Well, thats it folks. Every Sears Portrait Studio is Shutting Down Forever

From: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323646604578405001071809788.html

"CPI Corp, in a statement on its website, said it closed all of its U.S. studios "after many years of providing family portrait photography." The St. Louis-based company didn't explain the hasty closure, and calls to CPI went unanswered. However, the company has struggled financially, hurt by the rise of digital photography. 

The news came suddenly to the retailers. "We were notified Thursday that CPI is ceasing its U.S. operations at retailers across the country immediately," Sears spokesman Howard Riefs said. CPI has provided photo services for Sears's customers since 1959 and has been the store's only portrait studio operator since 1986, currently located in all 788 Sears stores in the U.S. and Puerto Rico."

Geez--immediately? Anyone on the front lines who can share an anecdote of what went down?

Here's what I hear so far from the comments. Add yours:

"We went to clock in and it said your services are no longer needed " 

"Picture Me studios weren't given notice either. We received text messages from District Managers that we no longer were employed. There's been talks of closure for at least a year but were always told things were still profitable. As for the closure, there wasn't any prior notice. The customers are going to be hit the hardest. Former employees have no control of the portraits in studio or in shipment... "

Just a funny story

From the comments: "Just last week I had a 10 o'clock come in at 10:15 and tell me that her child just threw up in the parking lot. She then proceeded to say that he seems fine and is it ok if she goes into the store and gets him a change of clothes. So when we finally tried to take his pics, needless to say they were lousy. Mom says "I don't know why he's acting like this, he's usually so good for pictures!" Duh mom!!!!"

Get off the breathing machine and IV and get back to work

(From the comments by fedupwithsps:)

The other day I had a customer come in 2 hours early for an appointment, wanting to be taken early. I had an appointment every hour until her appointment, so I politely explained that I did have other appointments scheduled to come in before her, but that if they canceled or didn't show I would be able to get her in early, then suggested they walk around the mall so that the children did not get restless sitting there there for possibly 2 hours.

She declined and said she would just wait. During the next two hours both appointments showed, and while i was with them, her children were literally tearing the studio up. They knocked down and broke 5 of our hanging pictures and put a hole in the wall. so I again suggested maybe they go play in the play place to keep them entertained. Again she declined.

So I finally made it to them, and began trying to take the portraits, and they children were crying with snotty noses, and they would not cooperate. i tried for a full 30 mins and only got 2 photos. so I suggested that if they came back, we could try again. she threw a fit and said that i was giving poor customer service, because I didn't take their pictures right away... I mean forget about the other people that had appointments.. she yelled and cussed but agreed to come back. ??

She then called in on me the next day, saying that I made her wait for two hours when she had an appointment, and that I kept taking people before her...and then I got mad that her kids would not take pictures and demanded they come back later. So like everything else at sps, instead of listening to what really happened, because the customer is always right, I got a corrective action, because of poor customer service. Now you tell me is that fair? I did everything possible, yet still got in trouble. This company is messed up, and if they don't start treating their employees right, they have none.

And for this entire past week I have had the flu and pneumonia. I have been on bed rest and breathing machines and an at home IV. The meds they put me on, I found did not react well to stomach ulcers...which is how I found out I have one. I called the manager and explained that I would be out for at least a week, told her all the details, and all she said was if you don't have a doctors note, you don't have a job... I received a text today asking when I was coming back.. there were no, " how are you feeling" or " I hope you are doing better" messages at all. It's completely ridiculous that I can be as sick as I am, and the biggest problem in their life is the fact I am sick, and they might have to work a double to cover it.

Kiddie Kandids Shuts Down Without Warning

In case you haven't heard, Kiddie Kandids (not a CPI company) abruptly filed for bankruptcy and closed their doors, leaving customers without their orders and associates without a job and unpaid. From this article

"Thousands of Utah parents and countless others across thecountry are worried they may have just lost precious family memories. Photographsof their children are locked up, behind closed doors, inside hundreds of KiddieKandids stores that are now closed. The company is bankrupt.

More than 175 Kiddie Kandids studios abruptly closed theirdoors today when employees got word, in the form of a letter from the corporateoffice in Sandy,the company was declaring Chapter Seven bankruptcy. More than 1,700 workers,from part-time college students to full time managers supporting theirfamilies, are now unemployed. Worse, they also found out they won’t be paid forthe past two weeks work."

