Dear people in Hospitality Industry :
You put all your energies and finances in setting up a hotel or a restaurant.
You do not compromise on the quality of interiors,linen, crockery and cutlery.
You hire best of the Chefs and other support staff to create high standards.
You ensure that the raw food and ingredients/condiments supplied to you are of best quality.
You try to give best experience to your clients in terms of ambience and food. A small complaint by the customer is taken seriously and corrective measures are taken immediately.
You are passionate about your business and work extra hard to maintain high quality and match the standards in the industry.
Besides word of mouth you want to spread the word through advertising,through PR and through food bloggers.
If you do all of the above,why don’t you spend a little extra and hire a good photographer to take some nice photographs of food and interiors.
You want to project a certain image of your business and the photographs in the advertisements constitute the first step towards achieving this. These photographs create the first impression in the minds of potential customers. Visuals where interiors are inviting and food looks appetising add value to your endeavour to get more clients,more business.
Photography is not an expense,it is an investment,a long term investment. The returns of this investment will accrue for years to come.
Don’t be Penny wise and Pound foolish.
This advertisement in a leading national daily is placed by one of my favourite restaurant serving some excellent Japanese and Chinese food . I can vouch for the perfect ambience and excellent taste and quality of food . But the visuals here tell a totally different story. The food is not at all appearing appetising, rather looking repulsive. The interiors are not inviting,the place look dingy. This will surely not impress a potential new customer though the cost of placing this advertisement must be quite high.
This is one of the examples,the newspapers,magazines and social media is flooded with similar images of food and interiors.
Today everyone is a photographer, from a person having a camera in the phone to a person with a high end DSLR. Food and interiors photography is a specialised genre,a field of photography where besides equipment and technical expertise,aesthetics equally play an important role. It is better to hire a specialist for the job rather than depending on ‘in house’ or ‘wannabe ‘ photographers who might be willing to work for free or in exchange of food.
© All Rights Reserved Ravi Dhingra
