Today's Guest: Dave Rafftery of Trotter Photo in Manchester, Missouri
Today's Host: John Bentley - July 2007
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Dave Rafftery Transcript Page
JOHN: Welcome to VTalk Radio Photography Spotlight. Today's program is sponsored by Morephotos.com. The online total photo sales solution for professional photographers worldwide. I'm your host, John Bentley.
JOHN: Today we're in the studio with Dave Rafftery of Trotter Photo of Manchester, Missouri. Welcome to the program, Dave.
DAVE: Thanks, John.
JOHN: Can you tell us a little bit about your business?
DAVE: Well basically we are a wedding portrait and commercial studio in the St. Louis, MO, area. We have four locations to serve our customers in the area here. I guess, basically, we specialize in wedding photography. We shoot close to 500 weddings a year. Large staff with an in house lab that we handle all of our printing needs from.
JOHN: What other types of photography do you do also?
DAVE: Well basically, I would say we do a great deal of portrait photography in the studio. Basically families, some senior photography, commercial work as well. Product shots, things like that. People who can't bring their products into our studio, we will photograph them here under our controlled lighting, but then we've also done homes and businesses and things like that to where they needed larger photo-type stuff for brochures and things like that.
JOHN: I've been looking at your website. Can you give your website address real quick?
DAVE: Yeah, it's www.trotterphoto.com and the website is up 24/7 and we can have as much information on there as we possibly can to promote our studio including all of our pricing for wedding packages, portraits, Bar Mitzvahs, the whole nine yards. Everything we have, you know our pricing is up front online which is something a lot of our customers really like because when they are searching for somebody like that, they want to know bottom line what things are going to cost.
JOHN: I've been looking at some of the photographs you have on your website. One in particular struck me, it was a beautiful black and white shot of a sleeping baby with a baseball glove over his petusky. Very cute, that's a nice photo, I like that one.
DAVE: Yeah, and that's something you know we spend a little bit more time than some of your mall photographers on some of your portrait type stuff. We're not a high end photography portrait studio, but we like to feel that we can shoot the classy things like that. We give our customers a little bit of extra time. You know, we'll spend a half hour to an hour on a portrait session for people and take several different proofings for them to make sure we get the shot they want. That was one that just really came out great.
JOHN: Do you have any advice to give for a client who wants an event or portrait photo?
DAVE: I'm sorry, some advice about what?
JOHN: Just taking and preparing themselves when they come in the studio, that kind of thing.
DAVE: I would say the thing that most of our customers want to know is what they should wear. What they're really in for, because a lot of people don't do this kind of thing. Or they go to some little, like a mall photographer, to where you know they're taking their kids in there to an unknown thing and they're being rushed through. Advice, like I said, is just if they have anything they would like to you know embark that upon our photographer so we know to look for to get them the final product.
JOHN: So, what is your most important goal when you're shooting an event? What are you looking for?
DAVE: Basically on weddings, especially, we're trying to keep it a little light and lose as far as our attitude towards our customers go. That's one thing we instill upon all of our photographers is that you know it's customer relations job first and foremost. So if you're out there pushing people to do something in a time frame they're not comfortable with or you know even grumpy with them. We hear so many people come in and say, you know, somebody shot my sister's wedding and it, the guy was really good, but he was a jerk to us. That's the last thing we want to hear on a wedding day. Because you know, they won't like their pictures before they even see them if something like that happens.
JOHN: What is your favorite place to shoot? Do you prefer the weddings? Do you prefer indoor/outdoor shoots where you can control lighting?
DAVE: I prefer weddings, because weddings, you know, I've been doing this myself for 25 years. Weddings are still to me an exciting thing because they are the same thing every week, but they're different because you have a new different set of people every week. So that's always a challenge to come up with some new creative ideas for people because everybody wants something different. The way this industry has changed over the last few years, has been good and bad because there's some people who can't change with the times and we feel we can. Still, you know, outdoor photography really sets off a wedding album. So any time we can outdoors to a park or someplace like that, any kind of outdoor venue, that's when we really get some fun pictures.
JOHN: Now I see on your site, you also do sport photography. Can you tell me a little about that?
DAVE: I'm sorry, I couldn't hear that.
JOHN: Yes, I see on your website you do sports photography, can you tell me a little bit about that?
DAVE: Yeah, actually we're doing a lot of that kind of stuff right now. Dance studio recitals, something to where we take backgrounds to and set up and while they're doing their dress rehearsals, usually, we are doing their individual pictures for kids for packages type thing. We also do baseball teams and swim teams is kind of our bigger niche around St. Louis area. Those are challenges a lot of times because you know the dance studios are not so bad because they are inside. The baseball and the swim teams are outside and you're kind of at the mercy of the weather. So, you have to have a little bit of experience to know how to do these things for you know to make the best photograph under any situation on something like that.
JOHN: We are in the studio with Dave Rafftery of Trotter Photo in Manchester, MO. This is VTalk Radio's Photographer's Spotlight. We'll be right back after these important messages.
ANNOUNCER: This VTalk Radio Spotlight is sponsored by morephotos.com. The online photo sales solution for professional photographers worldwide.
VTALK RADIO ... we now return you to VTalk Radio Photographer's Spotlight with your host, John Bentley.
JOHN: Welcome back to VTalk Radio's Photographer's Spotlight. We are in the studio with Dave Rafftery of Trotter Photo in Manchester, MO. Welcome back Dave.
DAVE: Thank you.
JOHN: Can you tell us a little bit about why you got into photography in the first place.
