Thanks in advance!

Fred

I did a TEST order for myself and ordered a print from a recent wedding, the turnaround was not good, I wanted to check the delivery time and the quality. The quality was very pixelly, smugmughelp told me that I needed to upload at higher then 800px on the long side to get better results, they suggested that I stick to 1500px on the long side to be safe. The delivery was 15 days, I am in PA, but even so.
Tony.

Andy

Techman1 wrote:

Hello all you Pro Smugmuggers out there! I have a few customers that are asking about when their orders should come in. Unfortunately, I don't know how to check on this through either Smugmug or through EZPrints directly. Can someone tell me how this is done?

I can see where the prints were ordered, when & the customers email address, but that's all I know.

Also, what is the typical turnaround for small prints & small print orders (8x10 & smaller; less than 10 prints)? I ran a small test print order initially and it came back to me fairly quick. But, having had several customers ask and since I just turned on my site to clients recently, I'm concerned.

I did a search on this and really didn't find an exact hit, so that's why I'm posting a new thread.

Thanks in advance to all that have experience and advice in this area!

Fred

hi fred, so sorry we missed this thread. shipping options are here and i can tell you that most orders are printed same day and shipped out immediately. of course, actual shipping time will depend on when they place the order (early or late in the day) and what method of shipment they chose.

jfriend

Give the printer your highest resolution originals

tony larcombe wrote:

I did a TEST order for myself and ordered a print from a recent wedding, the turnaround was not good, I wanted to check the delivery time and the quality. The quality was very pixelly, smugmughelp told me that I needed to upload at higher then 800px on the long side to get better results, they suggested that I stick to 1500px on the long side to be safe. The delivery was 15 days, I am in PA, but even so.
Tony.

When printing anything other than a really small print, you should be uploading the highest resolution file you have (full resolution of the camera) to give the printer the most pixels to work with.

Ideally, you'd end up with at least 220 pixels per inch at the print size you order (some people think even 300ppi is better). This is not to be confused with the pixels per inch that might be stamped in your photo's EXIF as that's basically meaningless.

To calculate the pixels per inch for a given print size, take a properly corrped photo height or width in pixels and divide it by the matching print dimension. So, if you have an original that's 2000x3000 and you're printing an 8x12, you'd have 2000/8=250ppi which should be good.

But if you have a 533x800 and you're printing a 4x6, you'd have 800/6=133ppi which will may show some pixelation because you don't have enough pixels for the size. If you tried to print an 8x10 with a 640x800 inmage, you'd only have 800/10 = 80 ppi and you'd definitely end up with severe pixelation.

So, whenever printing from a commercial service, always give the printer your highest resolution original and their software can then give you the highest possible quality result.

portellimagery

The one great thing about SmugMug is unlimited storage (granted, I haven't made use of it yet) I need to finish organizing and I will upload all my digital photos for backup. I know it is time consuming uploading large files, but the quality of your output will decrease as the file gets smaller and vice versa. I have a few 16x20 prints on display that came from my 20D and they look great. When it comes to photo printing, size does matter.

Ben

tony larcombe wrote:

I did a TEST order for myself and ordered a print from a recent wedding, the turnaround was not good
...
. The delivery was 15 days, I am in PA, but even so.
Tony.

Other people have talked about the quality, but I do want to address the delivery issue. With very rare exceptions, our prints are printed and shipped the very next business day. We get complaints like this of how long it took to get it in their hands, but once it is out the door of the warehouse there is absolutely nothing we can do about it. Of those 15 days, 1 day was us and the other 14 would be the US Post Office.

The Post Office is currently having a lot of problems moving packages around and out of Georgia. I don't know why this is (weather?), but despite what people seem to think... we really don't have any influence over the post office.

Normally (when the Post Office isn't in the process of imploding), these packages take anywhere from 3-10 days on average. Out here in CA we get them delivered frequently in just 3 or 4 days.

That is all in regards to the cheapest delivery option of course. Choosing a more expensive option will get them to you much faster. (They print and ship just as fast, they just actually get delivered in a reasonable amount of time)