Supplier Spotlight: Brandon Wong from Photo Booth Supply Co

For some time now I have been interviewing operators of photo booth businesses and sharing their stories and insights on this truly great industry we are all a part of. Recently I had the opportunity to spend some time talking with Brandon Wong from Photo Booth Supply Co. Whilst no longer an operator his business PBSCO' has made a a huge impact on the world photo booth market and through his and his teams personal interactions with photo booth operators and their own educational event "Booth Summit" Brandon and his team have been able to positively affect the lives of hundreds of photo boothers. To that end I am very pleased to be able to share with the Australian photo booth industry a little about Brandon. 

An Interview with Brandon Wong PBSCO

When was the first time you can remember being in a photo booth?

I'm going to cheat and tell a story here about the first time I realised what a photobooth could do. We went to a wedding and I shot the pictures with my camera and a standard white backdrop. Everyone was a little stiff and uncomfortable. It was clear that I was intruding on something that was supposed to be personal. I couldn't build the bond I needed with the subjects to help them create great pictures, and there was a lot of friction. The next time that I saw an automated booth at a wedding, no one was acting stiff, the relationship was already there with the camera. A light went off. There is just something special about a photobooth.

Describe what you believe it is about photo booths which makes them so popular.

I think they're popular for a ton of reasons, but two really stand out. Photobooths allow people to let their guard down. When it's not a photographer standing there and taking a picture, or you're not holding your phone above you and trying to get the perfect angle for a selfie, you can show who you really are. People who never smile in photos light up. People who are scared of making a silly face in a selfie stick their tongue out immediately. The other thing that stands out to me is on the other side. If someone books a photobooth for their wedding, they are going to get pictures that no photographer would have ever taken. In American weddings, a photographer might cost $5,000 and give you 500 pictures. A photobooth is going to give you an additional 500 pictures for 20% of the price.

How long were you a "photo boother" and during that time what did you enjoy most about boothing?

We ran the business for a few years alongside our wedding photography. Once it became clear that Photobooth Supply Co. was a manufacturing company and not an events company, we stopped taking bookings and started passing them to our owners. I'd say that was probably the most enjoyable part.

What made you decide to become a manufacturer?

People kept trying to buy the photobooth we'd built. It's a really humbling experience to have famous photographers, people you look up to, try to buy something that you've made. Working weddings for so long allowed us to understand what the market was asking for, but once we'd built it, we realised that scaling our business at that level was an incredible option. My wife and I wanted to capture memories all over the world. We'd never be able to do that if we had to be at each event. Becoming a manufacturer allowed us to achieve that mission. Every single day, dozens of PBSCO booths are out there capturing memories. And on busy weekends? We might be in 500 cities at once. It's a dream come true.

Tell me about the ethos behind Photobooth Supply Co and how your booths and products are different from other photo booth manufacturers?

This is a great time to mention that we're always moving forward. For a long time, our booth was different than others because of the look, the support, the history, the brand, the training, and more. With Queso, our newest photobooth, we feel like the entire game has changed. It's the first time that software and hardware have been designed around one another. With no more DSLR, external flashes, or off the shelf computers, Queso is 100% custom made. This hardware isn't the whole story though--we also built software from scratch to take advantage of each of those features. Our ethos has always been to make our owners the most successful, and this is all about that. You can now offer dozens of new features to clients and shift from just taking beautiful photos.

You're based in OC, California. Has that had an influence on your styles of booths?

Our location in California has definitely had an impact. Californians could be considered as trendsetters for the entire world. We have always tried to honour that and stay ahead of the curve.

Naturally your main market is North America, where else do you sell your booths, have you got many in Australia?

We're in 28 countries around the world. There are definitely some of our booths out here in Australia already, but the industry is still a lot younger here than somewhere like Los Angeles. It's a place that we see tremendous growth potential for boothers, especially if they're smart enough to invest in themselves and attend a conference about improving their business. 

Over the last ten years we have seen the average booth go from being a heavy hard to transport enclosed box with simple software to a sleek and refined light weight and highly portable stand with amazing software allowing social sharing, GIFs and customisable templates. What do you see as the next big change in photo booths?

We think the future is bright! Queso is going to be a big part of it. And the biggest part of that future is likely the transition away from just taking pictures. While beautiful photos will never go away, photobooths in the next ten years are going to allow people to have new experiences. I don't think it's going to be 360s and trends like that--I think the next truly big trend hasn't even come to our attention yet. That's the soul of why we had to make our transition to being fully custom and integrated. We want to be able to start that trend, and now we can.

As you see Brandon lives and breathes photo booths and helping the industry. Thank you to Brandon for taking time out of his busy schedule to chat with me especially considering the impending release of Queso it is most appreciated and I am sure we are going to be seeing and hearing lots more about PBSCO in the Australian industry in the coming years. CLICK HERE to visit the Photo Booth Supply Co website

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Happy Boothin!

(Photo Booth Blogger: Justin Jowett)