We wanted to share with you our guide to choosing your Photo Booth vendor in GTA. As an original Mirror Booth company in Toronto with hundreds of events under our belt, we hope these tips will help you in selecting the best vendor for your celebration!
While this guide can help you search for any type of booth we will assume that you are most likely interested in the Mirror type which has quickly become one of the more popular options for many types of events due to its many interactive, customizable and fun capabilities.
And now let’s get to it! Below are some of the main things to consider when choosing your vendor:
1. Online Reviews
One of the easiest ways to check the company’s credibility is to check their online (google) reviews. This should be the first thing to look for in order to protect your investment and ensure your event runs smoothly. If you haven’t initially found the vendor in Google search we recommend searching for the name online to ensure it does not have any glaring negative reviews. And when checking their reviews one thing to keep in mind is to make sure to closely match the company’s name and address as we have seen some photo booth companies with very similar names!
2. Price
If you find a photo booth company that is considerably cheaper than its peers, there is likely a good reason. The old saying “you only get what you pay for” certainly applies to photo booths as well. There could be many reasons why a vendor might be offering a significantly lower price on their quote and unfortunately, some of them might only get revealed at the event itself (when it’s already too late to change anything). One of the more common reasons why we see a significantly lower rate offered is a brand new vendor trying to secure some initial bookings. While we don’t see anything wrong in this case (everyone gotta start somewhere) it’s important to take into account the trade-off between the price and experience. With a sophisticated piece of equipment like Mirror Photo Booths, there are
literally hundreds of things that can go wrong, and the more experience the vendor has the
faster they will be able to rectify or prevent the issue. Which brings us to the next point:
3. Back Up Equipment
With sophisticated photo booths like the Selfie Mirror, there are multiple pieces of equipment that need to work in sync. What happens when one of the pieces stops working? In most cases, you will end up with a simple giant mirror that you paid lots of money for 🙂 We recommend ensuring that your vendor has backup equipment that is readily available during the event so in case of any trouble you can be up and running again. (With My Selfie Mirror we carry lots of smaller spare parts in our setup and always have someone on call to bring any larger components like a printer)
4. Insurance
Commercial insurance is a must for most vendors that work in public event spaces and deal with various equipment. At the very minimum, we recommend the vendor to have minimum liability insurance of $2 million. Every year we encounter more and more venues that require vendor liability insurance and choosing someone who already has it will greatly speed up your booking process. Liability insurance will protect the vendor in case of any accidents with your guests or the banquet hall.
5. Space and other venue restrictions
My Selfie Mirror and most other mirror-type photo booths usually require about 10×10 feet of space and an electrical outlet within approachable distance. While most of the venues we work with in Toronto have an adequate amount of space it’s always a good idea to double-check that the photo booth can be accommodated.
6. Props
We finish off with our biggest personal pet peeve. Maintaining photo booth props is probably one of the most troublesome tasks and yet it must be done. This may sound silly but all too often sweaty guests put on hats, boast sunglasses, etc. when posing for photos. Does the vendor have a process to clean and disinfect the props after/before the event?
Don’t make the mistake of hiring the wrong vendor for your once-in-a-lifetime event or celebration. We recommend working with professionals to get the most out of your entertainment investment and to fully enjoy your celebration!
