Picateers disrupts school portrait market with Web 2.0 tactics

May 21, 2008 | Dean Takahashi | Comments | |

Having paid through the nose for school portraits over the years, I would love someone to do a Web 2.0-style disruption on that business. And it looks like that is happening with a company called Picateers.

School photos are a pretty big racket with an old-style approach to doing business. Parents have never been that happy paying exhorbitant prices to companies such as Lifetouch, which employs tens of thousands of photographers and other specialists across the country.

Larry Jacobs, a former manager at Oracle and IBM, thought the market was ripe for disruption. He saw that school photographers didn’t seem excited about their jobs and thought that parents with increasingly inexpensive digital SLR cameras could probably take better pictures.

In 2005, Jacobs founded Picateers in a San Mateo, Calif. to let parents to take over the school-picture program.

Jacobs (pictured left) finds volunteers among parents to shoot the pictures of kids. They then upload them to the Picateers site, where parents can view the shots and select the ones they want to buy. Then Picateers delivers the pictures to them for about the same cost as what Lifetouch charges. Prices on picture packages range from $10 to $90, with the average order about $38. Parents can order collage pictures or photo books.

But the powerful part of this Web 2.0 approach is that PIcateers gives back half the proceeds to the schools. Lifetouch also gives in-kind donations back to the schools, like free student IDs, but it often can’t give more than 15 percent because of its overhead.

Picateers can afford to kick back half of the fees charged to schools because it has low overhead. It has only 14 people and relies on parent volunteers, who can generate more money for the school with Picateers than with traditional fundraisers. The parents can also be creative, staging pictures outdoors or at scenic spots. For pictures of 100 kids, Picateers asks for a few parent volunteers.

Picateers got initial funding in May 2006. It raised a $5.5 million round from Norwest Venture Partners in June 2006. Jacobs expects to raise another round and he hopes to be profitable by the end of 2009.

The company launched a beta program last August and is doing a full rollout this coming August. Now there are more than 300 schools, from preschools to high schools, participating in the program. One school in Fresno uses Picateers eight times during the school year, for everything from dances to graduation ceremonies.

There is plenty of room for growth. The Photo Marketing Association estimated last year that 22.7 million households bought school portraits in 2006. The PMA said that school portraits were the most popular form of portraits in America, followed by sports and family portraits. Full told, Americans spent $2.2 billion on school-related portraits in the U.S., according to the PMA.

With Picateers, schools can find a significant new source of funding in an age of budget cuts. At a school of 400 kids, the average share for the school could be $4,500 to $5,000 per photo event. One such school is Berean Christian High School in Walnut Creek, Calif.

The private school with 430 students has tried out Picateers for a couple of different photo events. Gary Jung, the school’s information technology administrator, yearbook chief, and digital photography teacher says he is an enthusiastic fan of the program.

HIs school wasn’t happy with Lifetouch. It also wasn’t pleased with a local photographer. So at the beginning of the year, Jung started using Picateers. He organized the event himself and Picateers handled all of the chores that he didn’t want to undertake. Now he is expanding it to use it for senior portraits, school mug shots, and sports team photos. About a dozen of his own photography students will shoot. Jung anticipates thousands of dollars will come back into the school’s coffers.

“Most people who went to Picateers viewed it as a way to raise money,” he said. “I thought it was a way to solve my problem. The principal used to get complaints about the photos. That has ceased.”

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About the Author, Dean Takahashi

Dean is lead writer for GamesBeat at VentureBeat. He covers video games, security, chips and a variety of other subjects. Dean previously worked at the San Jose Mercury News, the Wall Street Journal, the Red Herring, the Los Angeles Times, the Orange County Register and the Dallas Times Herald. He is the author of two books, Opening the Xbox and the Xbox 360 Uncloaked. Follow him on Twitter at @deantak, and follow VentureBeat on Twitter at @venturebeat.

