Meet Sarah Thompson | Business Owner & Photographer

We had the good fortune of connecting with Sarah Thompson and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Sarah, can you walk us through the thought-process of starting your business?
To be honest, I started my business because I got fired from my corporate creative job. It was December 2016 and I had just come home from my honeymoon to find I had no job. Scary.

I took the holiday season to lick my wounds and when January of 2017 rolled in, I hit the ground running. Ultimately, my thought process was “I don’t have a job, so I need to make one”. For photographers, it’s exceptionally hard to get a steady paying W2 style job with any company. Often times we are always contractors for special projects and never a consistent 9-5er.

I had been photographing weddings on the side since 2013 as a fun side hustle, but with the full support of my husband, launched the business full time. In Seattle, our wedding season is typically May-October, so I had a 5 month runway to get as many bookings as I possibly could. Thankfully, I was an an age where the majority of people I knew were starting to get married and I had a large network. That being said, I priced myself exceptionally low just to get the bookings I could so I could build my portfolio with more wedding work. I also became an associate for my friend’s wedding photography company so I could fill my empty weekends. I think combined, with that work and my own, I brought in a whopping $45k my first summer. By the following year, I had tripled that.

Nothing will make you more successful as a business owner than being hungry for it. You get scrappy, you get smart, you get savvy and you keep going. Every closed door launches you into knocking on the next.

Please tell us more about your work. We’d love to hear what sets you apart from others, what you are most proud of or excited about. How did you get to where you are today professionally. Was it easy? If not, how did you overcome the challenges? What are the lessons you’ve learned along the way. What do you want the world to know about you or your brand and story?
I think what sets my art apart from others is the experience I give my clients. I genuinely care about how they experience their photo sessions and the memories they keep with them. I’m also a little OCD when it comes to backgrounds or how things line up in the frame, so I really like my work to be very polished….real, but polished.

I got to where I am in my industry and in my career through a lot of persistent hard work and networking. In the beginning, there wasn’t anything I wouldn’t shoot. Seniors, parties, headshots, weddings, engagements. Basically everything under the sun. It was never easy to be hustling like that so I’m very thankful to be where I am and have more balance in life. I overcame a lot of the challenges that come with starting a business through the community I built. Having people to be your cheerleader while also being a sounding board. Entrepreneurship can be very lonely, so it’s important to have those bonds.

My biggest challenge in getting to where I am is always having patience. I’m the type of person who wants to “be there already”. Enjoying the journey isn’t my natural state of being. I suppose a big life lesson and business lesson is “your time will come” and “enjoy the ride”.

For anyone interacting with my brand or my work, I really want them to have a sense of how much I care not only about the final photographs, but about them as people. I want to know how you’re doing, where you end up in life after we interact, which photographs are your favorite and why. I’m an exceptionally curious person, so there is always something I wish I knew about.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
Oh man, in the Seattle area there is so much to do. I honestly would first take my friend OUT of the city and down I-90 towards the mountains. The landscapes in Washington are insanely gorgeous and you have to experience our wilderness first hand. I’d give them a tour of my favorite spots in the Cascade mountains, take them to the perfect view for sunset and hit up XXX Burgers on the way back to the city.

I’d take them to the classic Pike Place Market for some fresh flowers and ingredients for dinner, while also showing them the new waterfront. Rachel’s Ginger Beer is always a hit in Pike Place, and maybe a pirosky for lunch.

If you’re from Washington, you know it’s summer when people start saying “the mountain is out”, so I’d have to take them to Mt. Rainier so they can see her beauty firsthand.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
There are SO many people who contributed to the success I have today. I’ll make them each short and concise…I could write novels.

My husband, who encouraged me to take the wheel and really carve my own path in business.

Mr. Tibeau, my high school photography teacher, who never gave me a 5+ ranking (the highest you could get) because he knew my hunger for it would keep me going.

Jim Garner, my first creative job employer out of college, thank you for being so patient with my hubristic twenty-year-old-self. You taught me so much about client experience, longevity of business, and to never take anything too seriously.

Rebecca Mortensen, my dear friend who took me under her wing as an associate, you helped me craft the business I have today. Your depth of knowledge of creating a business that continues to feed back into you is immeasurable. Thank you for giving me work and being my friend all these years.

My best friends, Emily & Samantha, thank you for letting me photograph your faces for the last 15 years, ever since I picked up a camera. If anyone saw those early pictures…they’d be impressed you stuck around 😉

My sister, Erin, who was brilliant at every other artistic medium so I HAD to choose photography, just so I’d have my own thing.

My parents, who paid for my education and even though may not have believed photography could be an actual career, let me do it anyway.

Website: www.SarahAnnePhoto.com

Instagram: Sarah_Anne_Photo

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarahannephoto/

Image Credits
Sarah Anne Photography