2024 10 19

Photographers wear many hats. See You Soon. Chicago, Illinois. July, 2024. © Clayton Hauck

While out on a short getaway this week, I came to a realization that in the near future, everyone will be have a bed & breakfast. It’s really the perfect job for participants in today’s manic economy. You have not one measly job but quite literally all of the jobs, while being fully responsible for participating in them twenty-four hours a day, three-hundred and sixty-five days a year (you get one day off every four years on February 29th).

I joke, but the joke is deeply rooted in my own reality. Photographers first and foremost need to be skilled not in the act of making nice images but in sales and marketing (along with client relations, finance, studio managing, tax accounting, law, etc). They don’t teach you this in art school, of course. The fun stuff (making photos) is a shockingly small portion of the time you spend being a photographer. If you are good enough at sales, you can get enough paid jobs to save up enough money, buy a dilapidated building in a small but charming midwest town, and then live the good life as full-time inn operator.

-Clayton