A few weeks ago, I received my very first Wedding Album through Millers Lab. I couldn’t have been more excited about this album, and I wanted to share it with you! I held off as long as I could to order an album for myself for a multitude of reasons. One being, that I was waiting for the right wedding to show off my work, and two because I needed to settle on a printing company. In March, I visited WPPI in Las Vegas, where I had plenty of opportunities to research Wedding Albums. After spending three full days in the trade show, I don’t think I was even able to visit all of the printing companies! Going into WPPI, I had several goals that I wanted to achieve when searching for a printing company to fit my needs.
1. Cost – I wanted to be cost efficient, but without sacrificing quality. I wanted to avoid spending a premium price, if the final product wasn’t noticeably superior. With that said, I want to offer premium products to all of my clients, and I knew that with enough research, I could find a company that would be cost efficient.
2. Quality – I think this goes without saying. The final products that I offer to my clients are a direct reflection of my business and my work. As I have been a loyal customer of Millers Lab for quite some time, I knew that they would meet my needs.
3. Options – Going into WPPI, I already had several ideas in mind as to what sizes and styles of albums that I wanted to offer. Understanding my personal preferences, and how they tend to change from time to time, I also wanted to allow room for flexibility in the future. Sometimes offering too many choices to a client can leave them confused, and often makes it difficult for them to make a final decision.
4. Turnover time – This is where Millers Lab really differentiated themselves from the rest of the competition! They offer free overnight shipping through Fed-Ex, and had the final album at more door only 3 days after placing the order! Almost all other companies that offer similar products need 2-4 weeks to turn over their wedding albums! That’s insane!
5. Style – This may be one of the most important factors when trying to settle on a printing company! I need all of my final products to reflect my brand. It was my goal to maintain seamless similarities between my Wedding Albums, and my online portfolio. Keeping these factors in mind, I was able to settle on colors, layouts, and sizes that I felt best reflected my brand.
I was very particular when determining the different elements of this album. The album you see above is a 10×15 inch panorama album. I chose this size because I loved the horizontal layout! I tend to shoot more horizontal photos throughout the day, so I felt that this would compliment my style best. Plus, doesn’t it just look sweet?! I also ordered the largest album offered by Millers because photos just look better when they are bigger!
I had some help from my wonderful girlfriend when creating the templates for my Wedding Albums. I gave her several ideas of sample albums that I had seen at WPPI, and she designed custom templates for me using Adobe InDesign! You can’t beat having a Graphic Designer as your girlfriend! Each album that I offer (10×15, 12×12, 10×10) have custom layouts specifically designed to match my style! Basically what I did, was I took notes from the albums that I liked at WPPI, and mixed and matched!
As of now, I offer the acrylic crystal clear cover you see in the pictures above, as well as custom leather bound covers. Although Millers offers a wide variety of cover options, I plan to hold off and keep things simple. I tend to try to keep things clean and professional looking when I can.
If you have any questions feel free to shoot me an email! I’m no expert, but I am very happy with what I have learned thus far!
I’m also excited to say that a received a phone call from Millers recently asking if I would let them to duplicate this album and use it as a show album for future trade shows and such! Pretty cool, eh? Especially considering this was my first ever Wedding Album! (haha! Don’t tell them that!)
