HAs anybody had a session with Venture photography?

[IlanaK]

We won a prize draw for a session with them. It is tomorow and I am wondering if anyone else has done one.

Our voucher is for the session and for one photo (total cost supposedly £125). But I have my doubts now as to how legitimate the prize draw was as I saw them advertising these vouchers to give people at christmas for only £25. When I filled out the prize draw form I mentioned that we were interessed in a photo of the kids for a large space on our wall and I suspect they gave us the voucher as we were a good bet to buy something.

Anyway, has anyone experienced this company? Are we in for a hard sell tomorow? And how expensive are their photos to buy? I am guessing very expensive!

Thanks!

have a look at www.thefamilyphotographer.org.uk for london and surrounding areas.

Very much like venture images, but he sells the disc to you, and you know what you are paying for up front! Seems a much better method to me.

We did some research recently to check out photographers locally and venture popped up everywhere. I have heard some terrible stories about venture and was keen to avoid them if possible.
We were recommended a local photographer who has a very smart stand in the market on Northcote Road London SW11 at the weekends. The photos were absolutely fantastic and very reasonably priced.
Let's hear it for the local guys!!

Not sure how much my sister and husband spent - they have one photo only - but they do have a USB stick with several photos on of them, them and their two dogs, and a few of just the dogs.

Seems a lot of money from what others have mentioned, compared with some independent photographer in any town or city who could no doubt offer similar quality photos at a much lower cost (and in desperate need of the work, I suspect, now that digital cameras are everywhere, and mobile phones used for odd snaps and small video clips).

THINK AGAIN!!!
I am so angry with this company...my 3 teenage girls saved hard and as I have been really really ill they wanted 2 give me the best MUM's day(bless!!)

They went 2 Venture and had 4 pics done costing over £500....and as if that vast figure wasn't bad enough the photos are dreadful. I know evry mum thinks her babes are best but I think my 3 are pretty stunning and even so Venture made them look terrible..mainly cos on 2 pics they had scarfs over their heads!!!! Seriously...no faces! And evn the bodies look distorted. On the other 2 pics the girls are barely on the frame and badly out of focus. I am stunned that such a company can exploit young people and do such a poor job. My advise...save the cash and take the pic urself.

Emma, you just resurrected a five year old thread!

I totally agree with you though, it's not a mistake I will be repeating! I now use a MNer for all my pictures, she charges £350 for a session and has done different things for me. I've had a shoot in my parents garden, a BF awareness type thing and Baby's Dedication. She's lined up to do my engagement party, engagement shoot, wedding and 8 shoots for me for my Doula work! I have pictures that feel like real life, as in they're not taken in a clinical white room! Best of all she puts all the pictures on disc (last time was about 300) in two folders, one high res for printing, one low res for internet.

Not trying to sell her, but pointing out that there are much cheaper options than Venture where you get far more.

(she lives in S Wales and I'm in Birmingham so she travels, if anyone wants details)

The only thing with wanting a photo big enough for a wall is you need to make sure it's done with a decent camera ie a DLSR rather than a compact. But for the price you could actually purchase a Canon 500D and do your friends' kids for £30 a pop...

Hi Sorry to resurrect this thread again but I just feel so cross with Venture Photography.
Whilst they do nothing illegal I find them very under-hand in their operation.
We got a free session through our dentist as my eldest daughter had some work done on her teeth. Prior to making the appointment I asked them about their prices as I thought that we wouldn't bother going if they were too expensive. I was told on the phone their prices range from £95.00 so I thought ok that's not too bad lets go ahead with it.
After our photo session we were then and only then, given the price list. You cannot get a print for £95.00 in fact we went for the cheapest package they do (and this was only offerred once we said we weren't buying anything because of the ridiculous prices) and this cost us £450.00 !!! for 3 VERY small pictures. What's more only AFTER we paid the money were we told that we would have to wait EIGHT weeks before we got them - Shocking company to deal with to be honest and no I would not recommend them.

Why on earth did you spend £450 on 3 photos? That's crazy money! I would have told them where to stick their photos.

To go against the grain, we had a positive experience of Venture, but it did involve the small issue of not spending anything! We were given a £215 voucher for Venture photography when we bought our car. Having done our photo shoot (which was great fun). I then read all the nightmare reviews on here. I was really worried about getting the hard sell/emotional blackmail, but on our viewing the guy was lovely & didn't pressurise us at all. So we just took the 'free' photo & left it at that. They do take fantastic photos, but it's true that you have to be prepared to spend at least £600 for something decent. Unless you're prepared to fork out, or think you could crack when you see the lovely pics of your family, go for somewhere cheaper. But on the whole our experience was quite positive (Palmer's Green studio in N London).

A friend has recently shelled out almost a thousand pounds on three prints from Venture. They are quite nice but ... not almost-a-thousand-pounds nice. She thinks they're worth the money which is obviously the important thing, but I think people can get beguiled into spending too much by the entire experience. It's very clever, of course, but as a pp said too much like pyramid selling for me. We're going to get a few quotes from local photographers, look at their portfolios and go from there ...

