MicrostockGroup

Does anyone sell directly to newspapers or TV stations?  If so, what is the rate which you sell your photos and/or video?

Over the past few months I've been able to get some really good photos and footage of local events where the event was over by the time the local media outlets arrived.  I've sold photos to the local paper for $10 to $40 each and footage for $100 to $300 per event.  And I'm wondering if I'm selling low.

I always insist on their non-exclusive contract so that I can sell to other media outlets or as stock.  Although, I've made comparatively little money off editorial so I'm wondering if I should sell exclusive for a few extra bucks (typically 30% to 50% more).

AP and UPI don't buy from independents.  So I'm wondering if there is other established editorial media distribution besides microstock.

Hi there

It's my main job selling editorial to national newspapers, so maybe I can help a bit...

I only deal with photo's and this is split into editorial stock and news. Local news in normally just that - local. Provincial papers only pay a small amount, and in all honesty your lucky to get any money of the them in the UK.

If it is a news story with wider interest you could send it in on spec to all the national's as well. They all have email adresses for news stories, gather a list and send them in ASAP. If they get used in the next days papers then you can ring up the picture desk to arrange a fee. They'll probably give you their standard space rate unless it's a big event or something exclusive  (which is a different ball game altogether).

I make money from supplying stock to nationals. It's an area in decline, and the fee's paid are the newspapers own space rates. For a headshot, 2"sq color, it would range from £30 to $70 depending on which paper it is in the UK.

The NUJ are professional rates and have mileage, half day rates etc, etc. Normally you need a commission from a newspaper to charge these. To my mind you would be sending pics in on spec and would only get the space rate. There would be no exclusive tie in or contract, so you can do what you want with the picture afterwards.

Footage I can't help with, but any more questions fire away.

Rgds

Oldhand

if editorial = "newsworth, current topics", you may be right, but the longer lived form of editorial - street scenes and other non-released people pix have done well on the MS sites for me - at any site that takes editorial, i get a higher % sales of my editorial port than of my RF one.

in addition, some editorial scenes can be cropped to make them RF by an alert designer - while that cropped image would probably get rejected by the MS as 'ocer-cropped'

s

I am also discovering that it has a lot to do with the shot itself...  I accidentally (long story) attended a local ceremony for welcoming home some troops over the weekend and got a shot that no one else did.  Not including MS sales (which were all subs), I've made a little over $400 from this image in just direct sales to papers and TV stations:

Too good for microstock, IMHO. Very expressive.