Elopement Photographer Pricing: The Complete Guide

So you want to be an elopement photographer?

You’ve got the gear ready. You probably have experience shooting portraits or even weddings.

Only one thing is left standing in the way.

You haven’t figured out how much you should be charging for your elopement photography services yet.

Coming up with an elopement photography pricing structure isn’t as simple as recycling your old service packages. Elopements are a completely different animal and will require a bit more tweaking than most photography niches.

Not to worry, we’ll be fixing that up today. Here’s your complete guide to pricing your services as an elopement photographer.

Why You Shouldn’t Recycle Old Photography Service Pricing Structures

If you’re coming into elopements from any other photography niches, you may be tempted to just reuse what you’ve used before.

Why fix what isn’t broken, right?

Well, elopements are very different from the usual photography segments, even wedding photography.

Elopement photographers wear many hats, including that of a wedding planner. Your job will not start and end on the day of the wedding.

You’ll have a lot of room to add more value to the service you’re delivering to the couple as you’ll see in a minute.

Couples Photos vs Elopements

The biggest difference is that brides will be much more critical of themselves, which may require additional editing from the photographer.
Couples photos tend to be a single location, elopements can often be 2-3, or even more locations depending on the package.
You may add value as a minister. Becoming ordained as a photographer can help you make more money, and even save some money for clients in the process.
You’ll often be required to have permits. Your average couples photos sesh can be deemed low impact photography, which you don’t need a permit for in many states. Weddings, you’ll have need to have permits and thus packages have to be priced accordingly.

Here’s How I Currently Price my Elopement + Intimate Weddings:

I’m a portrait photographer based in Maui, Hawaii and I’ve just added elopements to my services (after long holding out because I didn’t want to work weekends, or with bridezillas).

I’m actually on the cheaper side for elopement photographers in Maui, but this is the pricing model that is currently working for me, and I plan to raise it after my portfolio grows.

You might have to adjust based on your competition and location.

Working in Hawaii, a simple elopement on the beach is very popular, thus my Mini session caters to that crowd. And then for couples who are seeking multiple locations, eg. jungle, waterfalls, hikes, etc., I have the Pro session to accommodate.

Again, this is the pricing model that works for me, and I’ve found converts fairly well. For you, you may have to factor in other things…

What’s Your Cost of Doing Business?

There are four components to the magical formula that can help you put a pin on your elopement photography pricing.

The first one is your cost of doing business or CODB. Simply put, your CODB is the figure that you spend to keep the business running.

Here are some pointers that can help you come up with your CODB:

Camera equipment – Elopements are more demanding than most photography niches out there, so you’ll need to invest in pro-level equipment that can withstand the abuse of sudden rain showers or the wear and tear of long treks. Think about the cost of insuring all that gear and buying backup bodies and lenses, media drives, computer upgrades, software subscriptions, etc. Take anywhere between 20-30% of that sum and that’ll be your equipment costs.

Office / Studio Rent – Having a base of operations as a working pro is kind of important. So if you’re working off a nice studio or a cozy office, factor in your rental costs.

Marketing Costs – Are you running ads? How much does it take to keep your website and social media pages running? List down all your subscriptions or ad spends or whatever fees you are paying for your marketing efforts.

Payroll – Do you hire an assistant for more complicated jobs? How about an accountant? Are you working with a virtual assistant to set all your appointments and take your calls? Are you outsourcing your post-production?

Reinvesting in Your Business – Your business needs to grow over time, and the way you do that is by setting aside at least 10% of your total cost and putting it back into your business.

Now take note of your annual CODB and we’ll move on to the next one.

Determine Your Expenses

Think of this as your personal CODB – how much money do you need to survive or provide for your family, while also honoring your monthly payments?

Just some aspects of your finances that you’ll want to look at:

Food expenses
Rent / mortgage
Car payments
Student loans
Healthcare
Leisure expenses

Again, take note of your annual expenses and we’ll move on to the third part of the elopement pricing photography formula.

How Much do You Want to Make as an Elopement Photographer?