DAVE: Well, it's kind of a strange thing. I was 20 years old and my best friend bought the business from his sister and brother-in-law the portraits and weddings side of the business, and Jim and Joyce Trotter who started the business went off onto mostly commercial work and real estate and stuff like that so, Charlie said, "I gotta a job for you on Saturdays." So I started going on this on the job training type thing learning the in's and outs of shooting a wedding. Twenty-five years ago, twenty-six years ago now, shooting weddings was a lot simpler thing than it seems to be today. It was just a matter of you usually went to the bride/s house, got some pictures before hand there, went to the wedding, and the reception immediately following at a VFW hall or you know a hotel ballroom or something like that. Very simple. You have one style of album you sold, one style of photography that you shot; life was very simple back then. Times have changed where people want to make a real production out of their wedding. So we have to adjust to the times as something like that goes. So basically you're learning more and more people like more candid stuff as opposed to portrait style photography or a good mix thereof. That's what we find in the St. Louis area is most people are looking for a good mix and want the posed pictures with the parents and the grandparents, but they still want all the fun stuff with the bridesmaids and the groomsmen. You know, the friends at the reception.
JOHN: Can you tell me some of the area/cities you service?
DAVE: Anything in the metropolitan area. I mean the St. Louis city proper itself, the suburbs to the west, and the east side in Illinois. It's just a growing sprawling area.
JOHN: Can you name some of those?
DAVE: So, I mean we can drive an hour to an hour and a half between weddings and receptions sometimes. Every area is serviceable to the St. Louis area here and we can also do destination weddings. I was in Chicago for a wedding last year. It's the kind of thing where the family knew my work and shot sister's wedding something like that and instead of finding a photographer they didn't know there, they paid for my travel up there and we shot a wedding there.
JOHN: Can you tell me some of the cities in the area that you have actually done recently?
DAVE: A couple weeks ago I was in Edwardsville, IL; two weeks from now, I'll be out in Troy, MO; Arnold, anything in North County. Hazelwood, Florencent area - that's one of our bigger areas up in the North. The Chesterfield and St. Charles County as well.
JOHN: And what about facilities. Are there any banquet halls in the area, wedding facilities that you do a lot of shooting at?
DAVE: Oh yeah, we have a lot of affiliations with a lot of the places because we are a large studio, like I said, we've done a lot of work for these reception places. One that comes to mind is Windows on Washington. It's more of a eclectic modern kind of facility. They have six ballrooms i think now. But they're just a little bit different; not your standard hotel ballrooms. We've worked up quite a relationship with them over the years to where we are on their preferred vendors' list. To where us and two other photographers are on that list and we offer those customers a discount for you know getting our services. By the same token, we get a lot out of that because we get a lot of January, February and March weddings which is a slower time for weddings in St. Louis that we probably might not get.
JOHN: Dave, tell me what makes Trotter Photo services unique. What sets you apart from other photographers?
DAVE: I'm sorry?
JOHN: What sets you apart from other photographers?
DAVE: Sets us apart, it's probably our customer service. Like I said, we have our own in-house lab. That's the kind of thing to where we can turn stuff around a lot quicker then some photographers can. Service after the sales is very important to us, because it's not we were just like taking these pictures and giving them to the people and say, "Here you're on your own." We do a lot of album design and layout for their finished wedding album.
JOHN: Now, is there a way to inspect or proof the photos online.
DAVE: Oh absolutely. MorePhotos has been one of the biggest blessings we've had in many years; just by the fact of we take all of our wedding proofs from every wedding and post it online. Bride has a pass code to get into that. She can give it to anybody she wants to. In fact, we usually do little cards that we either hand out at the reception or she will send out with her thank you notes saying that all the pictures taken today will be posted online and usually we get those online about two weeks after the wedding so it's still fresh in their minds as well. We've gotten orders from all over the country and even the world. We send pictures to England and Australia. And those are orders that I don't think we would normally get if the bride had to take her paper proofs around to all of her family and friends.
JOHN: So anybody can go to the website and view these photos and order them right online?
DAVE: Absolutely. Like I said, it's been a great thing. It shows every print we had taken that day so if we took a candid picture of the bride's cousin and her husband dancing... you know sometimes you wouldn't think .. some people wouldn't think that would be a sellable photo, but to them it's important. So they can order directly from us. It keeps the bride and groom out of it. So the bride and groom don't have to worry about collecting money and delivering photos. We take care of all that for them.
JOHN: Sounds like a great service, Dave. Can you give me any final thoughts before we let you go?
DAVE: Just that we have now four locations in St. Louis to serve people a little bit better. Especially with portraits, alot of people won't drive more than 10 minutes to get a portrait taken. Especially kids and family that change all the time. So, having four locations gives us a little bit broader area of service in the St. Louis area. The other thing would be just our quality of work at a reasonable price. We're not the most expensive photographers here. We actually do a lot of stuff wedding wise. Especially like I said, we shoot 500 weddings a year that, you know, we can offer rates that are a lot more reasonable than somebody that's only gonna shoot 20 or 30 weddings a year.
JOHN: So you said you have four locations, can you tell me where those other locations are?
DAVE: We have a location in St. Charles which is actually Ofalon, MO, and that's on Mexico Road; location is fourth location is at Dunn Road and 270, and our newest store is the south location and that's in Arnold MO which is at 55 and 141 basically.
JOHN: Alright. Do you have any contact information, phone number people can reach you and then give us your website again will ya?
DAVE: The best way to get ahold of us is to call either of the studios. The main studio is on Manchester Road, Manchester 141, and the phone number here is (636) 394-7689 and all of our information is on our website which is www.trotterphoto.com.
JOHN: Well thank you Dave Rafftery of Trotter Photo for stopping by and taking a moment out of your day to do this interview. We greatly appreciate it.
DAVE: My pleasure, John, thanks for the opportunity.
JOHN: You've been listening to VTalk Radio's Photographer's Spotlight. Thanks for listening. Have a great day.
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