In my four short years in the business I've noticed that April is the slowest month of the year. I've been told Spring Break and tax season are the reasons. Any one else find that April is a bad month?

For me, April is pretty average.  May looks like a much worse average, although April 2011 looks like one of my worst months ever.  It's the actual tax season that is killing me.... not only do I have to pay for 2014, but they just sent us a statement last week that we missed a T-5 and have to come up with $950 for last year too.  And my new D810 and 24-70 are coming in tomorrow... it will be light years till I pay this credit card bill off!

April is hit or miss for me, historically (full time microstocker for the last 8 years, uploading regularly).  So far April has been incredibly sluggish... but we're only on day 6.  Two of those days were weekends.  It could still pick up.  Easter, Good Friday, tax season definitely all effect sales as well.  Ebbs and flows are all part of this.  Can't worry about it - just keep working.

Hmm, on Sunday April 5 2015 already better than for all April 2014.

Quote from: fotoroad on April 06, 2015, 18:57
Hmm, on Sunday April 5 2015 already better than for all April 2014.

and how many images did you have in your portfolio last April compared to this April? Also you probably submit to more companies now thus increasing your sales...

Historically April is one of the best months for me.

April's usually ok for me except for the days just before and after Easter.  Otherwise pretty good.

your question made me look back on my past years to see if this is a trend. but lately i notice a big change which surprised me also. i went back to my geomap for ss and found the downloads coming from all over the map instead of what used to be mostly USA.
we don't have that luxury of geomap with the other sites so i cannot see anything to suggest.
but given this evidence of a wider world in ss, i think it would be interesting to see if the usualy slow months of USA is offset by the rest of the world.
let's hope so for all of us.

and while we are at lt, as pixelbytes said, slow during easter. i had a very good easter which came from outside the (easter world)

Been doing this for nearly 8 years.

Yes, April is always slow.  March is great, then April is 10-20% lower than March.  Reasons are Easter and Spring Break (I don't think taxes are to blame... businesses don't shut down when they have to file their returns... otherwise we'd see April 13-15 be terrible, and I've never seen that).  May will bounce back up a little, then we fall back down from June through August.  Things will get better Sept - Nov.  First half of Dec will be strong, then we fall off a cliff due to the holidays.  Jan through March are very strong, and the cycle starts again.  It's all very predictable, and the larger your port gets, the less variation in this pattern (assuming you're not heavy in seasonal or holiday pics)

(iS exclusive) I wondered for a silly moment why April was by far my best month of 2014, then I realised that was when they introduced compulsory subs, so obviously income was going to be slashed after that.
(Actually, April was my second-best month in 2013, but not in previous years).

Seriously, Spring Break? Does that affect a lot of businesses in the US? In Europe, businesses will usually only be closed on Good Friday and Easter Monday. Some parents will take time off to be with their kids in the school holidays, but businesses don't close for the duration.

No, businesses don't close in the U.S. for spring break...but I think a lot of parents plan to take their vacations then to be with their kids.

Yes, everyone who works in an office environment in the US knows that there are a LOT of vacations taken around Easter and spring break.  People take time off when their kids are off school.  It's the same reason why summer months are down.  Businesses don't shut down during the summer, but that's when vacations are concentrated.  April is the same.

Quote from: ShadySue on April 07, 2015, 12:29
Seriously, Spring Break? Does that affect a lot of businesses in the US? In Europe, businesses will usually only be closed on Good Friday and Easter Monday. Some parents will take time off to be with their kids in the school holidays, but businesses don't close for the duration.

Are we actually debating whether Americans or Europeans take more time off?  Did I just walk into the Twilight Zone? 

Reality check: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/01/worlds-most-paid-vacation-days_n_3697394.html?

I'm not saying that America has the right idea on this.  Just that it's funny to see people scoffing at Spring Break when Americans are known for not taking much of a break.

Quote from: stockmarketer on April 07, 2015, 13:24

Quote from: ShadySue on April 07, 2015, 12:29
Seriously, Spring Break? Does that affect a lot of businesses in the US? In Europe, businesses will usually only be closed on Good Friday and Easter Monday. Some parents will take time off to be with their kids in the school holidays, but businesses don't close for the duration.

Are we actually debating whether Americans or Europeans take more time off?  Did I just walk into the Twilight Zone? 

No, why on earth did you infer that?
I was questioning whether the Spring Break in the US was really a reason for reduced stock sales overall. So I wanted to know if whole businesses closed. Simple question.

Well, I was going to check my history but I seem to have a deleted a folder with a bunch of excel files,including my Stock admin.

April is normally ok for me.  Not nearly as good as March of course.  It's certainly starting off slow this year, the way the holiday fell and all.

How is it possible to lose a folder from my laptop with no trace whatsoever? I even bought a recovery program to scan my laptop but nothing comes up. The whole folder just vanished. 

Quote from: Semmick Photo on April 07, 2015, 14:11
How is it possible to lose a folder from my laptop with no trace whatsoever? I even bought a recovery program to scan my laptop but nothing comes up. The whole folder just vanished. 

Did you move it to an external HD? When I lose a folder, that's usually what I've done.

Quote from: ShadySue on April 07, 2015, 14:15

Quote from: Semmick Photo on April 07, 2015, 14:11
How is it possible to lose a folder from my laptop with no trace whatsoever? I even bought a recovery program to scan my laptop but nothing comes up. The whole folder just vanished. 

Did you move it to an external HD? When I lose a folder, that's usually what I've done.

Sorry to take this off topic but no, its no where.  I scanned everything. I must have accidentally deleted it. But I cant remember doing anything like that.

I can feel your panic trans-continentally.  Sounds like something I would do and have a meltdown over   Good luck.

Sometimes it may happen that a folder is moved accidentally into another folder.It's still there, but for all purposes, practically invisible.