Argh, just realised how old the thread is. Sorry!

The thread might be old, but this 'rip off' is still alive and kicking.

Venture, run a mile ... I'm a photographer, I'm soooo bored with their output and I don't like their hidden and non-transparent pricing policy, and their final prices are RIDICULOUS.
Instead, my partner paints ... originals. By hand. Brush and acrylic paint.
We now offer a brilliant alternative, which is an original painting, any size, uniquely designed and the price is upfront. And, none of your friends will have the exact same thing (Venture sadly sell to everyone mummy and her dog).
Prices are just related to the materials cost, time (complexity, number of subjects in the painting). Normally its anything from 200-400 or a 1000 if its raelly complicated, the end result is stunning ... and we don't ask people to pay until its done and they see it. And, if you don't like it we'll just keep it for the gallery. Search on google for 'marina skaya art ', and drop us a line if you want to know more (email a good photo if you want an estimation). We are in the Midlands UK.

Hi al,, I know that I have posted a cooment on here before but have to agree with the general negative feedback about Venture photography. We got duped into a session at the Marlo studio after completeint a questionnaire at the Eden Shopping Centre in High Wycombe. We went along and had our session and I nearly fainted when we were told that the pictures that we were interested in would cost just under £1,000. We declined to pay that and asked for our 7x5 frame. The young lady who was doing our session became surley and visibly annoyed and told us that if we were not going to purchase the pictures then the session was over as she had other work to be getting on with. We were escorted downstairs with hardly a word of thanks and shown the main front door. The smile disappeared. My husband was not at all impressed and I have to say that I had expected more than just to be pushed out because we didn't purchase big as thet wanted. All in all a nasty experience all round. We may be in a position to buy some pictures at a later date but Venture Marlow will certainly not be my choice again, save your money and give them a miss.

Hello evryone, have been reading the comments about Venture with interest only to find that I totally agree with all the negative remarks. We also fell victim to the Venture young lady on the exhibition at the Eden Centre, High Wycombe and received a telephone call that we had been 'selected' to have a session and a 7x5 print. The session was at the Venture studio in Marlow, Bucks and after a decent start we realised that this was going to be a pricey excursion. To cut a long story short, had we bought the pictures that the member of staff was 'pushing' us to buy, we would have said goodbye to £1,250. A lot of money for pictures that if I am honest were pretty average in quality. After declining to spend, the young lady who was taking our session lost her smile and manners and became quite terse and offish. We got our 7x5 but the atmosphere was very frosty and quite rude. We too were marched downstairs and out of the door without a word of thanks so bad luck Venture Marlow but we think that your studio stinks and we would not recommend you to anyone. Your loss.

I am also a photographer and went to this experience for a bit of fun and was horrified! the prices are OUTRAGOUS and the pressure that is put on you to buy is also terrible. when the experiences are sold to you, you donot expect prices this high. below is the email i sent to complain and have not yet had a reply which i think is again VERY rude. Definitly a no go guys:

Email:

Following our recent photographic session, I felt that our experience was such that I must in all conscience drop you an email and give you our thoughts.

This voucher was sold to me just before Christmas and was in fact a Christmas Gift. I found myself very disappointed at the amount of time given to use the voucher. My family have had this type of session before and vouchers usually last for 6 months, even 1 year. However, I was told after buying the voucher that we had to have the shoot by the end of February. Nevertheless, I booked our shoot and first impressions were good. The photographer was very up-beat and put us at our ease. She seemed to understand that what we wanted was a mother and daughter shot, head and shoulders only.

We were then asked to return the next week to view the photographs after they had been edited and she had had a chance to ?photo-shop? and enhance the shots taken. When we returned, we were very disappointed to find that it was difficult to find even one shot which we were completely happy with. In fact I don?t think there were any which were head and shoulder only as requested. The only work that had been done to the shoot, I felt, was that they had been presented in different shapes and sizes.

The sales pitch was quite obviously focused on selling the highest number of very expensive framed pictures as possible and felt very pressured. The salesman was quite happy to swap and change sizes as long as we were going to spend lots of money. Quite frankly, this was an impossible situation as I could not afford any of the absurd prices. Although he had, within seconds changed sizes and shapes of shots all the way through the presentation, once I said that I only wanted the picture which was included in the voucher price, he refused to undo the panoramic format of the only picture we were ?fairly? happy with. Saying that if we wanted that one we would need to spend in excess of £400 to buy it as a set. He stated that, although the formats had been changed for the presentation, he would not change the format back as we were taking only a ?discounted? photograph. Surely the photograph included on the voucher should be available to you. After all you have paid for this, discounted or not.

We did finally agree on another one of the photographs so that we didn?t lose what we had paid for originally. We now were asked to return a third time, which means trying to get time off work, yet again, to collect our purchase. However we found the whole experience very disappointing and misleading. At no time prior to the shoot are you given any clue to the very high prices or the limited time and pressure on this. And I think that other people should know that these vouchers are being sold under false pretences without giving the full information.