  • benbbeck
    What a great piece of news! I've always hated how Lifetouch charged so much! Now they have to deal with the beauty of capitalism... competition!
  • jeff
    Of course instead of the school overcharging parents they could just sell the portraits for less and encourage participation in all of the schools fundraising efforts. Or if they really wanted to save they could print their pictures at sams clum or wal mart and the average package would cost $6.00
  • James
    The article says "Parents have never been that happy paying exhorbitant [sic] prices to companies such as Lifetouch .." and yet "Then Picateers delivers the pictures to them for about the same cost as what Lifetouch charges." Geesh. what irony.
  • Denise
    So much for the "Professional Portrait" industry. In an effort to fill their (Picateers) coffers and using "Lifetouch" as their justification for distroying an industry. Picateers has managed to pull a "Wal-Mart". Creating a situation where the consumer thinks they are getting a deal and driving the local small business out of business. And, they wrap it in a pretty package that says it's good for the consumer.

    There are hundreds of small local "school" portrait photographers that provide an excellent product at very competitive prices while struggling to provide all the "services" that the schools now require and give back, too. Most "school" photographers give back more than 50% of the monies earned to the schools in products and services - not to mention outright commissions.

    This sounds like a great idea...however, it's been our experience that "volunteers" sounds good - but the reality is that very few follow thru. What happens then? How does the school provide the security that the parents and state require because the "volunteers" didn't get everyone photographed for an ID Card. What about yearbook images? What about the photos needed for the school "Disaster " reference manual? What about the disruption to the school day? Most school picture days are just that one day or one half day.

    I agree, some parents are very good at taking photos of their children, what about the 20 or 50 others that need to be photographed? And, perhaps if the schools didn't need so much in the way of "services" then photographers could provide their photographic services at a more appealing price.

    Speaking personally, I have never felt that the prices I've paid, over the years, for school photos of my children as being unreasonable. I treasure every photograph, even the ones with the goofy expression or their hair not combed correctly. That is my child, at that time of their life. It's priceless.

    Please remember that - and stop making this just a price and a profit center issue. Finally, shame on you Picateers, for attempting to "distrupt" an industry under the pretense of saving parents and families money, while lining your pockets. Good luck, you are gonna need it. Because, we are not all "Lifetouch". And, "Lifetouch" isn't all bad.
  • Mary M. Soquel, CA
    I am currently in my third round of school portraits as volunteer coordinator using Picateers Portrait service at my children's school. Our small public school depends on fundraising to support a well rounded curriculum with, music, art and performing art. I have volunteered on numerous fundraising activities including auctions, craft fairs, festivals, fund drives and book fairs and Picateers is by far the quickest and easiest fundraiser I have ever done. I found that the prices are better and more families purchased portrait packages than ever before. Plus our small school made close to $2000 each year. The actual photography took about 2o minutes a classroom, with 5-6 volunteers so we were done in one morning. The rest is cake. All the forms and announcements are done for you. This is one fundraiser I will not give up. And I love that we choose our background that reflects our school environment, I personally do not care for the phony painted backdrop of lifetouch and other commercial photo services.

    I tell everyone I am Picateers biggest fan!!!
  • Karen
    If there is a need to change the background, you don't need to go through Picateers to have that done. I'm not even sure why they use that as a selling point. Perhaps because most of us have stopped thinking through things for ourselves and are more willing to be feed whatever someone else dishes out?

    All of the information isn't exactly true. No upfront costs? You need a camera and a tripod AND lights. I'd say those total significant upfront costs! A photographer will be ready to create technically perfect images right after viewing a DVD training video? Can I get my phd after sitting through a short video presentation as well? Hmm....I suppose it's possible...

    It will be interesting to see how long this fad lasts. All that glitters is not gold.
  • Cautiously Excited
    I have spent about two hours today searching the internet for a photo sharing website and found www.picateers.com.

