Hello guys,

I don't know if this is the right place for asking this type of question, but here we go.

a client contact me because he want me to record a soccer tournament, this is going to be between two days, around two hours each day. he want two camera, final project edited and DVD for parent distribution.

Now my questions is, Should i charge him for each copy of the DVD, or can I have him tell the parent to buy the DVD from me or sell a master copy for a higher price.

this is my first time doing this type of event? any suggestion will be appreciate.

thanks again in advance.

Personally, I don't like handling consumer sales, so I'd price it based on my time and materials He can take the master copy and get them duplicated elsewhere, or he could have me duplicate them and I'd charge him a per-disk duplication fee. He can then sell the DVDs as he wishes.

That's just my preference.

I would agree with Chris that having a fixed price for a quantity of discs delivered to him to sell on is preferable however if you are selling them then your final price will depend alot on the potential or predicted sales.
Having the organiser purchase the film from you takes away your worry over it being copied by parents and puts the pressure on him.
Before you can give a quote you need to know
How many people are in the tournament ?
what age are they? parents are far more likely to buy a film of their kids then if its adults playing in the games.
how long is it going to take to edit 4 hours of footage and how much do you charge for this.
How much do you pay your second camera man per hour?
how much is the media ie tapes ?
How much for packaging and other raw materials ?
Most of the dance schools, Skating clubs I film for do not want to have anything to do with dvds as they have enough to do organising shows, competitions etc therefore I take care of ordering and sales.
This does mean however that its my risk and my price is based on the extra work this involves and if a job doesnt pay then either the price goes up, they purchase a fixed quantity next time or I just dont film it again.
Try to find out if it was filmed before and also what price they were sold for (discreetly) this will give you a ball park figure ( no pun intended ) as to if it is worth your while.
hope this helps a bit, john

John is telling it pretty much in the same way I've found it here in the UK. Some clients will rip you off. I agree now a minimum number of DVDs to start with. In many cases, they never order more, and as I've discovered, they simply copy extra ones, one at a time as they need them. So I build this into the price. Much of the work I do also requires a MCPS/PRS copyright license (the limited manufacture license available here) and this gets addedd to the total. As a guide, it's running at just over £90 per 50 DVDs including Tax at 15% and just over £30 for the license. DVD duplication takes no time, but printing is a pain. However, I tend to do it in the slack times when my time doesn't really cost that much.

I agree that most sports/theatre/school and events organisers simply don't want another problem. Top of the list of people not to be trusted are:
Pop groups. They never have any money, but plenty of promises, and being younger - see no problem in burning extra DVDs.
Any organisation run by committee. They make decisions, then after a meeting, change their minds, and worse still, rarely pay quickly.
Any organisation where the final product is given to parents. I often get complaints because their little darling was not featured enough, or from a poor angle, or the lighting in that part of the stage was too dark ......... the organisers always pass these people on to you.

The grief is made up for by the loyal clients who simply phone up and ask for another 100 every month or two. These I look after very well!

I would agree with the above and add the the most important thing is to not get left holding the bag on empty promises of sales or demand.

Going into a sales only business model is risky with a new client. The parent don't know you and they might not even know you are shooting the video!

They also might not find where you are selling them and once the event is over, about 90%+ of the enthusiam of buying it is over as well.

So protect yourself going in and don't be afraid to pass on the job.