Quite agree with you nikinoodals. We found the atmosphere very upbeat and trendy.........if you are going to purchase big which we are not going to at present but have the option to later in the year, but based on the conveyor belt type customer service which we received from the Marlow studio, they will not be our first choice when we decide to have our pictures taken and I urge all of you to be on your guard with Venture. They want big sales regardless of who you are and if you will not purchase then the response is rude and very terse which we are not going to accept. We are the customers and we are King in the marketplace, not to be treated so rudely by greedy and unprofessional staff. Go elsewhere for better deals.

My husband is a photographer, and he say's these prices are really taking the proverbial, ( and I bet you all thought school photos were expensive at 25 quid for 4). Anyway if anyones interested and you are in the Derby/Notts area I could email you some pics so you could see them. He is available and has been doing photography for many years professionally.

A friend of mine has been investigating Venture and it seems that all is not rosey. Studios are closing all over the country and even their websites lies about how many studios they have in the UK. Give Venture a miss.

If anyone wants the opposite to Venture, try an independent photographer in your area who specialises in children & families. Put into google "childrens photographer" & then your area. I'm one such photographer & I try to give beautiful, natural photos & reasonable prices.

I had a shoot with Venture Photography a couple of months ago and found the whole experience to be a far cry from what they make out on there web site. It was all about getting money out of us and they used some hard sales tactics when we refused.. the images were ok but nothing that was particularly captivating!! We left without an image which was quite disappointing as we actually wanted something to hang and give away as xmas gifts. I set about trying to find a company that was a little closer to home.. when I stumbled across these guys in Cirencester, Gloucestershire! They offered a much more personable approach which I guess is what you get from a independent compared to a corporate giant. They captured the essence and character of my children fantastically! Great guys and a great ehos, check them out cant rave about them enough, ive had friends and family use them since and they have all thought they were great and can tailor make packages to suit your needs!

www.originphotographic.co.uk/

Enjoy!!

My cousins bought us a photo experience with Venture for Christmas 2014 (from WH Smith) which included a framed 10x8 photo. Having read the reviews on Mumsnet, we nearly didn't use the voucher for fear of what additional expense and pressurised sales experience may lie ahead, but given it was a present, we decided we would go, but just have the freebie photo. We set off on a 2 hour journey (unfortunately there were no studios local to us) and are SO PLEASED WE DID USE THE VOUCHER. We had a really lovely time during the shoot and our photographer, Wayne, took some superb photos. We had previously had some done by our wedding photographer (who is very talented and well known in the industry), but the story telling provided by Venture far exceeded previous photos we had had done in the past. We were encouraged to bring props (we took our son's theatre and garden jenga to name but two items) and had some very natural, but energised, shots as a result. Needless to say, when we saw the beautiful photos, we couldn't resist buying some. We opted for an album as thought we could take the photos out and mount them in our own frames (this was the cheapest way of getting lots of photos at a reasonable size). Yes, the photos are really expensive, but at the same time, I would say they aren't poor value for money though. The photographer we had was brilliant (he could easily do a photoshoot Vogue would be proud of) and we have such amazing photos of the three of us now and they are of a quality far better than I've seen any local studio produce. Venture edited the photos to enhance them (at my request) to take away my grey roots and restore my chubby face to a more pre pregnancy weight!), all this was done at no additional charge, which you wouldn't get anywhere else I suspect. Venture (especially Della who handled our order at the Eton studio after the studio we went to moved) have bended over backwards to accomodate us throughout the process. They let us do the shoot and view the photos on the same day (to save us the long journey of returning another day) which meant they had to edit all the photos straight away. Wayne let us review our photos for hours too (I mean literally hours too, poor man, we left so late!) and Venture even couriered our photos to save us returning to collect them. People say that Venture use pressurised sales techniques. Well I wouldn't say we were pressurised to buy additional photos by Venture directly. The only pressure we felt were that the photos were so amazing we really wanted more. But can Venture really be blamed for taking amazing photos of us?! They did present the photos very well (on a screen) with some nice background music, but that didn't affect our purchase decision. The images would have sold themselves if they were in buckets of manure to be honest! But even it had, they are a business at the end of the day and what business wouldn't want to try and maximise its sales? We didn't really have the money to buy the photos we bought (I used the money I had saved for a crown I need on my molar, but I've waited two years for that, so thought, "what's one more year?"!), but a month on, we are delighted we did. Friends and family have commented about how amazing the photos are and we are so happy with them. My recommendation is this, know the photos are expensive and ensure you have saved up first, accept you will be wowed by them and not want to just walk away with the freebie - you won't be disappointed. If you are strongwilled enough to have just the offer photo, well you're in for an amazing deal, as you won't get photos of this quality elsewhere. It's not Pixie Photos guys, this is a professional photography company at the end of the day who manage to really tell a story through the photos they take. And, perhaps if people didn't just opt for the cheap 49 deals, the rest of us wouldn't have to pay through the nose for additional photos as they'd be making enough money on each job!! If you're not prepared to spend a north of a few hundred, well I suggest you try elsewhere.