    I found an article about how Larry Jacobs was sitting at his computer one night trying to print and organize all of his photographs from his child's kindergarten class and voila! Picateers was born.

    What we need at our school is a SAFE photo sharing website that our parents, educators and most importantly our children could SAFELY log in to and order photos and photo gifts. I considered Shutterfly (mostly because I LOVE their photobooks) but I then did a search on Shutterfly and typed in the word "sexy" and ugh! there were some photos of things I would not want my daughter seeing. NOT GOOD!

    On another note, while researching Picateers, I found their portrait fundraiser program. Although I am not sure that we could get the entire school population to agree to have school portraits done the way Picateers does it, I do find it refreshing to see that there are other options available to us. And I like that we can use the Picateers fundraising program for other things, like school sports or performances.

    I also do REALLY LOVE the idea of having 25% of our photo order (not portraits) returned to the school, that the site is PRIVATE and that our children's identities are protected.
  • Virginia Leiby
    Hello,

    I first used Picateers last Spring in 08 and I have to say their customer service has gone above and beyond my expectations. I first met with Amitesh from Picateers at the PTOtoday show in Marlboro, MA. He followed through with a promise and we received an excellent photo kit that we couldn't have afforded so we were able to get started - ours to keep.

    The process is easy and with help from Amitesh and then Steve who handles the technical support they always follow through. I am east coast and they are west coast, but using email, we are able to communicate easily and they provide fast responses.

    We will be doing our second fundraiser with Picateers this fall which will be a "Friends & Family" photo shoot for all the schools in our 1400 student district. We will take group shots and individual student portraits during school lunches and on Saturday we will shoot friends and families.

    Last Spring we had some great shots of two friends with their skateboards and helmets and a couple of girls with their drums. By having our volunteer photographers take four shots of each individual, group, or family, you get some great shots. Our photographer was great with the kids and by the forth shot usually had them all smiling. He was very impressed with the help he got from Steve and the technical crew who helped him take better shots after sending in a few test shots.

    Our local volunteers who did the photography knew a lot of the kids already which really helped. All the volunteers who helped said they were really impressed with the school and the behavior of the students while we were there. This proved to be an added bonus we didn't expect as we build important parent and community involvement.

    The background that came with the photo kit helped the pictures of the kids just pop. Adults could not believe the difference between our school's traditional photos done by Lifetouch and the photos done by our volunteers with the Picateers expertise. I am still hearing this year what a tremendous difference there was. Adults just came up to me out of the blue to share their positive opinions. The website is very easy to use and so convenient. If you do your part, you will find that Picateers does their job really well.

    Good luck! This is a fundraiser that is well worth doing.
  • anon
    Of course they can offer big cash back. They don't employ very many people, they con local photographers to cold call for them having the photographer think there might be some jobs in it, and they don't bother to carry any liability insurance. That last part should make any school shoo them away since if one of their lights (that either the school or photographer has to purchase) falls over on a kid the school or the poor volunteer is the one getting sued.
  • anon
    I don't know if Picateers is a scam or not, but it's poorly executed to say the least. The first thing amertuer photogs going pro get told is to get insurance.
  • D Pickel
    As the owner of a small photography studio who photographs scool pictures as a large part of my income I am really distressed by this whole concept. It was bad enough tha tI have to underbid companies like "LifeTouch" in order to even get a school contract. But then I have to kick back a percentage from every portrait sold. In addition I have to provide team and group pictures to the school at know charge, design a composit print of all the senior class (at no charge), cover things like homecoming games and senior nite activies and provide images to the school (again for FREE). All of that while parents are buying the cheapest package possible and then scanning my images on their home computer so they can print their own copies. Plus every digital SLR owner who thinks that makes them a photographer is cutting into my regular senior portrait business. With cheap prices and ink jet prints. I worked my ass off to become a PPA Certified Professional Photographer and companies like this are popping up. Mt guess is "You get what you pay for"
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