Good luck in 2010, everyone

So it looks like SPS is going to last for another year at least. Thanks everyone for leaving comments. I know I've been more spare with posting so let me direct new readers to one of my favorite posts of the year:

What it means to be a "Photographer" in a "Fun Work Environment"
I also just moderated some comments on older posts, so those should appear now as well.

Everyone loves snotty noses in photos

From the comments:

Tis the season for runny noses, coughing kids and spreading it to ALL employees. Twice this week I had 2 Moms come in with kids that "were too sick to go to school" to come in for pictures. What the hell? One kid even said "Mommy and I are both sick!" Hand sanitizer? Give me a break... what about all the things they are touching and the air I am breathing while they are coughing and sneezing? Our church has a sign up.. "If you are sick, please DO NOT come to church and infect others. OBVIOUSLY common sense does not prevail!

Have other busy season stories? Leave 'em in the comments!

Welp, good luck with this one.

Ok, so let's get this new pricing straight. Let's say you're coming in for senior pictures. You have the option of getting

-One 15 minute session to do all three outfits in where you pay $169 to get 8 sheets and a CD.

-Three 15 minute sessions (scheduled on different days), each in a different outfit, where for each shoot you pick your favorite pose of the entire shoot and get 4 sheets of that pose (minis don't count as a sheet). Total cost to you? $30. Sure, you don't get a CD, but that's what scanners and reorder sales are for.

Sears is lucky that most parents wouldn't dare do three shoots with a 2 year old.

Above all, I really hope that they don't raise your PRS expectations. That would be insane.

Sears Portrait Studio has a Deathwish [updated]

From the comments, here's a rumored price change:

"Just when you thought it was hard enough to get people into collections or out of the $7.99 package SPS announces new pricing starting 10/21.

Sheets = $9.99
Enhancements = $9.99
CDs = $229.99 !!!!!
Greeting cards - get this... now there's a $10 fee to add text to the cards!
Cheapest collection with a CD = $179.99 (Same bronze cd collection as before... only now $50 more.)

Are they trying to put themselves out of business?"

Edit: someone in comments uploaded a 2 page PDF of all the price changes.

I'll see you in the comments for continued discussion. I would love if this price increase were coupled with SPS appointments getting more time and care (since appts are so low anyhow) to justify the price increase. But instead this is just going to make life harder for SPS people and make customers angry (what are you going to do? Tell them before the session "hey, everything is the same except now the price is more"?

On the positive side though, at least it would seem that the customer has the option of doing the $99 collection (without CD) that is definitly really now a better deal than individual sheets (barring any coupons they print). And we all know a $99 sale is better than a 9.99 sale. Of course, at least at my studio, the CD was a major motivation for buying the 129.99 collection. I'm not sure the CD is motivation enough to pay $40 more for the same thing. I think that that's motivation to get in the phone book and look up "Photographers"

3.99 sheets and .89 chicken ranch gorditas

I had a request that I make a thread about the 40% off sheets coupon and the 3.99 sheet coupon. Here you are; discuss!

I like what our first commenter points out:

"OK. So you flip your customer from the so-called "trial package" to custom sheets at $3.99 per. Then you get written up for low PRS. Can you imagime if every business punished employees for selling an ADVERTISED SPECIAL? Do you really think Taco Bell is writing someone up every time they sell a new chicken ranch gordita for $.89? And I always assumed working at the Bell would kinda suck. I stand corrected. "

I'd also like to remind you that you also get punished for bringing in more customers through outreach since they also tend to spend lower amounts when they get called to come in each month.

While we're on the topic of offers, I think the free 10x13 offer is somewhat laughable. I get it that you're trying to get them used to having larger prints (that sell for 19.99 unenhanced instead of $7.99), but if you always give away a free 10x13, you are kind of not accomplishing your goal.

Not that this is bad news or unexpected, but you may not have a job next year

One commenter writes:

"The company is only making 88% of its projected sales, even with those numbers having been reduced 10% from last years' sales.
At our conference call on Friday, we were told that we might not have jobs this time next year in the portrait studio....and that if we don't want the company to fold, we need to be working all weekend every weekend.
Oh yeah, and our manager just quit, leaving me in the lurch with little to no idea what to do, and five positions to staff and train in time for the holidays. Great."

On a related note, another commenter writes:

"I'd like to send a big shout out to Neil and his boss Cindy! Thanks again for firing me- I never knew life could be so great! "

This job danger could also be a made up story: we all know how the people up top like to make it seem like everyone's job is in jeopardy as a means of motivation, but still I tend to believe it.

