Shutterfly, a Billion-Dollar Company, Just Refused to Pay for This Photographer's Photos

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#NoBudgetNoPhotos is going viral after a photographer, Nafa Ribeiro, revealed damning emails from a Shutterfly executive trying to use her photography for free.

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In the emails, you can see Ribeiro quoting Shutterfly $150 per photo, a seemingly low sum for a billion-dollar corporation.

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You can also see that employee responding that they had absolutely no budget for photos for the project, and so they said they would take Judah Avenue Photography off of the project.

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Ribeiro then replies that it is "highly unethical" to exploit photographers by trying to pay them in "exposure."

She suggested the employee take the issue to her board to convince them to stop the practice.

After these photos went viral, the photography community the world 'round could be heard voicing their disbelief and disdain for the practice.

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#NOBUDGETNOPHOTOS A few days ago a billion dollar company called Shutterfly reached out to me to request a photo for a project they are working on. After sending them my rate, they came back to tell me that there is no budget. Minted, another conglomerate, also reached out to me and did not want to pay. These rates are outside of what I would subsequently negotiate for my clients outside of licensing. And I am wondering why a billion dollar company should want use our images for free? My reply: Thank you! Photographers need to be compensated for the photographs being used for your marketing purposes and large companies like Shutterfly and Minted that depend on the images produced by photographers will have to start paying these artists for their work. Exposure and merely dropping links or giving credit does not pay our bills. Kindly reconsider this exploitation of photographers and artists for the selling and marketing of your product that generates you millions in revenue. It is highly unethical. Please encourage your board to allot a budget to cover these costs. I worked with a group of photographers to write a piece on the blog titled “The Corporate Welfare No One Is Talking About: Why Creatives Are Fighting Back Against ShutterFly, Minted and Their Ilk!” Our goal is to make sure that more creatives (photographers and artists from all walks of life) become aware they can demand a rate for their creative work from these large corporations and as more and more people start requesting compensation, they will understand #NOBUDGETNOPHOTOS

A post shared by Wedding & Newborn Photographer (@judahavenue) on Aug 29, 2019 at 8:19am PDT

It's hardly the first time a photographer was asked to work for free, but the fact that the company clearly has the $150 asked of them and just doesn't want to pay makes the unjustice feel worse.