No Experience Necessary

“I’ve never really done anything like portraits.” I say to the small blond woman sitting across from me at a booth in McDonalds. “But I have been interesting in photography for several years.”

“That’s fine.” She says while looking around for the next person she has scheduled to meet for an interview. “We’ll teach you everything you need to know.  There’s also plenty of room for advancement.   First you become a Trainer, than a District Manager, and then a Regional Manager.   After that you might head into Upper Management.  The Sky’s The Limit.”

I quit that Company after one year, when I sued them and won on grounds that they were not following the Minimum Wage Laws.  They went out of business about three years ago.

When I started in Assembly Line Portraits it was pretty common to find ads that read No Experience Necessary-Will Train.   The training usually lasts two weeks, but can be as long as four or five weeks.  The Serious Companies give you two or more three ring binders two or three inches thick filled with all the minutia you never wanted to know about The Company and what The Company demands that yo do in order to work for them.  Takes notes, there will be a test about this material.

It’s pretty amusing to read these ‘Classified and Not For Public Review’ books.  They are pretty much the same books.  The guidelines on dress codes, posing, greeting customers, handling money, and so on and so forth are all the same.  Remember to lift with your knees, not your back.  In other words, all of the manuals fall under the broad general heading of The Company Covers Their Ass.  Anything you do, anything that happens to you, anything that happens to a customer in your care-is pretty much your problem, if you had been following the Procedures Outlined in The Manual, none of this would have happened.

I have been lucky enough that nothing bad has happened in my years of taking Assembly Line Portraits.  I have not had any children hurt, not had any octogenarians take a fall, not had anyone claim I was sexually harassing them, not injured myself on the Job.  I have known other Photographers who have had these problems-they are no longer photographers.

Assembly Line Portraits can be a long term career, but the odds are good that you will not be working at the same company for the whole time.  Though, to be honest, I have known people who have worked for the same Assembly Line Portrait company for 25 years.  These are the Old Pros that talk about The Good Old Days when you could roll into a town and make some real money.  My best money year was three years ago-and I am missing the good old days myself.

Most of the Assembly Line Portrait Companies have two types of people working for them, the ones who have been there forever and the new hires.  As a general rule you don’t even bother learning the new hires names until they have been around for six months, but most of them won’t last six months.  They are all excited by The Future and all the money they are going to be making.  It doesn’t take them long to figure out that they are not going to be making all the money.

I have been at The Company I now work for three years, a new record for me and Assembly Line Portrait Companies.  I am, as always, looking for something better, but I think I have pretty much hit the end of the road.  Those No Experience Necessary jobs aren’t as easy to find as they used to be.