When you figure your cost of production, make an allowance for advertising and advertise.

Put the loud pedal on quality and workmanship and then live up to your advertising.

Your competitors are the merchants all about you. They are showing attractive new goods. The public will buy if the temptation is great enough. Tempt them.

It's time to think of Spring Styles, what is new in mounts and folders, how you can put your pictures in a new dress that will create a desire among your patrons for new pictures.

The Convention Season has opened and will soon be in full swing. Go by all means - take an exhibit - compare your work with what others are doing and you will profit by your convention experience.

When you take a dose of medicine, you like something good to take the taste out of your mouth. When you make a convention exhibit and see work that is far ahead of your own. it's a bitter pill, but don't forget to look at the fellow's exhibit that is not so good as your own. You will feel more encouraged and work harder to improve.

Possibly you have been mounting most of your prints solid on cards. Try printing with margins, using larger paper - tint a part of the margin directly around the print - use E Iris Artura. which has a mellow buff tout-. and don't mount the print solid. You will be pleased with the result - so will your customers.

Little Things In Business Methods

A well known judge was riding on a street ear with a successful business man, and in the course of their conversation the judge asked the business man, who was very wealthy, how he managed to accumulate such a large fortune. "I have a very comfortable income myself, enough to supply all my wants, but I have never been able to accumulate anything. How do you manage it?"

Just then the conductor asked for their fares and the judge paid his five cents while the business man handed the conductor a ticket. Then turning to the judge he said, "That is one of the many ways of accumulating money. The street car company sells six tickets for twenty-five cents. By buying tickets instead of paying cash fares, I save 20% on my investment. This is only a small thing, but it is the little things that count in savings of any kind."

I was having a little talk with a successful photographer the other day and the conversation drifted into business methods. On being asked what he considered the most important little thing in his business, he replied, "The cash discount on my bills. I always figure that the cash discount on my stock bills pays my insurance, but it does other things besides insuring me against loss. It insures my credit at all times, and a good credit is the best asset any man in business can have. It permits me to invest any surplus I may have in the bank, and have it working for me, for with a reputation for prompt payment of bills, one does not need a large bank account to insure his credit. If I can manage to keep my help busy at all times, I am sure of making the material I have bought pay for itself and leave me a reasonable profit over and above all expenses.

"When I say, all expenses, I include my own salary, for I run my business on the same plan I would if it belonged to someone else. It must pay me a profit on my investment the same as though it were a stock company and the stockholders were clamoring for dividends.

"I read the article in the February Studio Light by Mr. Jukes, on the cost of producing photographs, and I think that if every photographer knew his actual cost of production, there would be much less price cutting among photographers.

"I also think that if many of the photographers who make the mistake of catering only to a high class trade, knew their cost of production, they would follow a rule which would insure them a greater profit on the high class business they secure by paying their overhead expenses with a bread and butter' class of work. By this I do not mean cheap pictures, but work on which there is a reasonable profit and which will keep the studio running at full capacity.

From An Artura Iris Print By C. M. Hayes & Co. Detroit, Mich.

Copyrighted 1912.

C. M. Hayes & Co.

"I made the mistake in my younger days, as a photographer. of catering to only one class of trade. I had made something of a reputation for myself: won sev-eral convention medals and felt that I was too good to cater to anything but the very highest class of trade. My help were working overtime in the busy season and were loafing when things were quiet, until a demonstrator, who was a personal friend of mine, pointed out the mistake I was making and set me thinking.

"His advice to me was to try to keep the studio running at full capacity at all times, and it did not take me long to see how impossible it was to accomplish this when I was catering to about ten per cent. of the population of my town. On figuring my cost of production, I found I was making a small salary but no interest on my investment. I immediately raised my salary, for I felt I was worth it. The next thing to do was to decide on a style of picture that was not cheap looking and at the same time not expensive. It must be something attractive and at the same time different from my high grade work.

"When I had decided on the points above, I advertised my bread and butter grade of work. and the advertising, appealing to the 80% who had never been able to afford my pictures, had the desired result and brought me a good, clean class of cash customers.

"I have held all of this class of trade I could ever since, have not given up the high class work, am running at full capacity most all the time, thereby holding down the cost of production and making a larger profit on my high grade work.

"My success is not a secret, it is simply due to the minding of all the little details of my business, keeping my help continually employed, safe-guarding my reputation and advertising."

Thousands of Photographers have visited The Eastman School of Professional Photography and have been benefitted by the thorough instruction received.

Thousands are making their second or third visits this year.

You cannot afford to miss what others are profiting by.

From An Artura Iris Print By C. M. Hayes & Co. Detroit, Mich,.