Photo printing methodology? (for school photo gig)

photobug · March 18, 2008

Next month, I'll probably be doing my first "public" gig, shooting parent-child portraits at a school event. The cost of the photos will be included in the admission price, so everyone will get a photo.

I'm comfortable doing the photography itself, but have never handled a "mass portrait shoot" like this before.

So far, I've done my own printing at home (currently on a Canon Pro9000 printer, in a color-managed workflow). ...However, I may be looking at close to 100 photos and I don't want to kill myself with labor in post-processing. I expect to deliver the main photo in a "keepsake" folder, possibly imprinted with the school name and event date. I'll also put all photos up on my SmugMug site so folks can order other sizes after-the-fact, and without any further investment of my time.

Here are my questions, hoping for some DGrin help:

What would you recommend as the best method of printing all these photos, with good quality?
Print them at home?
Use SmugMug's service (EZ Print)?
Use other outside lab (e.g. I've heard positive comments about Mpix)?
Use a local lab (is some place like Costco even worth considering, if I used their color profiles?)
Since I won't personally be able to recognize 90% of the people in the photos, can anyone suggest a good way to keep track of which photo goes to whom? I expect to have each couple register on a sheet as they come through the line (name, address, email, etc) and I will encode notes on each registration form such as digital image file#s, identifying clothing colors, etc.
If I print just a few photos at a time at home, it's not hard to keep them straight -- but if an external lab sends 100 "random" photos back to me, how can I easily keep them straight? Some of you reading this must have already solved this problem many times over...
Is there any easy way to encode a shot# on the back of the photo delivered to them, with which they can order reprints at any time? I don't want to ruin the photo by writing on the back of it, or by sticking a label on it that will degrade the print over time. Again, surely some of you have solved this one?

Thanks for sharing your advice/expertise!