Cost of Entry / Economy of Scale

We are announcing our new Project Management tool next week, and it has had me thinking a lot about the cost of entry and its relationship to the economy of scale. I remember spending every nickel on equipment and studio tools when I started my photography career. The amount I have invested in darkroom equipment would astound you. Today, with digital, a starting out photog can invest as little as 10K and have a complete business infrastructure: cameras, lights and computer(s).

Many of the tools we had to have on hand are now available through 3rd party. Labs like Mighty Digital can handle all of the large print orders and retailers like Target and Costco are doing a good job for proof prints. All of these companies offer online solutions for sending the images to them. Tools like the PHOTOtool offer ways to show proofs and 'digital 'roids' to art director in nearly real time. And with Photoshop doing your post production, there are a whole world of effects and corrections that are easily applied.

In software development, the teams used to be huge. Each programmer writing code by hand-sometimes going into un-charted areas and developing tiny little parts of a larger product. Today, Daniel and I were able to build a very robust project management tool that will allow teams in diverse locations to collaborate on everything from documents to images to strategy.

What does this all mean? Well, faster delivery, less costs associated with creation, more upgrades coming faster, and a large group of talent with less challenges. Will that translate into lower fee rates in the industries? Probably... supply and demand thing. However, it will also allow a smaller group of talent to rise to the top through doing a little more than is expected with less than previously needed.

When we first designed our PM tool a few years ago, we made it specific to a vertical. Now we are redoing it for a much wider spectrum of users and dropping the price to a fraction of our niche price. This should allow us to reach a wider group of potential users and thus the cost of entry for the user drops precipitously as well.

Cost of entry declines and the economy of scale creates a powerful set of tools for the entry level creative to produce their work.

The challenge now becomes (again) marketing.