What's new? Other than that everything is the same

Hi there. Sorry that I haven't had time to put a new post together recently. Let's use this as an open thread for conversation and go from there. Thanks for checking back!

All the more reason to quit

There's a new study out that says job insecurity is worse For Your health than unemployment

GoPortraits

With business coming to SPS and PictureMe less and less, they're now offering to come to you thanks to their new GoPortraits. Admittedly, I don't know much about this: are they doing it as a seperate company? Those of you in the comments seem very much against it so I'm guessing there's some stuff I'm not aware of. While I would never want my wedding photographed by them, I'm guessing that the senior pictures stuff could work out well.

The main thing is though: where are they getting the people to shoot these things: Sears Photographers aren't in any way trained about how to properly expose photos in a non studio setting.

Anyhow, fill me in via the comments or via email. Let's discuss.

Holding it down solo.

From the comments on yesterday's post:
"I am the only one who works in our studio. Yup. No Assistant manager...and 2 other girls who are flex. yeah...I work a lot. I would love for them to fire me; they would be so screwed. No one wants to work here. Guess how much I make as a manager? Come on...guess: I am probably the lowest paid. 9 bucks...YUP...9. Why? Because technically I am not the manager. Our manager quit and the AM did too. I should have when they did."

I was going to ask the community what does happen if someone like our submitter quits, but I suspect that I already know the answer: one of those flex people or a integral part of another studio would be picked to take over in her/his place.

I'm not sure how SPS plans to survive if they're working managers 6 and 7 days a week until they quit. But perhaps SPS isn't planning on surviving and is just holding out as long as their current plans dictate.

Final Jeopardy

As all of us know first hand, you're always made to feel like your job is on the line over at SPS and that is your primary form of fun-work-environment motivation. I received an email from an employee who asked a question that I'm not able to answer but that I thought that we might be able to tackle as a community. Her it goes:

"I am a current SPS employee who has, for the previous 6 years, poured my heart and soul into my studio. Since acquiring a new DM about 2 years ago, I feel I am being set up for termination. My studio is getting a "visit" late this week from our lovely DM! I think there are a couple of scenarios that could happen this week...

1: I am fired.....which is the best option at this point.
2: I am demoted.
3: He pretends like everything is fine and we all keep moving on in the so called fun company like nothing is happening.

My question is...If he does try to demote me, is there anything I can legally do to say, "No thanks"? Honestly, I would rather be fired than demoted. I will not take the demotion. I have worked too hard to have someone else try to run MY studio! I don't want to ruin my chances of receiving unemployment by "quitting". Any help for me? Any legal advice?"

Now I don't know much about this situation (I was someone who put in my 2 weeks notice once things at my studio started to get even worse and, talking to past employees now, I'm glad that I did), but it seems like to me if they say "We are demoting you," then they are effectively saying "take a demotion or get let go" which, if you choose to get let go in that sense, it seems like (since it wasn't for your own misconduct) you could collect unemployment.

But I'm not sure which is why I'm tossing it to the community.

Sometimes parents can't control their children. Sometimes the parents are children themselves

An email submission with the subject "Sexual Harassment??"
"The reason behind the question marks, is because I'm not sure if you could call it that at all, considering it happens from our CHILD customers!!!! They grope and grab us and their parents just giggle. Not to mention the Fathers staring at our "Goodies" and it sometimes being caught on camera.

Just this past week i was shooting a family of 6, the children being 4 Boys. The second to the oldest was about 10yrs old. I was trying to pose them and this particular boy just kept reaching up and "Honking" (for lack of a better word to describe his gesture) my breast. I looked at him and he got the biggest Cheshire smile on his face.... i thought he wouldn't do it again, but i was wrong. I turned back to keep posing them and he continued to do it over and over and over again, i just kept swatting his hand away.

Another incident was with a fellow employee. I'm unsure of the age of the child, but it was a little boy and he was continuously grabbing her rear-end...for the entire visit at our studio.

As far as the fathers, ugh. On more than one occasion Ive had comments made about my breasts and Ive also caught them in pictures staring at them...in a photo with their children and wife they are obviously STARING at my chest. How can i tell?! If i have them in a floor pose and I'm squeaking a duck to get the kids to smile, i pull the Duck UP towards the camera...when Mom and the kids eyes are UP but Dads are DOWN and in my direction, we can only assume what he is looking at!"

