I’m quite impressed by the story of 25-year-old Alexandra Hallman, a California woman who has turned her love of travel and photography into what sounds like a lucrative hustle. While her unique qualities may make it difficult to replicate such a business, I can attest that her business model is not just clickbait or a pretty face.
Alexandra Hallman Makes Thousands Per Month Taking Photos While Traveling.
Hallman travels the world, takes “stock photos” and sells them. Specifically, she takes pictures of branded items and then sells them to the companies for their marketing campaigns. For example, she made $12,000 selling photos of her sipping a Corona beer in Aruba…that certainly pays for the trip and then some.
She has now built up a reputation for herself, but it all began by cold-emailing. In Cabo, she emailed the Hilton with the photos she had taken of their property. Hilton liked the photos and bought them. Now she can often stay in hotels for free in exchange for photos (and still be paid for them).
It’s a very cool business and something I should consider, even though I’m not photogenic like Hallman. In fact, I do not even need to be in any pictures. I’ve sold my airplane cabin pictures before and made a lot of money doing so…finding the right buyers is key in a market saturated with stock photo companies.
While you can sell images to those sorts of companies, they often have exclusivity provisions and the pay is not all that great. Finding clients who will buy your photos directly is more work, but clearly lucrative for Hallman.
The Irony Of Social Media
The irony…perhaps the hypocrisy…of social media is that those relaxing, idyllic photos are anything but relaxing and idyllic. Finding that picture-perfect photo often takes hundreds of shots. It is indeed a lot of work to take pictures and the idea of an idyllic vacation is truly illusory for an influencer…or travel blogger.
It’s true when I review flights too. While I still find enjoyment when flying, it is a lot of work to photograph everything, edit the photos, and then write about it. Lining up like a fool before everyone else so I can be onboard first is not fun and frankly embarrassing when I am told to sit down or that boarding will not begin for 20 minutes…
But those unobstructed cabin photos are important to me…and I hope they separate my flight review photos from others. Photos are a vital tool of communication.
CONCLUSION
Kudos to Hallman for creating a business for herself that is both lucrative and fun. I so admire those who can corral their passions into money. I’ve snapped over 400,000 pictures in my travels over the years and have sold many pictures over that time, so I can attest to how much people are willing to pay for great pictures. While AI and photo editing tools can create photos out of nothing, there’s still great value in “real” photos taken by real people.
image: @runwithalexandra / Instagram
Boomers and curmudgeons in the comments section will find a way to get mad at this.
Props for her hustle!
Ok, umm, whatever you are. 🙂
Makes me feel old when I say this, but a lot of kids in gen-z these days are really working hard and are really thinking out of the box and I only have respect for them. There is a twenty-three year old I met who is actually a governance consultant to the board at my job and is doing a PhD at the same time!
Depends on if they look good … this one , not much .
Dearest Matthew, don’t sell yourself short. She’s hot, but I’d much rather see you (and do you) on camera.
Seems like there may be an OnlyFans cross-selling opportunity/demand out there in the travel blogosphere space.
No thanks!
Glad to hear that.
I was getting concerned that this would become a NSFW site.
SIR/MAM THIS IS A WENDY’S
Good for her finding a way to capitalize on her passion for travel.
Unfortunately the picture made Aaron throw up in his mouth.
I really do live rent free inside your head, don’t I lol Maybe you’re the one obsessed with me…
I don’t know Matthew, I for one am way more turned on by your shirtless pics than anything she’s put out.
You may be surprised to learn that other 25 year old females have made money by doing yoga in bikinis, or by playing music while dressed provocatively, and putting those videos on YouTube. I guess you could say they also found a way to capitalize on their passions for yoga, or, respectively, for music.
lol.
Matthew, we all know you’re straight, but honestly the high-end gay elite travel community loves you 🙂 I think the comments reflect this. Haha.
But in all serious … good for Alexandra! She’s clearly good at marketing herself and capitalizing on it, which is absolutely respectable.
I love you back! 😉
And I think Alexandra’s making an honest living…I think she’s doing a great thing.
It doesn’t hurt that she is easy on the eyes.
Very interesting about you selling pictures. I never knew that was a thing but in retrospect it makes sense. As far as the Corona example goes, hot girl in a bikini selling ready made photos is a whole lot cheaper than Corona organizing and sending out a team to do the work themselves.
You’re quite right – her good looks help, but she argues in her book that sometimes the product alone is enough. Like if I had brought a bunch of products to the Brando and shot them there on the property without me or Heidi in them…who knows, maybe I would have paid for my stay!
Work it Matthew! Work it!
If youre hot you can take pics for money.
Enjoy it while she can. There will come a day, soon enough, where she won’t be able to give it away for free.
So, she says she makes x amount of money. Why would we believe her or care ? Wonder if what she says she makes would match up with her tax return?
Sex sells? Next you’re gonna tell us that water is wet!
It sells, but it also requires building a workable position for the market circumstances .
The major American pornographic print publications of Playboy, Penthouse, Hustler and Screw struggled financially in the era of online pornography and more or less went bust when way more busts and more were viewable for free online.
The person featured in this blog article is the following person from a little while ago?
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-10972533/amp/Holidaymaker-23-says-allergic-reaction-henna-sleeves-left-feeling-burning-alive.html