Why Is It?

I found out yesterday that a friend of a friend has started a photography business. I saw some of her pictures, and honestly, meh. She's not that good. Of course, this affects me not at all in my life. She lives several states away and takes maternity pictures and pictures of people's babies. So this lady's photography business is no business of mine. I get that.

But this bugs me.

Here's the thing. In my mind, if you're going to charge people for something, you ought to be able to provide a service that they can't do for themselves.

And if I were going to start a business, it would be either a bakery or photography. Those are 2 things that I'm really good at. Like good enough that people could pay me to do them and I wouldn't feel like I'm taking their money.

But if I were going to start a business, I'd want to be even better than I am now. I'm one of those "strive for greatness" kinds of people, and I'd hate to do it if I couldn't do it well.

In kind of an unnecessarily snarky way, when I looked at this person's pictures the other day, I thought to myself, "Hmm. I hope they didn't pay her a lot for those! They're just kind of mediocre."

It's weird - because really, what do I care if someone gets ripped off by paying a mediocre photographer? No one's paying me to take nice pictures, so it's not like she's taking away business or that she and I are in direct competition for maternity photos or whatever. But I know that if I took just regular pictures like that, I wouldn't be posting them on a website advertising my business either.

I just think there's a difference between being able to take OK pictures of your own kid and charging other people for mediocre pictures.

I don't know. Just kind of a dumb rant. Don't mind me. But make sure that if you hire a photographer that she's excellent and not mediocre!