Let's do some math

I know that this is math that we've done before, but with all that we've been talking about how hard it is to find a job, I wanted to revisit this discussion:

Let's say that you work 30 hours a week making 11.50 an hour. That means that before taxes, you bring in $345/wk. Let's imagine that you're looking to make the exact same amount of money working somewhere else. If you find somewhere that is able to give you 40 hours per week, you would only need to make $8.63 per hour. I know sometimes that it seems it's hard to find a job that gives you what you get at SPS in terms of pay, but in the end, you can take a pretty substantial pay cut and make out pretty well (and work 5 days a week).

Plus getting your sanity back is the best paycheck around.

I thought it was bad when they bought the $9.99 plus composite

People used to get around missing out getting all their poses by getting the 9.99 package and then getting a 9-image composite of all of their other poses and scanning it on their computer. An email submitter informs us of another thing that people are up to:

"We all have the cute kid/irritating mom that has 2-3 outfits and then gets the 4.99 or 9.99 package. We recently had one and played dumb and made a few comments to get her on our side and whooaaa: Out comes the truth.

After a session, she goes online right clicks to save to her computer and sends to CVS online and prints wallets, 3x5s and even 5x7s. I call home office they say there is nothing they can do: CVS should ask for the copyright. The problem is though is that the computer doesn't know what that is when you submit online have it mailed to you! not to mention the client who you bend over backwards for those cute belly/maternity pics who only buys 2 sheets then you see a facebook/myspaces and they went saved pictures from online to the computer to then post online."

As one commenter writes, I don't know why they don't just have the online uploading process automatically watermark the image.

Sears Portrait Studio drives away its last customers

The latest email:

"Team,
You must hit 3 appointments per day outreach. The company is coming down hard on this. All associates/managers must make 10 calls per shift. If they don't. It will result in finall/termination. You must average 3 a day.
Thank You!"

Is this going to make associates fear for their jobs? Yes. Is this fear going get them to call with every spare moment (that they don't have)? Yes. Will some of that calling be off the clock? Probably.

I'm not sure how this is even possible for many studios. It was a struggle to hit 10 outreach appointments every week for us, let alone 21.

And let's say you normally have 40 appointments a week this time of year. Is calling the same people over and over again really going to raise that number to 61? Are you really going to be able to add 91 appts to your books each month this way? You may get them to come in more frequently, but you can bet that they aren't likely to spend as much (if they show up at all).

What SPS needs right now is new customers to bring them new sources of income. They aren't going to acquire and retain customers if every time you visit SPS, you have phone calls every day for a week every time 60 days rolls around. That's how you make customers angry.

This is all your fault

I've probably already used that topic title before since these kinds of issues come up so often, but this time I'm talking about outreach.

The word on the street is that these days, if you don't get your 3 outreach appointments, you're getting written up no matter what. As one commenter pointed out, when CPI makes its reports it says that sits are down because of the bad economy, but on the studio level, they tell you that sits are down because of you. Here are two further comments expounding on the problems:

Anonymous writes:

"I asked what happens if we book 100 appoinments but none of them are for the next week...yup still a write up!"

Anonymous [a different one: you guys have to start choosing names like burntoutmgr did] writes:

"Today on a conference call we were told we have to speak to 10 customers a day during outreach or we get written up. 1st time corrective action 2nd time termination. that means if im alone and booked and only have one hour to outreach 10 people have to pick up the phone and speak to me or im fired? because i control the people at home now too? where is this magical wand im supposed to have to do my job? did it get sent through UPS on my day off? one person asked what if no one answers the phone do we still get written up? the reply was i highly doubt you can call ALL the call lists and not one person answers. i think im gonna go get a job telemarketing. ill make more money and when my schedule says off at 6 ill be actually going home not calling home and saying sorry honey we cant make the movie/dinner/boat ride/5 minutes alone/anniversary/birthday party/BBQ/birth of child/wedding/graduation/too tired to procreate... OH EXCUSE ME LIFE!!! because im chained to my studio. even though i spent all day with no appointments telemarketing myself into depression and someone decides to walk in at 5 effing 55!!!"

And I also hear from another commenter that now some lower volume studios are being tasked with making appointments for larger volume studios: bringing their job title closer and closer to telemarketer.

My main problem with outreach appointments is that a good majority of the time, they wouldn't even show for their appointment: they would just make one to be polite (while I appreciate the appointment, it just makes me look like I'm making fake appointments when so many are no shows).