Now this is where a lot of people get tripped up. Putting a pin on what you’re worth as a professional photographer is tough.

A lot of it stems from confidence issues or imposter syndrome, maybe lack of business experience, or perhaps just honest ignorance that comes with the territory of people just starting in the game.

Doing your due diligence should help you get more clarity on this very crucial component of your pricing formula.

So scout the market. Ask around and figure out how much your competitors are charging. If you’re absolutely new, then you might have to eyeball your entry rates by referencing your CODB, expenses, your level of experience, and what the market is charging.

For the sake of our little demonstration, let’s just say you want an additional $50k revenue through elopements.

How Many Elopements Can You Shoot a year?

How busy are you with family photos? Headshots? Real Estate and other areas of photography?

While you may be able to shoot more elopements than weddings in a week, it’ll be best to keep things conservative at 1 a week.

Let’s land on 4 elopements a month for this example and put everything together.

The Elopement Photography Pricing Formula

The first step is to find the sum of your CODB and Expenses.

Now add your desired income.

Then divide the figure by the number of sessions you can do in a year.

If you want to make $50,000 revenue before taxes, and you can do 48 elopements a year (1 a week), then you’re looking at an average purchase price of $1,042 per elopement.

Of course, doing 48 elopements a year might not be realistic, so you may want to drop your sessions/year and bump up your asking price to arrive at a more feasible number.

Your average photographer makes just $50k a year, you can add that to your business with elopements alone.

How to Add More Value to Your Elopement Photography Services

We’ve alluded to this earlier, but getting into elopement photography lets you add more value to the couple’s experience outside of your camera work.

Position yourself as an elopement planner AND elopement photographer.

One major reason why people opt to elope vs hold a traditional wedding is to escape the logistical nightmares of planning an old-school wedding ceremony.

While elopements will still be an order of magnitude easier to plan and execute than most weddings, it’ll still require some elbow grease and weeks of planning.

Here’s where your expertise can come in. You can position yourself as a planner that will:

Recommend the right mix of vendors (caterers, décor rentals, venues, etc.) that’ll achieve the look and vibe that the couple wants for their ceremony.
Help craft the perfect timeline for the special day.
Scout locations and prepare options and backups.
Assist in securing permits and guide the couple with the legalities of their big day.

Being the couple’s elopement planner AND photographer should help them cut at least half of the stress and prep work they’ll be doing before their wedding.

That amount of legwork and peace of mind that you’ll offer will add tremendous value to your services, and you should be properly compensated.

Offer Videography Services

There are a lot of overlaps between photography and videography – that’s why a lot of pros offer both services. But that’s not to say transitioning from a photographer role into a hybrid shooter will be easy.

Adding video to your elopement packages will require more investment from you in gear and education, but it’s a low-hanging opportunity that can help you hit your target income a lot faster.

Checkout our videography resources to help you get started:

Offer Elopement Albums

Another money-making opportunity photographers seem to ignore – prints!

Try structuring albums or other printed products as an “add-on” or you can directly include it in your packages and see your income go up and up without too much additional work.

Sure, it may take you some time experimenting, networking with printing businesses, or putting together albums, but selling prints will undoubtedly help get the most out of the jobs you book.

Wrapping Up

If you’re new to this and have really sat down to figure out how much you should be charging as an elopement photographer, you probably didn’t like what you saw.

But don’t forget about the simple law of supply and demand – more and more of the wedding population decide to get eloped rather than hold a small wedding in their hometown.

Elopements let couples customize their wedding day to the last detail, which can’t be said for traditional weddings. Packed chapels and having to meet all 50 of the bride or groom’s extended family for a day that’s supposed to be all about the couple just doesn’t sit right for a lot of people.

For the same budget as a small wedding, sometimes even less, couples get to experience a wedding day that is quite literally unlike any other wedding they’ve been to, far away from the old set of rules majority of the population has been doing for the last half a century.

It’s your job as an elopement photographer to document this special day and deliver stunning photos that the couple will cherish forever – and you can’t put a price tag on these memories that you helped preserve.

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