Print Option 1: Automated Print Vendors

To automate the printing and shipping of print/product orders through your website, you can use one of our three integrated print vendors. To create an auto-fulfilled print/product, you must create a Prints and Products Pricing Profile and set prices with the integrated print vendor of your choice. Currently, PhotoShelter supports the following:

• Printique (formerly AdoramaPix) (NY)
• Loxley Photographic (Scotland, UK)
• White House Custom Colour (MN)

Setting Up an Automated Fulfillment Pricing Profile

1. From the Navigation Bar click Sell > Pricing Profiles.

2. Click the Add Profile button. A pop-up box will appear; select Prints & Products.

3. In the text boxes provided, enter your Profile Name, as well as a Public Description (displayed to your buyers) and/or Internal Description (both optional).

4. Choose your Crop Preferences: The typical digital sensor has an aspect ratio of approximately 3:2. However, typical print sizes like 8x10 don't have the same width:height ratio. Therefore, we give you the option to specify whether you'd like the images to be cropped (wherein some of the image might not make it into the final print) or fit to the size ordered (which means the image will be shrunk to fit the print size ordered, which may mean the image is printed with white borders).

The image is sized such that the entire image fits within the print size ordered. This may lead to large white borders, depending on the aspect ratio of the paper size.

Pros: You control the integrity of the image by ensuring that no arbitrary crop occurs.

Cons: Customer might be confused by the large borders.

The image is centered and printed so that the shortest side matches the shortest side of the paper. This will lead to the longer side potentially "falling off" the paper, leading to a crop.

Pros: Maximizes paper area.

Cons: Arbitrary crop might cut out "important" detail.

5. Print Vendor Order Review: Select this box if you want to review an order before it's sent for auto-fulfillment. Enabling this option also allows you to:

Replace the image (e.g. high-res retouched images)

Adjust the customer's crop

6. To begin setting prices for the different prints/products you wish to sell, click the + Add a Vendor button in the Inventory & Prices section. If you’re not sure which vendor is right for you, click the Compare Vendors button for a full breakdown of each.

7. After you’ve added a vendor, you will find the full list of prints/products that vendor offers through PhotoShelter. In the blank Price fields provided next to each print/product name, enter the price at which you'd like to offer that particular print/product (leave the field blank if you do not want to offer a particular option). The wholesale price indicates the price you will pay for the printing. You should mark up the pricing to cover your cost of doing business.

Use the Group by drop-down to sort the vendor prints/products as desired (by type, size, or no sort).

8. Click the Save Profile button at the bottom of the page when you're done entering prices.

After you have created a Pricing Profile, you need to apply it to your galleries or images that you want to make available for print/product sales. Check out our detailed Applying Pricing Profiles tutorial to learn more.